Huizhou Chinese

The Huī (徽) dialects are unrelated to the Huí (回) ethnic group of China.

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Hui
徽語/徽语 徽州話/徽州话
Spoken in	China
Region	southern Anhui, neighbouring portions of Zhejiang and Jiangxi, about 12 counties in total
Total speakers	3.2 million
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Sinitic Chinese Wu? Hui
Language codes
ISO 639-1	zh
ISO 639-2	chi (B)	zho (T)
ISO 639-3	czh
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Huizhou (simplified Chinese: 徽州话; traditional Chinese: 徽州話; pinyin: Huīzhōu-huà) or Hui (simplified Chinese: 徽语; traditional Chinese: 徽語; pinyin: Huī-yǔ), is a division of Chinese. Its status is disputed among linguists, with some classifying it as Wu, others as Gan, and still others setting it apart as a primary branch of Chinese.

Hui is spoken over a small area compared to other Chinese varieties: in and around the historical region of Huizhou (for which it is named), in about ten or so mountainous counties in southern Anhui, plus a few more in neighbouring Zhejiang and Jiangxi. Despite its small size, Hui displays a very high degree of internal variation. Nearly every county has its own distinct dialect unintelligible to a speaker a few counties away. It is for this reason that bilingualism and multilingualism are common among speakers of Hui.

Like all other varieties of Chinese, there is plenty of dispute as to whether Hui is a language or a dialect. See Identification of the varieties of Chinese for the issues surrounding this dispute.

Dialects

Hui can be divided into five dialects:

• Jixi-Shexian, spoken in Jixi, She County, Huizhou, Jingde, and Ningguo, Anhui province, as well as Chun'an, Zhejiang province
• Xiuning-Yixian, spoken in Tunxi, Taiping, Xiuning, Yi County, and Qimen, as well as Wuyuan, Jiangxi province
• Qimen-Dexing, spoken in Qimen and Dongzhi, Anhui province, as well as Fuliang, Dexing, and Wuyuan, Jiangxi province
• Yanzhou, spoken in Chun'an and Jiande, Zhejiang province
• Jingde-Zhanda, spoken in Jingde, Qimen, Shitai, Yi County, and Ningguo, Anhui province

Dialects of Huizhou Chinese differ from village to village.^[1] People in different villages (even in one county and township) often cannot speak with one other.

Features

Phonologically speaking, Hui is noted for its massive loss of codas, including -i, -u, and nasals:

Many dialects of Hui have diphthongs with a higher, lengthened first part. For example, 話 ("speech") is /uːɜ/ in Xiuning County (Putonghua /xuɑ/), 園 ("yard") is /yːɛ/ in Xiuning County (Putonghua /yɛn/); 結 ("knot") is /tɕiːaʔ/ in Yi County (Putonghua /tɕiɛ/), 約 ("agreement") is /iːuʔ/ in Yi County (Putonghua /yɛ/). A few areas take this to extremes. For example, Likou in Qimen County has /fũːmɛ̃/ for 飯 ("rice") (Putonghua /fan/), with the /m/ appearing directly as a result of the lengthened, nasalized /ũː/.

Because nasal codas have mostly dropped off, Hui reuses the /-n/ ending as a diminutive. For example, in the Tunxi dialect, there is 索 ("rope") /soːn/ < /soʔ/ + /-n/.

References

External links

• Classification of Hui Dialects