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CentralAsian Dungan as aChinese Dialect

Olli Salmi

29.12.2007

This paperwas originallywritten for a publication in Australia in early 1990. The publicationdid not appear. The text was originally written on MacWrite and allthe character formatting had been lost. Now I have converted the textcharacter by character into Unicode and HTML. I have not changed thecontent in light of new information but I may do it later althoughthere is not much to change. Obviousmistakes have been corrected. The purpose of thepaper was to find where in China Central AsianDungan originated. However, this may be futile because both Dungan andthe SouthernXinjiang dialects were formed only after the Dungan uprising. 

1.1History

In 1861 anuprising of Moslems broke up in Northwest China. It was finally crushedby ZuǒZōngtáng 左宗棠 in 1878. The rebels fledahead of the Manchu troops all through northwestern China and some ofthem finally crossed over the border into Russian territory. The rebelsincluded many nationalities, among them Dungans, Chinese speakingMoslems.

The Dunganscrossed theborder at different times and places. The first groups crossed theborder in 1877–1878 and the last groups again in1882–1888 after the Ili area was given back to China.(Jusupov 1977, Rimsky-Korsakoff Dyer 1979:1). Altogether nearly 10,000moved over (Sushanlo 1979:66).

Janshansin(1938:83–84) mentions some places of origin for some of theDungan groups. All the places mentioned are in Xīnjiāng. For instancethe group settling down in Frunze came from Ili Valley.

The presentDungan settlements are mainly in the Chuy (Чуй,in DunganЧүй)River Valley on the border between Kirghizia and Kazakhstan. One, Irdyk(Ирдык,in Dungan  Эрдэх),is near Przewalsk (Пржевальск)south of Issyk Kul (ИссыкКуль).The settlements elsewhere have probably lost their language.

The Dunganshave their own literary language, which was first written in the Latinalphabet since 1932,then in Cyrillic after 1952 (Riedlinger 1989).

There wereabout 80,000 Dungans in 1989, of which nearly one half live inKirghizia. The annual population growth is 3.8 per cent. (ShyjüәdiChi, 7 November, 1989).

1.2 Writing and pronunciation

The mostaccurate description of Dungan phonetics is Zav'jalova 1979. It is theonly source that uses the IPA alphabet. Imazov 1975 describes thesounds in articulatory terms, but not in great detail.

Theorthography is phonemic as far as segmental features are concerned andthe following treatment uses the Dungan orthography as the basis of thedescription.

SinceZav'jalova 1979 does not list all the finals some of the followingtranscriptions are tentative.

1.2.1 Thefinals

Trubetzkoyhas discussed the vowel system of Soviet Dungan. He thinks it isdifferent in different contexts (Trubetzkoy 1939). Because the medialhas become a secondary articulation of the initial and the final nasalcan be realized as nasalization, syllables are of the CV type. This iscustomary in Soviet analyses (Imazov 1975).

Notes:
•ы [ɨ]is retroflex or alveolar depending on the previous consonant. It is thevowel in Chinesesiandshi.
• The final nasal[n] varies with the nasalisation of the preceding vowel (Zav'jalova1979: 57):
[æ̃] ~[æn]
[ɔ̃]~ [ɔn]
• и[i]palatalizes the initial, sometimes considerably
•ўlabializes,уdoes not, otherwise the difference is slight (Zav'jalova 1979: 56).уis written instead ofўafter labials.
•у[ʊ]is [ou]in Aleksandrovka (Александровка) in Chuy Valley.
• If theу[u] is medial, the initial consonant usually has no labialization.The labialization isoccasionally a bilabial trill (Zav'jalova 1979: 44–45).
кў [k^ɸu],kuэ[k^xuɛi]
тў [t^ɸu],чў[tʂ^ɸu]
бу [p^βu]
пу [p^ɸu]

Imazov(1975:26, 126) gives the following phonetic values:

•эрis [əɹ]in Irdyk, but [ɯ]in Aleksandrovka (Zav'jalova 1979: 42).
•ки[k^xɪi],бый[pɨi](Zav'jalova 1979: 56). The first part of this glide is regarded as atransition by Nurmekund (1979) and Trubetzkoy (1939).
The final -иis written instead of -ыйafter labiodentals and velars, which are never palatalized. The finalis pronounced [ɪi]in that context.
• Inхуэйthe final –уйis written withэin order to avoid resemblance with a Russian taboo word.
• Some of the vowelshave diphthongal realizations (Zav'jalova 1979: 55):
[ɛ]vs. [uɛi]
[o] vs. [iou]
[ɔ]and [ɛ]are diphthongs in Aleksandrovka.
• Withérhuà儿化, written –р,the opposition between nuclear vowels is obliterated. Only the medialis preserved. (Imazov 1975:30–31, 39–40)

1.2.2The initials

Notes:
•ң[ŋ]only occurs before [ɤ],where [n] does not occur and it is consequently an allophone of /n/. InIrdyk it is pronounced [ɣ] (Zav'jalova 1979: 41).
•Aspiration isvelar: [p^x][tʂ^x]etc. (Zav'jalova 1979:43).
•в[v],ж[ʐ]andй[ʝ]are strongly fricated. They are originally medials with a zero initial.In Dungan they are probably best regarded as initials.
•р[r] occurs in loan words, also syllable finally.

1.2.3 Thetones

It is usuallystated that Soviet Dungan has three tones with no difference betweenthe yīnpíng and yángpīng, i.e. between the firstand second Pekingese tones (Kalimov 1968, Rimsky-Korsakoff 1967). Inisolated syllables this is true, but in connected speech there are fourtones just as in Standard Chinese. (Zav'jalova 1973, 1979, Salmi 1980).

There aredifferences from Pekingese in the distribution of the tones caused bythe fact that the old entering tone becomes yīnpíng oryángpíng, depending on the nature of the initialconsonant. In table 3 the number 1 means low and 5 high pitch. 

There is onecase of tone sandhi. A first tone is changed into a second tone if itis followed by another first tone. In other words, sequences of lowtones are not allowed.

The neutraltone occurs after third and fourth tones. After a first tone it isreplaced by a second tone (rising) and after a second tone by a thirdtone (falling).

Zav'jalova(1979) describes two dialects. The above tones are those of Irdyk,which has a simpler system. In Aleksandrovka some of the tones areslightly different. The fourth tone is 35 and finally 342. In addition,the first tone has a level final variant 11, which mostly occurs afteran underlying first tone.

Structurally it is mostelegant to think that Soviet Dungan tones are low, rising, falling andhigh. Low changes into rising finally and before another low.

1.3 Dialects within SovietDungan

It istraditional to say that there are two main dialects of Soviet Dungan.The literary dialect is based on Gānsù dialect and the otherdialect is a Shǎnxīdialect.(Kalimov 1968, Rimsky-Korsakoff 1967, 1979).The best account of dialectdifferences between the two main dialects of Soviet Dungan areJanshansin 1968 and 1938. The descriptions are not very systematic.They are of little use in the placement of the Shǎnxīdialect in the context of Chinese dialects.

According toJanshansin 1938 the first primer was printed in 1929. The teachers inthe first Dungan school were from Frunze and spoke the Gānsùdialect and that is why it became the literary language.

Below aresome of the differences between the two dialects.

There is along thematic vocabulary list of the two dialects in Janshansin 1938.The differences in vocabulary are often cases like the following, whereboth variants are formed from Chinese roots.

гуйhuа瑰花~цымыйхуар刺玫花儿'rose'
лыйзы肋子~лыйба肋吧'rib'
эрхуанзы耳环子~эрҗуйзы耳坠子'earring'

The chiefdifference between the two dialects is the number of tones, the Shǎnxīdialect having preserved the difference of the twopíngshēngs. They share the other main characteristics ofSoviet Dungan. Both have lost the oppositions -en vs. -eng and shu vs.fu.

1.4 Differences fromPekingese

1.4.1Phonological features

When wecompare the sounds of Soviet Dungan with Standard Chinese, there areconsiderable differences, but the phonological differences aresurprisingly slight, especially if one compares with some dialectsfurther to the east like Zhèngzhōu郑州(Zhōu Qìngshēng 1987), where rhotacism is a [u] and wherethere are finals like iai, where jian-tuan尖团are distinguished, and where ten is used for tun.

Some of thedifferences are such that the Dungan form can be derived from thePekingese form. There are two main cases of this.

• First,the difference between dental and velar nasal final consonantshas been obliterated so that there is no opposition between thefollowing finals:

-in = -ing[ĩ] ~ [in]
-en = -eng [ə̃]~ [ən]
-un = -ong [ũ] ~ [un]

Thedifference between -anand-angis reflected in the quality of the vowel: –ан[æ̃], –он[ɔ̃].

• Anotherdifference that no longer exists in Dungan is betweenshu-vs.fu-andru-vs.wu-.Soфу熟'ripe' andфу浮'swim' are homophonous and so areван软'soft' andван晚'late'. Incidentally, theф–andв–are never followed by a labial medial. The same constraint holds inChinese. This means thatshui水'water' becomesфи(fei),notфуй.

• Zeroinitial occurs in Soviet Dungan only in the prefixа–.Otherwise it has coalesced withн–as inнанзы鞍子'saddle'. Before [ɤ]it is the velar [ң]as inңә鹅'goose', but Soviet Dungan has no [n] in this position, so there is noopposition, although the orthography marks the difference.

Otherdifferences have to be derived from forms of Chinese earlier thanpresent-day Pekingese. There are two main differences of this sort.

• Thefirst of these is the tonal system. There are differences in thedistribution of the tones caused by the fact that the old entering tone(i.e. stop final words) becomes yīnpíng oryángpīng, depending on the nature of the initial consonant.In Soviet Dungan the ancient stop final words belong to the presentfirst tone if the initial consonant was earlier a voiceless stop or asonorant. If it was a voiced stop the word is pronounced in the secondtone. So the tones ofҗў–竹'bamboo' with an earlier voiceless stop initial andва–袜'sock' with a sonorant initial have fallen together withyīnpíng, while the tone бый白'white' with an original voiced initial has coalesced withyángpíng.

• Insome words the distribution of retroflex and dental fricatives andaffricates,sh-ands-for instance, differs from Pekingese. Dentals likes-are more widespread in Soviet Dungan. The occurrence of dentals iseasily stated by traditional Chinese terminology: they occur in wordsthat belonged to either the second division or else to the zhǐ止rhyme class in Middle Chinese. In Dungan it is сан (san)山'mountain' and -сы(si)是'to be'.

• Athird difference occurs in some words originally with a final velarstop, so there are words likeки(kēi)客'guest',мый-(mēi)麦'wheat',мый(mēi)墨'ink',бый(bēi)百'hundred',бый(béi)白'white'. These are words in the zēng曾and gěng梗rhyme classes. There are also other cases that have developed in a waythat differs from Pekingese such asфә-(фә<shuó)勺'spoon' andщүә(xuē)削'whittle'.

1.4.2Differences in grammar

There are alot of differences in vocabulary, syntax and idiom, but because we haveno information on these features on the Chinese side, they are notdiscussed in detail in this paper. However, some of the more importantones are mentioned.

In morphologythe differences are of minor importance. In Soviet Dungan it is commonto reduplicate nouns. In Pekingese this only occurs in children'slanguage (Chao 1968:202).

Dungan doesnot form compound words as freely as Chinese. It commonly uses phraseswhere Chinese uses words.

Chineseoften usesabbreviations that Thompson calls alluding forms (Thompson 1965:137).They are actually abbreviations like Zhōnggòng 'Middlecommon' for Zhōngguó gòngchǎndǎng'The Chinese Communist Party'. There are none of these in Dungan andthe reason is probably that they are of predominantly literary originin Chinese.

1.4.3Differences invocabulary

Soviet Dunganhas almost no words from literary Chinese. The ones it has are fromfolk poetry. There are a few Chinese loans likeдянйинзы'cinema' andгәмин'revolution'. There are differences in the frequency of many words andsomefaux amis.A lot of Chinese morphemes do not occur in Dungan and there are also aconsiderable number of Dungan morphemes that do not occur in Chineseand consequently have no corresponding character.

There are alot of unassimilated Russian words that occur in economic and politicaltexts, but are not so common in other kinds of texts. Other loan wordsare religious terms from Arabic or Persian. They are mainlyphonologically assimilated, and some of them seem to occur in everydaylanguage.

1.4.4Differences in syntax

The mostobvious syntactical characteristic of Soviet Dungan is the system ofmarked aspects. Nearly every sentence has an aspect particle and theabsence of one is grammatically determined. (Salmi 1984).

A lessobvious feature is that Soviet Dungan is far less topic oriented thanChinese. Most topics are marked by a preposition, including objects andpatients of passive sentences. In general, the order of constituents isfreer. Prepositional phrases can rather freely occur before the subject.

In general,there is more morphological marking of syntactical relations in SovietDungan. For instance, sentences as subject are usually marked, andclauses as object can be preposed with a preceding ба把and a following–ди的.

There arealso differences inthe use of complements. They rarely occur before the object anddiscontinuous directional complements only occur with –до到,while simple directional complements are rare.

There are afair number of other differences.

2 Dialects inChina

2.1 Mandarin

There areseveral mutually incomprehensible dialects in China, but some 70percent of the population speaks the Northern or Mandarin dialects. Inthis paper, only the northern dialects are dealt with, because SovietDungan clearly belongs to this group.

The NorthernChinese dialects are usually called Mandarin dialects. It has beentraditional to separate Mandarin from the rest of the Chinese dialects.However, Forrest says there are no real criteria for lumping them alltogether in one group. The grouping is unfortunate, because it does notexpress that Cantonese is nearer to Northern Chinese than to the othermajor dialects. (Forrest 1948:198–199).

YuánJiāhuá et al. (1960:23) stress mutual comprehensibility as acriterion for separating the Mandarin group from the rest of theChinese dialects, but there are also phonological features which can beused to set up the major dialect areas. These are the development ofvoiced initial consonants into voiceless stops, tonal development, andthe development of final consonants (Yuán Jiāhuáet al. 1960:23, Zhān Bóhuì 1981:93). It isespecially the present reflexes of earlier voiced initial stops thatset Mandarin dialects apart from their southern neighbours. In thesouthwest final stops and tones are important in this respect.

There havebeen objections to the use of the name Mandarin. Forrest calls theMandarin dialects Northern Chinese and so does ZhānBóhuì. The present classification of dialects isbased on work by LǐRóng (1985a), who again calls them Mandarin, because hemakes a distinction between Mandarin and the Jìn dialects,mainly spoken in Shānxī. He regards them as entirely outside Mandarin,although they are in the North.

No realreason for the separation of Jìn dialects is given in LǐRóng (1985a). It is simply stated that the area of Mandarinhas diminished in successive descriptions of Chinese dialects and nowthe Jìn dialects will be separated from them. Thedistinguishing feature is that they have preserved a final stopconsonant ([ʔ]). If this were the only reason for keeping thesedialects apart, the same thing should apply for theJiāng-Huái dialects in the southeast as well, because theytoo have preserved the old final stop.

Theremight be some realgrounds for the separation of the Jìn dialects, because inthe colloquial pronunciation of some Shānxī dialects the initials havedeveloped differently from the Mandarin dialects (Hóu Jīngyī1986). Moreover, they have often quite aberrant developments of finals.

The nameJìn is the old name for the province of Shānxī and it isused instead of the present name of the province, because the areawhere they are spoken is not coextensive with Shānxī province. Theysame principle is followed in Chinese in the names of many otherdialects, but it is not possible to follow it systematically in English.

2.2 The basiccriterion

There aredifferent ways of classifying Mandarin dialects. The classification ofMandarin dialects in Yuán Jiāhuá et al. (1960)can be regarded as traditional. The book divides them into four groups,Northern, Northwestern, Southwestern, and Jiāng-Huái betweenthe YángzǐjiāngRiver and the Huái淮River. The same classification is used by ZhānBóhuì (1981:94–98). This classificationis mainly geographic, there are no simple linguistic criteria for it.

LǐRóng 1985a is the first who uses a single isogloss toseparate the major dialects within the Northern Mandarin area. Thefeature used for the classification is the development of ancient stopfinal words. The stop has disappeared in most Northern Chinese dialectsand the earlier stop final words were apportioned between the otherfour tones. Table 5 describes the developments in the dialect areasproposed by LǐRóng. The numbers are the traditional numbers for the fourtones.