Hainanese (Hainan Romanised:Hái-nâm-oe,Hainanese Pinyin:Hhai3 nam2 ue1,simplified Chinese:海南话;traditional Chinese:海南話;pinyin:Hǎinánhuà), also known asQiongwen (simplified Chinese:琼文话;traditional Chinese:瓊文話),Qiongyu (琼语;瓊語) orHainan Min (海南闽语;海南閩語)^[5] is a group ofMin Chinesevarieties spoken in the farsouthern Chinese island province ofHainan and regionalOverseas Chinese communities such as inSingapore andThailand.

Hainanese
Qiongwen, Hainan Min
海南話,Hhai3 nam2 ue1,Hái-nâm-oe
Pronunciation	[hai˨˩˧nam˨˩ue˨˧] (Haikou dialect)
Native to	China,Singapore,Thailand
Region	Hainan
Ethnicity	Hainanese
Native speakers	Around 5 million in China (2002)[1]
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Sinitic Chinese Min Coastal Min Qiong–Lei Hainanese
Early forms	Proto-Sino-Tibetan Old Chinese[a] Proto-Min
Dialects	Haikou Wenchang
Writing system	Chinese characters[citation needed] Hainanese Pinyin Hainan Romanized
Language codes
ISO 639-3	hnm
Glottolog	hain1238
Linguasphere	79-AAA-k
Hainanese
Varieties of the Hainanese spoken in Hainan.
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In the classification ofYuan Jiahua, it was included in theSouthern Min group, beingmutually unintelligible with other Southern Min varieties such asHokkien–Taiwanese andTeochew.^[6] In the classification ofLi Rong, used by theLanguage Atlas of China, it was treated as a separate Min subgroup.^[7] Hou Jingyi combined it withLeizhou Min, spoken on the neighboring mainlandLeizhou Peninsula, in a Qiong–Lei group.^[8] "Hainanese" is also used for the language of theLi people living in Hainan, but generally refers to Min varieties spoken in Hainan.

The phonologies of the different varieties of Hainanese are highly divergent,^[9] with theWenchang dialect being theprestige dialect, and often used as a reference.^[10]

Below is a table for the consonants of Hainanese across the dialects ofWenchang,Haikou andBanqiao.^[9] For more information on a specific variety, please consult the relevant article.

Many of the most widely spoken varieties of Hainanese notably have a series ofimplosive consonants,/ɓ/ and/ɗ/, which were acquired through contact with surrounding languages, probablyHlai. However, more conservative varieties of Hainanese such as Banqiao remain closer toTeochew and other varieties ofSouthern Min, lack them.^[9]

The consonant system of Hainanese corresponds well with that ofHokkien, but it has had some restructuring. In particular:^[9]

• Etymologicalplain stops have undergone implosivization (*p >[ɓ], *t >[ɗ]) in the more innovative varieties such as Wenchang and Haikou.
• Etymologicalaspirated stops havespirantized (*pʰ >[ɸ], *tʰ >[h], *tsʰ >[ɕ], *kʰ >[h~x]) in more innovative varieties.
• Thelenition of an historic *b into[v] in Banqiao and Haikou, though not in Wenchang.
• Former *s has hardened into a stop (*s >[t]), although in the more conservative Banqiao dialect some instances have only undergone fortition to (*s >[θ]), and others have remained[s].
• Former *h has become[ɦ] in Wenchang.

Additionally,[ʑ] is an allophone of/j/.

These changes also make Hainanese fairly close toSino-Vietnamese vocabulary.

Hainanese has seven phonemic vowels.^{[citation needed]}

Hainanese Pinyin (海南话拼音方案) is a phonetic system announced by the Education Administration Department of Guangdong Province in September 1960. It marks tones with numbers.

• Hainanese culture
• Hainanese people

• Chang, Kuang-yu (1986).Comparative Min phonology (PhD thesis). University of California, Berkeley.
• Chen, Hongmai (1996).Hǎikǒu fāngyán cídiǎn海口方言詞典 [Haikou dialect dictionary].Great Dictionary of Modern Chinese Dialects. Vol. 16. Nanjing: Jiangsu Education Press.ISBN 978-7-5343-2886-2.
• Huang, Karen."Contact-induced changes in the languages of Hainan".Annual Student Conference of the College of Languages, Linguistics, and Literature. University of Hawaii.
• Kwok, Bit-chee (2006). "The role of language strata in language evolution: three Hainan Min dialects".Journal of Chinese Linguistics.34 (2):201–291.JSTOR 23754124.
• Miyake, Marc. 2008.Hainanese articles.
• Miyake, Marc. 2008.Hainanese -om and -op.
• Norman, Jerry Lee (1969).The Kienyang Dialect of Fukien (PhD thesis). University of California, Berkeley. includes a description of the phonology of theDing'an dialect.
• Solnit, David B. (1982)."Linguistic Contact in Ancient South China: The Case of Hainan Chinese, Be, and Vietnamese".Proceedings of the Eighth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society.8:219–230.doi:10.3765/bls.v8i0.2041.
• Woon, Wee-Lee (1979a). "A synchronic phonology of Hainan dialect: Part I".Journal of Chinese Linguistics.7 (1):65–100.JSTOR 23753034. describesWenchang dialect.
• Woon, Wee-Lee (1979b). "A synchronic phonology of Hainan dialect: Part II".Journal of Chinese Linguistics.7 (2):268–302.JSTOR 23752923.
• Yan, Margaret Mian (2006).Introduction to Chinese Dialectology. LINCOM Europa.ISBN 978-3-89586-629-6.

• Learn hainaneseArchived 2018-07-01 at theWayback Machine