Swatow dialect

Swatow dialect
Swatow dialect
Shantou
汕頭話 Suan¹tao⁵ uê⁷
Native to	China
Region	Mainly in Shantou, southeastern Guangdong province.
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Sinitic Chinese Min Coastal Min Southern Min Chaoshan Min Swatow dialect; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Early forms	Proto-Sino-Tibetan Old Chinese Proto-Min ; ;
Writing system	Peng'im
Language codes
ISO 639-3	–
Glottolog	shan1244
Linguasphere	79-AAA-jif
	Shantou dialect

Last updated November 12, 2023

The Swatow dialect, or in Mandarin the Shantou dialect, is a Chinese dialect mostly spoken in Shantou in Guangdong, China. It is a dialect of Chaoshan Min language.^[4] It is similar to and largely mutually intelligible with the Teochew dialect.

Phonology

Shantou dialect has 18 initials, 61 rimes and 8 tones.

Initials

		Bilabial	Alveolar		Velar	Glottal
		Bilabial	plain	sibilant	Velar	Glottal
Nasal		/m/ 毛	/n/ 腦		/ŋ/ 俄
Plosive/ Affricate	tenuis	/p/ 波	/t/ 刀	/ts/ 之	/k/ 哥	/ʔ/ 烏
	aspirated	/pʰ/ 抱	/tʰ/ 天	/tsʰ/ 此	/kʰ/ 戈
	voiced	/b/ 無			/g/ 鵝
Continuant	voiceless			/s/ 思
Continuant	voiced		/l/ 羅	/z/ 入		/h/ 何

Rimes

	i 衣	u 污
a 亞	ia 呀	ua 娃
o 窩	io 腰
e 啞		ue 鍋
ɯ 余
ai 哀		uai 歪
oi 鞋		ui 威
au 歐	iau 夭
ou 烏	iu 憂
	ĩ 丸
ã 噯	ĩã 營	uã 鞍
	ĩõ 羊
ẽ 楹
ɯ̃ 秧
ãĩ 愛
õĩ 閑
	im 音
am 庵	iam 淹
	iŋ 因	uŋ 溫
aŋ 按	iaŋ 央	uaŋ 汪
oŋ 翁	ioŋ 雍
eŋ 英
ɤŋ 恩
	iʔ 裂
aʔ 鴨	iaʔ 益	uaʔ 呴
oʔ 學	ioʔ 約
eʔ 厄
oiʔ 狹	iuʔ
	ip̚ 邑
ap̚ 盒	iap̚ 壓	uap̚ 法
	ik̚ 乙	uk̚ 熨
ak̚ 惡	iak̚ 躍	uak̚ 獲
ok̚ 屋	iok̚ 育
ek̚ 液
m̩ 唔

Tones

No.	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
Tones	dark level 陰平	dark rising 陰上	dark departing 陰去	dark entering 陰入	light level 陽平	light rising 陽上	light departing 陽去	light entering 陽入
Tone contour	˧ (33)	˥˧ (53)	˨˩˧ (213)	˨ (2)	˥ (55)	˧˥ (35)	˩ (11)	˥ (5)
Example Hanzi	詩	死	四	薛	時	是	示	蝕

Tone sandhi

Shantou dialect has extremely extensive tone sandhi rules: in an utterance, only the last syllable pronounced is not affected by the rules. The two-syllable tonal sandhi rules are shown in the table below:

Tone sandhi of first syllable
Original citation tone	Tone sandhi
dark level 33	23
light level 55	21
dark rising 53	35
light rising 35	21
dark departing 213	55
light departing 11	12
dark entering 2	5
light entering 5	2

Notes

↑ Min is believed to have split from Old Chinese, rather than Middle Chinese like other varieties of Chinese.^[1]^[2]^[3]

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References

↑ Mei, Tsu-lin (1970), "Tones and prosody in Middle Chinese and the origin of the rising tone", Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 30: 86–110, doi:10.2307/2718766, JSTOR 2718766
↑ Pulleyblank, Edwin G. (1984), Middle Chinese: A study in Historical Phonology, Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, p. 3, ISBN 978-0-7748-0192-8
↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian (2023-07-10). "Glottolog 4.8 - Min". Glottolog . Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. doi: 10.5281/zenodo.7398962 . Archived from the original on 2023-10-13. Retrieved 2023-10-13.
↑ Shantou Dialect entry in Glossika

Office of Chorography of Shantou City 汕头市地方志办公室 (1999). Shan tou shi zhi 汕头市志 ["Chorography of Shantou City"]. Vol. 72. Beijing: Xinhua chubanshe 新华出版社 ["Xinhua Publishing House"]. ISBN 9787501143870.

External links

Media related to Shantou dialect at Wikimedia Commons

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[minClassification-4] Min is believed to have split from Old Chinese, rather than Middle Chinese like other varieties of Chinese.^[1]^[2]^[3]

[1] Mei, Tsu-lin (1970), "Tones and prosody in Middle Chinese and the origin of the rising tone", Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 30: 86–110, doi:10.2307/2718766, JSTOR 2718766

[2] Pulleyblank, Edwin G. (1984), Middle Chinese: A study in Historical Phonology, Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, p. 3, ISBN 978-0-7748-0192-8

[glottoMin-3] Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian (2023-07-10). "Glottolog 4.8 - Min". Glottolog . Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. doi: 10.5281/zenodo.7398962 . Archived from the original on 2023-10-13. Retrieved 2023-10-13.

[5] Shantou Dialect entry in Glossika

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