Lili Wu Chinese

Theoretical and Experimental Linguistic

Ditongos orais no português europeu

Mestrado em Estudos PortuguesesNesta dissertação aborda-se o tema da ditongação do Português, no que respeita aos seus ditongos orais decrescentes e crescentes. A motivação para este trabalho tem na base um interesse em exercer algo prático no âmbito da fonética experimental; a constatação de lacunas nesta área de estudo e o confronto no que respeita a teorias relativas aos ditongos decrescentes, sendo estes, normalmente, como os verdadeiros ditongos do Português a ser considerados. Este estudo tem como objectivo a verificação deste tipo de sequências vocálicas enquanto ditongos dignos desta designação. Para tal, procedemos à gravação de um corpus construído especificamente para esse fim e à análise dos seus dados relativamente à sua duração e valores formânticos, nomeadamente de F1 e F2. Podemos concluir, pela análise efectuada, que os ditongos crescentes podem também ser considerados ditongos do Português, embora possuidores de uma natureza diferente dos seus pares decrescentes. ABSTRACT: In this dissertation we approach the subject of diphthongs in Portuguese in what concerns its oral falling and rising diphthongs. The basis motivation to this work is related to a strong interest on the experimental phonetics, to verifiable lacks in this area and also to several theories that should be challenged about the unique assumption on the falling diphthongs. This study has its aim on the verification of these vocalic sequences as diphthongs worthy of that name. For that, we proceed to the recording of a corpus so built, and to the analyses of its data in what concerns its duration and formant values, say F1 and F2. We can conclude, by the made analyses, that the falling diphthongs can also be considered Portuguese diphthongs, although they have a different nature from its raising pairs

On the cognitive basis of contact-induced sound change: Vowel merger reversal in Shanghainese

This study investigated the source and status of a recent sound change in Shanghainese (Wu, Sinitic) that has been attributed to language contact with Mandarin. The change involves two vowels, /e/ and /ɛ/, reported to be merged three decades ago but produced distinctly in contemporary Shanghainese. Results of two production experiments showed that speaker age, language mode (monolingual Shanghainese vs. bilingual Shanghainese-Mandarin), and crosslinguistic phonological similarity all influenced the production of these vowels. These findings provide evidence for language contact as a linguistic means of merger reversal and are consistent with the view that contact phenomena originate from cross-language interaction within the bilingual mind

Relational correspondence in tone sandhi

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Linguistics and Philosophy, 2007.Includes bibliographical references (p. 283-292).This dissertation proposes that the constraint component of OT grammars should be expanded to include a family of faithfulness constraints that evaluate input-output/output-output mappings for the preservation of gross Fo contours (rising, falling, level) across two or more segments. Following Steriade (2006), I refer to constraints in this family as Relational Correspondence constraints. The central tenet of Relational Correspondence is that phonological processes are shaped by pressure to maintain perceptual similarity between correspondent relations between successive elements, or syntagmatic contrast preservation in the auditory domain Fo, as opposed to paradigmatic contrast preservation according to which the well-formedness of an entity is evaluated with reference to the set of entities it contrasts with. Two types of Relational Correspondence are distinguished in this work: Contour and Slope Correspondence. Contour Correspondence, formulated as RELCORR constraints, assesses correspondence of the phonological height (Fo scaling) relation between successive tones. Four height relations are proposed for the tonal contour: "greater than" (x>y), "less than" (x<y), "equal to" (x=y), and "non-equal to" (x=/y). Preservation of the four scaling relations is contextualized with respect to different degrees of cohesiveness: nucleus-internal, word-internal and across words. Slope Correspondence, formulated as MATCH-SLOPE constraints, requires preservation of the steepness of the Fo contour across successive tones. Relational correspondence provides a unifying account for a number of seemingly unrelated tone sandhi phenomena in genetically diverse languages, while explaining empirical facts that cannot be adequately expressed within the standard Correspondence Theory of faithfulness plus markedness constraints.by Feng-fan Hsieh.Ph.D

Sinophone Southeast Asia

This volume explores the diverse linguistic landscape of Southeast Asia’s Chinese communities. Based on archival research and previously unpublished linguistic fieldwork, it unearths a wide variety of language histories, linguistic practices, and trajectories of words. The localized and often marginalized voices we bring to the spotlight are quickly disappearing in the wake of standardization and homogenization, yet they tell a story that is uniquely Southeast Asian in its rich hybridity. Our comparative scope and focus on language, analysed in tandem with history and culture, adds a refreshing dimension to the broader field of Sino-Southeast Asian Studies. . Readership: Students, scholars, (academic) libraries, community organizations, heritage organizations; linguistics, Southeast Asia Studies, East Asia Studies, Overseas Chines

Script Crisis and Literary Modernity in China, 1916-1958

This dissertation examines the modern Chinese script crisis in twentieth-century China. It situates the Chinese script crisis within the modern phenomenon of phonocentrism - the systematic privileging of speech over writing. It depicts the Chinese experience as an integral part of a worldwide crisis of non-alphabetic scripts in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It places the crisis of Chinese characters at the center of the making of modern Chinese language, literature, and culture. It investigates how the script crisis and the ensuing script revolution intersect with significant historical processes such as the Chinese engagement in the two World Wars, national and international education movements, the Communist revolution, and national salvation. Since the late nineteenth century, the Chinese writing system began to be targeted as the roadblock to literacy, science and democracy. Chinese and foreign scholars took the abolition of Chinese script to be the condition of modernity. A script revolution was launched as the Chinese response to the script crisis. This dissertation traces the beginning of the crisis to 1916, when Chao Yuen Ren published his English article "The Problem of the Chinese Language," sweeping away all theoretical oppositions to alphabetizing the Chinese script. This was followed by two major movements dedicated to the task of eradicating Chinese characters: First, the Chinese Romanization Movement spearheaded by a group of Chinese and international scholars which was quickly endorsed by the Guomingdang (GMD) Nationalist government in the 1920s; Second, the dissident Chinese Latinization Movement initiated in the Soviet Union and championed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in the 1930s. This crisis was brought to an abrupt end in 1958, when Zhou Enlai, the first premier of the People's Republic of China, relegated the Romanization system pinyin to an official auxiliary status, secondary to Chinese characters, thus concluding the half-century struggle between the Chinese script and the alphabet. The final containment of the script crisis was partly a political decision of the new socialist state, and partly the result of the use of "baihua." The multivalent term baihua--plain speech, vernacular, and a colloquialized written language--enabled an unlikely reconciliation between the phonocentric dreams of a Chinese alphabet and a character-based Chinese national language and literature. This alternative solution to the script crisis, which grew from within the Chinese script, was rehearsed in the first modern Chinese anti-illiteracy program in France during the Great War. The solution was consolidated as a colloquialized written Chinese became the staple of modern Chinese literary writing. The negotiated baihua--imprinted profoundly by the phonocentric-biased discourse- on the one hand registers the historical reality of the modern Chinese writing as a written language; on the other, it keeps alive the phonocentric dreams of modern China