How many dialects are there in Chinese?
China is a multi-ethnic, multi-lingual and multi-dialect country with a large population. According to the famous linguist Mr. Zhou Youguang, my country's 56 ethnic groups have more than 80 languages ??and regional dialects that cannot speak to each other. They belong to the Sino-Tibetan language family (such as Chinese, Tibetan, Jingpo, Yi, Miao). languages, Zhuang, etc.), Altaic languages ??(such as Mongolian, Uyghur, Kazakh, etc.), Austronesian languages ??(such as Alpine languages), South Asian languages ??(such as Wa, etc.), Indo-European languages ??(such as Russian, Tajik) wait). Among them, the largest number of people speak Chinese. In addition to the Han people, there are also the Manchu and Hui people. Most of the She people, Tujia people and other ethnic minorities also use Chinese. Chinese is the most spoken language in the world.
Although different national languages ??cannot understand each other, people who speak the same language may not be able to talk freely, because most languages ??have dialect differences, and the dialect differences in Chinese are Very serious. There are so many types of Chinese dialects, and the differences between local dialects are so great.
What is a dialect?
Dialect is what people often say as "local dialect" and is a communication tool popular in a certain large or small area. Dialects are regional variants of a national language that have differentiated over a long period of historical development. The so-called regional variation is naturally relative to the national homonym. Chinese dialects are naturally relative to Mandarin. Mandarin is spoken throughout the country and is the common language of the country; dialects are spoken in a few provinces, a certain province, or a smaller region, and is the common language in some places. Mandarin serves the entire Han people and even the entire Chinese nation, while dialects can only serve the people in certain places. From the perspective of the elements that make up a language (phonetics, vocabulary, grammar), dialects, dialects and Mandarin have "similarities in differences, differences in similarities" between dialects, and between dialects and Mandarin. The kinship relationship between them is that of brothers and sisters. The result of the historical development and divergence of the same ancient language.
So, how many dialects are there in Chinese?
From a broad perspective, modern Chinese can be divided into seven major dialects:
The first is the northern dialect (mandarin in a broad sense), which is circulated in the vast areas of the Central Plains, Northeast, Northwest and Southwest of my country. area.
Northern dialects can be further divided into four major sub-dialects:
1. North China Northeast sub-dialect (Northern dialect in a narrow sense): covering Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, eastern Inner Mongolia, Liaoning, Jilin, Heilongjiang, Shandong, Henan and other provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities;
2. Northwest sub-dialect (Northwestern Mandarin): covering Shanxi, western Inner Mongolia, Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai, Ningxia, Xinjiang and other provinces and autonomous regions;
3. Southwest sub-dialect (Southwestern Mandarin): covering Chongqing, Sichuan, Guizhou, Yunnan, most of Hubei, northwest Hunan, northwest Guangxi and other provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities;
4. Jianghuai sub-dialect (Xiajiang Mandarin): covers both sides of the Yangtze River in Anhui Province, most of Jiangbei in Jiangsu Province, and the areas along the river from Jiujiang, Nanjing to Zhenjiang.
The second is Wu dialect, that is, Jiangsu and Zhejiang dialects, which are distributed in the Jiangnan area of ??Jiangsu Province and most of Zhejiang Province. Jiangsu and Zhejiang dialects are mainly represented by Shanghainese.
The third is Gan dialect, that is, Jiangxi dialect, which is distributed in the northwest of Jiangxi Province and Fujian Province, the east of Hunan Province, and the southeast of Hubei Province. Jiangxi dialect is mainly represented by Nanchang dialect.
The fourth is the Xiang dialect, that is, Hunan dialect, which is distributed in most of Hunan Province. Hunan dialect is mainly represented by Changsha dialect (in the old days, Shuangfeng dialect was the representative).
The fifth is Hakka dialect, also called Hakka dialect and Hakka dialect. Hakka is relatively scattered and concentrated in the northeastern part of Guangdong Province, the northwest part of Fujian Province, the areas bordering Jiangxi Province and Hubei, Guangdong, and Fujian, as well as Sichuan, Guangxi, and Taiwan. Many Chinese in Southeast Asian countries speak Hakka. Hakka dialect is mainly represented by Meizhou dialect.
The sixth is the Cantonese dialect, also known as Cantonese, Cantonese, Cantonese, and vernacular, which is distributed in most of Guangdong Province, the southeastern part of the Guangxi Autonomous Region, as well as Hong Kong and Macao and Chinese communities in North America. Cantonese dialect is mainly represented by Cantonese.
The seventh is the Min dialect, which is the Min language, which is widely distributed, including most of Fujian Province, the Chaoshan area in the east of Guangdong Province, and the Leizhou Peninsula, Hainan Province, most of Taiwan Province, and southern Zhejiang Province in the west. , the Min dialect is very popular in the Chinese community in Southeast Asia. There are great differences within the Fujian dialects. Generally speaking, the southern Fujian films are represented by Xiamen dialect, the eastern Fujian films are represented by Fuzhou dialect, the northern Fujian films are represented by Jianou dialect, the central Fujian films are represented by Yong'an dialect, and the Putian Xianyou dialect The film is represented by Putian dialect.
Among the seven major dialects, Northern dialect is the most widely distributed, accounting for about 70% of the country's area; it is also spoken by the largest population, accounting for about 70% of the Chinese population. The other six major dialects The total speaking population only accounts for about 30% of the Chinese-speaking population.
Except for the northern dialects, the six major dialects are all southern dialects. The internal differences among northern dialects are small. The main difference is in pronunciation. The main difference in pronunciation is the different tone value of each tone. Tonality is one of the decisive factors in the appearance of dialects in various places, and therefore it is also one of the main indicators to distinguish the differences between northern dialects. I have listed the tones of nine urban dialects in the northern dialect area in the table below. They all have four tones of "yin and yang going up" and none of them have "entering". You can compare their differences.
If you say words such as "beautiful mountains and clear waters, full of strange things, very beautiful, observe carefully" in different tones from different places, you can feel the special flavor of the local dialects.
Compared with southern dialects, northern dialects have a strong internal consistency, so when people from Heilongjiang in the north talk to people from Yunnan and Guizhou in the southwest, they can understand each other's general meaning and ensure the most basic communication needs. . There has been a popular proverb in northern rural areas since ancient times: "From Nanjing to Beijing, one can live without talking." That is to say, Beijing dialect is a sub-dialect of Northeast China in North China, and Nanjing dialect is a sub-dialect of Jianghuai. They both belong to a large dialect area and can understand each other.
These seven major dialects are a rough division of modern Chinese dialects, and the actual dialect situation is much more complicated. Not only can northerners not understand Cantonese and Fujianese, but also people from Guangzhou, Meizhou, and Shantou within Guangdong Province, and people from Fuzhou, Putian, and Xiamen within Fujian Province cannot understand each other. Datian County in Fujian Province, which has the most complex dialects, has five small dialects that are difficult to communicate with each other. Similar situations are common in various provinces in the southern dialect area. A few years ago, I heard a short story in a university in Changsha. A freshman from Loudi recited his own poems at the party: mǎguà, mǎguà, fóng mǎguà. Everyone who heard it was confused. Could it be "mandarin jacket, mandarin jacket, red mandarin jacket"? The sound magua means "frog" in some places in Hunan, but "frog, frog, red frog" is also confusing. Later, when I saw that classmate’s poem manuscript, I realized that what he wrote was “roses, roses, red roses”! One year I went to Meizhou, and a court president said to me: "We must speak Mandarin well. Only by speaking Mandarin well can we deceive the people." I was really surprised when I heard that, the president of the court, are you using Mandarin to deceive the people? After further questioning, I found out it was "convenience"! In Hakka dialect, the word "ben" which does not convey air is called "lie" which conveys air.
"Dialect Island" is also a surprising language phenomenon. The so-called dialect island is a smaller area that speaks a completely different dialect within a larger dialect area. This area can be a county, town, township, or village. For example, Zhongshan City in Guangdong Province is a Cantonese dialect area, but there is a small town near Zhongshan City. People in the town speak Hakka that is completely different from the surrounding Cantonese dialect. Dialect Island is caused by the phenomenon of military garrison and immigration in ancient or modern times. The phenomenon of dialect islands is also common in Guangdong, Fujian, Hainan and even many places in the north. Tianjin dialect is significantly different from the surrounding Hebei dialect. It is said that in the early Ming Dynasty, a large number of imperial troops, mainly Anhui people, were stationed in Tianjin and thrived here. Therefore, it can also be said that Tianjin is a relatively large dialect in the Hebei dialect area. As the largest dialect island in Anhui, it can also be said that Tianjin dialect is a synthesis of Anhui dialect (the dialect spoken in Suzhou) and Hebei dialect. There is a Manchu village in Qingzhou City, Shandong Province. The Manchu residents there are descendants of the Manchu flag soldiers who were stationed in Qingzhou under imperial orders starting from the eighth year of Emperor Yongzheng of the Qing Dynasty. To this day, the young people there, like the elderly, still retain the cultural heritage brought from the north. His accent is completely different from those of the people in Qingzhou around him. In the early 20th century, the Tianjin-Pukou Railway was built, and many railway workers moved from Tianjin to Pukou. As a result, until the 1960s and 1970s, there was still a settlement of railway workers in Pukou who spoke Tianjin dialect. In the 1950s and 1960s, New China engaged in large-scale industrial construction in the western region of the motherland, and many workers and technicians migrated from the eastern coastal areas. Therefore, in today's emerging industrial cities in the west such as Xi'an, Luoyang, Baotou, Yinchuan, and Shihezi It is easy to find small dialect islands that speak Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Northeastern dialects in other cities. In the past 20 years, due to the development of the market economy, many farmers have moved to cities in an orderly or disorderly manner, and their hometowns have gathered together, forming newer dialect islands, such as the "Zhejiang Village" in the southern suburbs of Beijing and the "Xinjiang Village" in Haidian.
The differences between dialects are mainly reflected in pronunciation differences, but the differences in vocabulary are also considerable. Beijing, Tianjin and Tangshan are neighbors to each other, but what people in Beijing call "white potato" is called "white potato" in Tangshan. "sweet potato". I asked a little girl from Tianjin: "Do you like to eat white potatoes?" She asked me strangely: "How can white mice be eaten?" I said: "Eat it steamed, boiled, or porridge, it's all fine." She said : "Huh? How disgusting!" It turns out that she mistook "white potato" for "white rat" because Tianjin people call "white potato" "sweet potato". Another example is in Guangzhou Baiyun Mountain Park. I asked an old man, "Where is the cable car?" The old man said, "It's very convenient. Just walk forward and turn a corner." I walked forward, turned a corner, and came face to face. This is the "men's room"! It turns out that Cantonese people call "cable car" "cableway", and when they say "cable car", they call it "men's toilet".
You see, how different Chinese dialects are!