An Investigation into the phonology of Tanka Cantonese
- Priscilla Lam, University of Edinburgh
- Geography Building Drapers Lecture Theatre, Queen Mary University of London
Tanka is a dialect of Yue Cantonese. It is spoken by the Tanka - a fishing community living on boats. Zhuang (2009) outlines a set of phonological features of Tanka; these include: (1) Replacement of bilabial consonants /m, p/ in coda position by their alveolar counterparts /n, t/
(2) Absence of the vowels /y, oe/
(3) Delabialization of the velar stop in onset: /kw/ However, Zhuang (2009) does not provide extensive evidence for these phenomena. Moreover, the demise of the fishing industry in Hong Kong since the 1970s has resulted in a decline in the population of Tanka speakers and an increase in average speaker age. The lack of evidence in relation to Tanka phonology in Zhuang (2009) is a matter of concern, because Tanka is likely to disappear; as argued in Himmelmann (1998) and Woodbury (2003), accountability is a key concern in the context of endangered languages.
In this study, I present new findings on Tanka phonology based on a corpus study. I collected this corpus from 9 Tanka speakers in Hong Kong. Preliminary analysis suggests that, in relation to (2), /oe/ is consistently absent from the vowel inventory, as postulated by Zhuang (2009). However, in contrast, /y/ is realised sporadically in my dataset. In my presentation, I will offer an extensive discussion of these and other phonological characteristics of Tanka Cantonese.
(3) Delabialization of the velar stop in onset: /kw/ However, Zhuang (2009) does not provide extensive evidence for these phenomena. Moreover, the demise of the fishing industry in Hong Kong since the 1970s has resulted in a decline in the population of Tanka speakers and an increase in average speaker age. The lack of evidence in relation to Tanka phonology in Zhuang (2009) is a matter of concern, because Tanka is likely to disappear; as argued in Himmelmann (1998) and Woodbury (2003), accountability is a key concern in the context of endangered languages.
In this study, I present new findings on Tanka phonology based on a corpus study. I collected this corpus from 9 Tanka speakers in Hong Kong. Preliminary analysis suggests that, in relation to (2), /oe/ is consistently absent from the vowel inventory, as postulated by Zhuang (2009). However, in contrast, /y/ is realised sporadically in my dataset. In my presentation, I will offer an extensive discussion of these and other phonological characteristics of Tanka Cantonese.
庄初升. (2009). 岭南地区水上居民 (疍家)的方 言 (The Dialects of Sea Dwellers (Tanka) in Lingnan Region). 文化遗产, 3,126-132.
Himmelmann, N. P. (1998). Documentary and descriptive linguistics. Linguistics, 36, 161-195. Woodbury, A. C. (2003). Defining documentary linguistics. Language Documentation and Description, 1, 35-51.