Shanghainese

Spoken in

• Sino-Tibetan Chinese Wu Shanghai dialect

The Shanghai dialect, also called Shanghaiisch or Shanghainese, belongs to the Wu dialect group of Chinese.

Status

The Shanghai dialect has no official status. Administrative and educational language in Shanghai is Mandarin Chinese. Despite its relatively high prestige original site of the Shanghai dialect seems to be losing ground. Although there is a traditional form of opera in Shanghai dialect ( Huju沪剧), but for example, no modern pop music. Since the 90s, the Shanghai dialect is used sporadically in broadcasting. In 1995 there was a TV movie about the Cultural Revolution in Shanghai dialect, which was broadcast nationwide. Due to the influx of people from other parts of China and by the influence of the high Chinese to vocabulary and syntax of the Shanghai dialect change rapidly. Many linguists regard it as difficult to analyze mishmash and usually consider the dialects of Suzhou and Wenzhou as representative examples of the Wu dialects, although these dialects have much less speaker. For many younger people in Shanghai late 20th century has become the standard Chinese first language.

Typical errors in standard Chinese, as they are made by Shanghai dialect speakers, the lack of distinction between [n ] and [ ŋ ] at the end of a syllable and between [ ʦ ʦ ʰ s] and [ tʂ tʂ ʰ ʂ ] at the beginning of a syllable and the substitution of diphthongs by monophthongs ( [ ɛ ] and [ ɔ ] instead of [ ai ] and [ au] ).

Phonetics and phonology

In the Shanghai dialect of the historical three plosives and affricates division of the (single - voiced aspirated ) and the historical division of the fricatives ( voiceless - voiced) is obtained as Silbenanlautkonsonanten.

The voicing is in word-initial as breathy phonation ( breathy voice ) of the following vowel, realized in the word inside the voicing of the consonant itself.

Consonants

The Shanghai dialect has twelve plosives p p ʰ bt t ʰ dk k ʰ ɡ k ʷ k ʷ ʰ ɡ ʷ, the glottic closure ʔ, the four nasals mn ɲ ŋ, the nine fricatives fvsz ɕ ʑ h ɦ h ʷ, the five affricates ʦ ʦ ʰ ʨ ʨ ʰ ʥ, the two approximants wj and the liquid l

Vowels

The Shanghai dialect, the vowel i ɪ y ʏ ɛ ə ø a ɔ ɤ ou ʊ, where [ ɪ ʏ ə ʊ ] respectively allophones of / iy u ɛ / are ( / iy ɛ / → [ ɪ ʏ ə ] / _ [ ŋ ʔ ], / u / → [ ʊ ] / _ [ ŋ ] ). In Problems in the mid-forties Silbenauslaute [ ON ] and [- ɔŋ ] to [ ON ] coincide.

Syllable -forming consonants

In Shanghai dialect, the three syllabic consonants m ŋ ɹ occur, where [ ɹ ] an allophone of / i / is and occurs only after the apico - alveolar initial vowel ʦ ʦ ʰ sz.

Diphthongs

There are in the Shanghai dialect following " actual" diphthongs: / yes jɔ jɤ ej /, next enter the combinations [ jɛ jʊ ], since according to the palatal initial vowel ɕ ʑ ʨ ʨ ʰ ʥ a j is inserted (→ j / [ coronal - front ] _v if v ≠ [ ɪ iy ʏ ]); the "actual" diphthongs occur both after palatal and non- palatal after initial vowel.

Syllable structure

The Shanghai dialect has three different syllable structures: (K ) V (K ) VS and (K ) VN, where K stands for a consonant, V a vowel, syllabic consonant or diphthong, S for the glottic closure ʔ and N for the velar nasal ŋ.

Sound system

The Shanghai dialect is like all Chinese dialects a tonal language. In popular accounts, it is sometimes said that the Shanghai dialect have only two tones, and in fact the difference between a high and a low register is particularly pronounced. Scientific representations for monosyllabic words describe but usually five to seven phonologically distinctive tones. Some of the historical sound categories are collapsed; the Tonverläufe of the Shanghai dialect are shown here with numbers (1- low, 5 - high): Yinping阴平51; yīnshǎng阴 上34; yīnqù阴 去, Yangping阳平, yángshǎng阳 上and阳 去Qu 13; Yinru阴 入阳 入yángrù 5 and 12, with syllables that carry one of the two Ru tones end, a glottic closure.

Syllables with voiced obstruents in initial wear tones that begin deep ( Tonverlauf 12 with glottic closure at the end of a syllable and Tonverlauf 13); Syllables with voiceless obstruents in initial position, however, take notes that are not deep to begin ( Tonverlauf 5 with glottic closure, as well as Tonverläufe 51 and 34) This distinction between voiced and voiceless initial vowel does not apply to sonorants (mn ɲ ŋ WJL ), which combined with any Tonverlauf. occur

In the successions of syllables occur complicated tone changes ( Sandhi ) on; in polysyllabic words, one can observe four different sound patterns or progressions:

In this description the Toneme H stands for high, M for medium, and T is low register. The arrows indicate an increase or decrease in pitch. Following this analysis, only the lexical tone of the first syllable is instrumental in polysyllabic words; it determines the Tonverlauf for the word or even a whole phrase.

Grammar

The grammar of the Shanghai dialect is similar to the grammar of other Chinese dialects. The word order is generally subject-verb - object with two objects, however, is the direct object - in contrast to the standard Chinese - usually before the indirect object.

Clips

The project for the collection of audio samples Tatoeba includes on its website a selection of records in the Shanghai dialect to listen to.