A Study On Phonology Of Weiping Dialect

There are massive differences inside the Hui dialect which could be regarded comprising a precious mine from the perspective of dialectological research. In view of existing research findings, the academic circle’s focus and research on the Hui dialect are at a lesser extent compared to other dialects such as the Wu dialect, the Canton dialect, etc. Scholars have controversy over the internal segments of the Hui dialect resulting from insufficient research efforts. And the views on the watershed between the Jixi segment and the Yanzhou segment are pretty ambiguous. Regarding this point, different ways of division are found in Chinese Language Atlas and Zhao Rixin’s research outcomes. The town of Weiping is located in the transition belt between these two dialect segments, and the origin of Weiping dialect has become an issue of argument as a result.Mr. Li Rong suggested we should start research on dialects by probing our mother tongues, from the easy to the hard, and this will save us extra efforts and time. The author’s mother tongue is the Weiping dialect in Chun’an County. Weiping is an ancient town which has a history of a thousand years. Indigenous residents either have migrated to other counties or relocated to higher lands because of the construction of the Xin’an River reservoir. Xu Xiaoyan has made research on the Weiping dialect based on Wangchuan Village, Weiping Town.The author has detected many variances in her research findings, for instance, different classifications and combinations of tones. In order to describe the phonetic system of the Weiping dialect more comprehensively, the author conducted research in Ping Village, Weiping Town, and selected old immigrants as pronouncers. This study is both in-depth and full-fledged and provides abundant linguistic raw materials for research purpose.In this article, the description target is the spoken Weiping dialect, and the benchmark is the linguistic facts. The aim is trying to record the Weiping dialect reliably and comprehensively. Depended on the description of the Weiping dialect, the historical comparison and synchronic comparison will be carried out. On the vertical dimension, the Weiping dialect is compared to Guangyun-Chinese mid-ancient pronunciations to obtain its phonological features; on the transverse dimension, the Weiping dialect is compared to the phonetic systems of five regions, namely, Jixi, Xi County, Chun’an, Sui’an and Jiande, to obtain common features and discover the correlations between the Weiping dialect and nearby dialects in phonetics, and ultimately confirm the origin of the Weiping dialect.The major innovativeness of this article not only lies in the demonstration and analysis of special phonetic phenomena of the Weiping dialect, but also lies in the use of plenty vivid example.e.g. the initials of some ancient Fei initial words are pronounced as f, velar are pronounced as apical in some on occasion,diminutive retroflexation such as "min,min,j(?)",syllabic consonant m & n, etc. Based on historical comparison and dialects datum of Weiping’s surrounding areas, this article puts forward some relevant hypothesis of phonology evolution to expound those particular phenomena.In the end, this article explores and verifies a number·of etymological notes. Although this article does not include all features of the Weiping dialect, or probe its grammar, it nevertheless sketches the phonetic profile of the Weiping dialect and confirms its classification.In this sense, it has some reference value for the research on the Hui dialect.