Southern Qiang language

Southern Qiang is a Sino-Tibetan language of the Qiangic branch spoken by approximately 81,300 people along the Minjiang (Chinese: 岷江) river in Sichuan Province, China.

Southern Qiang
RegionSichuan Province
EthnicityQiang people
Native speakers
81,000 (1999)[1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3qxs
Glottologsout2728
ELPSouthern Qiang

Southern Qiang dialects preserve archaic pronoun flexions, while they have disappeared in Northern Qiang.[2] Unlike its close relative Northern Qiang, Southern Qiang is a tonal language.

Southern Qiang dialects

Southern Qiang is spoken in Li County (in Taoping Chinese: 桃坪, etc.), Wenchuan County (in Longxi 龙溪, Luobozhai 萝卜寨, Miansi 绵虒, etc.), and parts of Mao County. It consists of seven dialects: Dajishan, Taoping, Longxi, Mianchi, Heihu, Sanlong, and Jiaochang, which are greatly divergent and are not mutually intelligible.

Names seen in the older literature for Southern Qiang dialects include Lofuchai (Lophuchai, Lopu Chai), Wagsod (Wa-gsod, Waszu),[3] and Outside/Outer Mantse (Man-tzŭ).[4] The Southern Qiang dialect of Puxi Township has been documented in detail by Huang (2007).[5]

Liu (1998) adds Sānlóng (Chinese: 三龍) and Jiàocháng (較場) as Southern subdialects.[6]

Sims (2016)[7] characterizes Southern Qiang as the perfective agreement suffixes innovation group. Individual dialects are highlighted in italics.

Southern Qiang
  • 'inward' *ji innovation subgroup
  • 'downward' *ɚ innovation subgroup
    • Western Lixian: Puxi 蒲溪乡, Xuecheng 薛城镇, Muka 木卡乡, Jiuzi 九子村
    • Eastern Lixian: Taoping 桃坪乡, Tonghua 通化乡

Phonology

The consonants of Southern Qiang are presented in the table below:[8]

Southern Qiang consonants
Labial Dental Retroflex Palato-
alveolar		 Palatal Velar Uvular
plain sibilant
Stop/
Affricate		 voiceless p t ts ʈʂ tʃ tɕ k q
aspirated pʰ tʰ tsʰ ʈʂʰ tʃʰ tɕʰ kʰ qʰ
voiced b d dz ɖʐ dʒ dʑ ɡ ɢ
Fricative voiceless f s ʂ ʃ ɕ (x) χ
voiced z ʐ ʒ ʑ (ɣ) ʁ
Nasal m n ɲ ŋ
Approximant l j, ɥ w
  • /χ ʁ/ are heard as velar [x ɣ] before front vowels.
  • /f/ is also heard as a bilabial [ɸ].

The vowels of Southern Qiang are presented in the table below:[8]

Southern Qiang vowels
Front Central Back
Close i y u
Mid e ə ə˞ o
Open a ɑ
Syllabic ɹ̩
  • Vowels /e u/ can also be heard as [ɛ ʉ].

Southern Qiang has six tones as represented below:[9]

Southern Qiang tones
Name Pitch Symbol
Mid or Low-falling 33 ˨˥
High 55 ˦
Low (falling) rising 31 ˨˩
Mid-rising 241 ˧˩
High-falling 13 ˦˥

Status

As with many of the Qiangic languages, Southern Qiang is becoming increasingly threatened. Because the education system largely uses Standard Chinese as a medium of instruction for the Qiang people, and as a result of the universal access to schooling and television, most Qiang children are fluent or even monolingual in Chinese while an increasing percentage cannot speak Qiang.[10]

See also

References
  1. Southern Qiang at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  2. Guillaume, Jacques (2007). "A shared suppletive pattern in the pronominal systems of Chang Naga and Southern Qiang". Cahiers de Linguistique Asie Orientale. 36 (1): 4.
  3. McCoy, John, ed. (1986). Contributions to Sino-Tibetan Studies. Leiden: E.J. Brill. pp. 40, 65. ISBN 90-04-07850-9.
  4. Sun, Jackson T.-S. (1992). "Review of Zangmianyu Yuyin He Cihui "Tibeto-Burman Phonology and Lexicon"" (PDF). Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area. 15 (2): 76–77.
  5. Huang, Chenglong 黄成龙 (2007). Púxī Qiāngyǔ yánjiū 蒲溪羌语研究 [Studies on Puxi Qiang] (in Chinese). Beijing shi: Minzu chubanshe. ISBN 978-7-105-08977-2.
  6. Liu, Guangkun 刘光坤 (1998). Máwō Qiāngyǔ yánjiū 麻窝羌语研究 [Studies on Mawo Qiang] (in Chinese). Chengdu: Sichuan minzu chubanshe. ISBN 7-5409-2116-1.
  7. Sims, N. (2016). "Towards a More Comprehensive Understanding of Qiang Dialectology" (PDF). Language and Linguistics. 17 (3): 351–381. doi:10.1177/1606822X15586685.
  8. Sun, Hongkai 孙宏开 (1981). Qiāngyǔ jiǎnzhì 羌语简志 (in Chinese). Minzu chubanshe.
  9. Evans, Jonathan P. (2001). Contact-Induced Tonogenesis in Southern Qiang. Michigan State University and Oakland University. pp. 65–67.
  10. LaPolla, Randy J. (2003). A Grammar of Qiang: With Annotated Texts and Glossary. with Chenglong Huan. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. p. 5. ISBN 3-11-017829-X.

Bibliography
  • Bradley, David (1997). "Tibeto-Burman Languages and Classification" (PDF). In Bradley, D. (ed.). Papers in South East Asian Linguistics No. 14: Tibeto-Burman Languages of the Himalayas. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. pp. 1–72. ISBN 0-85883-456-1.
  • Chang, Kun 張琨 (1967). "A Comparative Study of the Southern Ch'iang 蒐 Dialects". Monumenta Serica. 26 (1): 422–444. doi:10.1080/02549948.1967.11744974.
  • Evans, Jonathan P. (2001a). Introduction to Qiang Lexicon and Phonology: Synchrony and Diachrony. Tokyo: ILCAA, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.


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