The Dialects of Wuhan (China)

The D ia le ct s of W uha n Thor May, China @18- 1- 2000 The Chinese provinces are a crazy pat chwork quilt of languages and dialect s, where t he hist ories of m igrat ions and cult ural enclaves, t he t ides of influence from em pire and com m erce, t he sperm t rails t hat follow rivers and railway lines ... are recorded in a t angle of codes t hat no one has yet m ade a serious at t em pt t o unt angle. The polit ical face of a " unified st at e" has dict at ed t o scholars and idle gossip alike t hat China has " one language" cont aining a num ber of " dialect s" * . The writ ing syst em is invariably flourished as a t rum p card t o prove t his hegem ony. I t 's a propaganda gam e wit h a long hist ory, and I 'm not going t o writ e t he book here t o challenge it in det ail. However, see " The Chinese Language - Fact and Fict ion" by John deFrancis, Universit y of Hawaii Press, 1984, for a t horough debunking of t he m yt hology . ( * Updat e 2013: These com m ent s are obviously inform al, not t he result of sy st em at ic research. Chinese scholars t hem selves are now t aking a m uch m ore t horough int erest in dialect s t han was t he case ev en in 2000 ) . The Dialect s of Wuhan © Thor May 2000 I f it is less t han rewarding t o t alk t o m any of t he anoint ed Chinese linguist s on t his subj ect ( m aybe t hey have a career t o worry about ..) , t he occasional local cit izen wit h a keen int erest in language can offer richly rewarding insight s. At t he m om ent it 's m y good fort une t o have a friend, a t eacher of Chinese, who has j ust such an unvarnished underst anding of dialect s in Hubei. Wuhan cit y it self has a fascinat ing linguist ic t opography from his account s. Wuhan is at t he confluence of t he Yangzi River ( Changj iang in Chinese) and Han River. This creat es t hree sect ors of t errit ory which unt il about sevent y years ago com prised t hree cit ies: Hanyang, Hankou and Wuchang. I ndeed, going back t o 223 AD when Wuhan's m ost fam ous landm ark, t he Yellow Crane Tower was first built as a m ilit ary wat ch t ower ( since burned down sevent een t im es) , t his locale m arked t he confluence of t hree separat e kingdom s. Not surprisingly perhaps, t he t hree cit ies each had separat e dialect s. Nowadays, t o t he unt ut ored eyes and ears of an out sider, Wuhan is j ust one ghast ly urban sprawl, but t o insiders like m y Chinese t eacher friend, t he dialect s of each cit y rem ain dist inct ive and socially significant . " True" Wuhanese is held t o be t he dialect of downt own Hankou ( now t he com m ercial heart of t he conurbat ion) , and t he " purest " speakers are said t o dwell bet ween Zhongshan Dadao ( t he m ain shopping st reet ) and t he river, t hat is, in what was once t he old walled t own. These speakers consider t hem selves t o be a som ewhat superior class of being. To a Chinese speaker, t heir Hankou dialect is m arked by large pit ch m ovem ent s, perhaps a bit like upper class Brit ish English ( as com pared t o, say, Aust ralian English, which has m ore, sm aller pit ch m ovem ent s) . The m et ropolit an area of Wuhan is surrounded by a pat chwork of count ies, each wit h it s own voice. I m m ediat ely t o t he nort h of Hankou for exam ple is Huangpi which is 2 The Dialect s of Wuhan © Thor May 2000 renowned for bom bast ic rhet oric. This m ay have som et hing t o do wit h an indigenous st ory - t elling & j oke t radit ion accom panied by drum s - - a kind of Chinese rap- t alk. Hanyang dialect diverges t he m ost from Wuhanese and is t hought a bit down - m arket . Wuchang, t he adm inist rat ive and educat ional sect or of m odern Wuhan, also differs a bit from Wuhanese, but has it s own claim t o snobbery. I n com m on wit h any num ber of ot her Chinese cit ies ( t here are about six hundred cit ies in China) , Wuhan has grown like t opsy, especially since 1949: 1949 1.02 m illion 1957 2.15 m illion 1964 ( 2nd Nat ional Populat ion Census) 2.48 m illion 1982 ( 3rd Nat ional Populat ion Census) 3.25 m illion 2000 ( Hubei Tourist bureau est im at e) 7.3 m illion... This last figure refers t o t he adm inist rat ive region of Wuhan. A professor of urban planning has suggest ed t o m e t hat t he t he current m et ropolit an figure is m ore like 4 m illion. Nobody is quit e sure because of t he huge num ber of rural m igrant s ( m ost " unofficial" ) w ho are const ant ly com ing and going. I n m et r opolit an t erm s, Wuhan is probably about t he sixt h largest cit y in China at present , ( but com es t hird, aft er Beij ing and Shanghai, for t he num ber of t ert iary educat ional inst it ut ions) . The dem ographic dynam ic has m aj or consequences for language change. I dearly wish t hat I had t he local language skills needed t o t rack it ! Som e t hings are fairly clear. A large num ber of t he cit y's resident s were not born here. These im m igrant s are of t wo kinds: a) t he rural poor who oft en speak dialect s or languages alm ost unint elligible t o t he Wuhan locals; and b) individuals w it h a higher t han average educat ion who have com e for t ert iary t raining or 3 The Dialect s of Wuhan © Thor May 2000 em ploym ent . These lat t er are obliged t o use t he lingua franca, Put onghua ( st andard Chinese) m ost of t he t im e t o be underst ood. The rural poor will pick up what ever bit s of language t hey need t o survive. My own research in anot her part of t he world ( Fij i, 1990) gave very clear evidence t hat poor rural im m igrant s like t hese are avid language learners exact ly because t hey are upwardly m obile. Their children will cert ainly learn t he nat ional language quickly. Social class dist inct ions are oft en cued by speech ( anywhere in t he world) . These dist inct ions are st rongly felt by visit ors and locals alike in Wuhan. A large proport ion of t he t hree hundred post graduat es who I t each com e from out side of Wuhan, m any from ot her provinces. Writ ing about people in t he cit y, m any disparage t he locals' " bad" accent and use of " rude" words. They t end t o t hink t hat Wuhanese are loud, quarrelsom e, and frequent ly host ile t o out siders including t hem selves, ( alt hough ot hers st at e quit e t he opposit e) . They also not e however t hat Shanghai nat ives are even m ore cont em pt uous of non- locals: we could guess t hat t his kind of provincial prej udice is likely t o be widespread t hroughout t he innum erable dialect and language areas of China. Wit h disarm ingly unselfconscious bias, som e st udent s writ e of " t he low qualit y of people in Wuhan" , while ( not surprisingly) local speakers are quick t o not e t he superior qualit ies of t heir group. Bot h local st udent s and incom ers t end t o be disparaging of rural im m igrant s, who ar e cursed by bot h barbaric dialect s and " low qualit y" ( what ever t hat m eans) . So m uch for t he brot herhood of ( com m unist ) m an... One of m y st udent s did m ake an int erest ing sociolinguist ic observat ion. Wuhan people, he wrot e, have a habit of " t alking in t he st reet " , whereas t he cit izens of Shenzhen ( his hom et own, on t he Hong Kong border) alm ost never discuss anyt hing on t he st reet , 4 The Dialect s of Wuhan © Thor May 2000 except when absolut ely necessary. He not ed wit h puzzlem ent t hat t wo Wuhanese friends, m eet ing in t he st reet , will im m ediat ely exchange news and views. They even have a word for t his phenom enon, zéi, in Wuhan dialect . I n t he nat ive com m unit ies of Wuhan it self, t he use of Put onghua is spreading, part icularly am ongst t he young. There are a variet y of reasons for t his. The nat ional language is com pulsory in schools. The m edia blit zes t hem wit h st andard language. People are m uch m ore m obile on a daily basis t han t hey used t o be, and t hose of m arriageable age are nowadays likely t o m arry anyone from t he great er m et ropolit an area, or even fr om elsewhere in China. These new nuclear households will, of course, have only t he nat ional language as a shared t ongue. Unt il a decade ago t he securely em ployed Wuhanese were able t o m aint ain a prest ige posit ion for t heir dialect . Now, in a st range t wist of invert ed snobber y, t he heavy m anufact uring base which built t he cit y has becom e a r ust ing j unk pile. I t is precisely t he Wuhanese nat ives who are finding t hem selves m ade redundant from bankrupt st at e- owned ent erprises by t he hundreds of t housands. I t is t hey who are becom ing t he new urban poor. The im m igrant s wit h special, m obile skills, t he Put onghua speakers, are t he new elit e. __________ Re fe r e nce s deFrancis, John ( 1984) The Chinese Language - Fact and Fict ion. Universit y of Hawaii Press Glucroft , Brian ( 2011) The Different Languages of China. ( ed: a short account of som e of t he challenges which China’s m ult it ude of languages and dialect s pose for reseachers of all kinds) . @ ht t p: / / www.isidorsfugue.com / 2011/ 07/ different languages- of- china.ht m l 5 The Dialect s of Wuhan © Thor May 2000 Zhang, Jing ( 2013) Wuhan Dialect . ( ed: a series of blog post ings by a young Chinese researcher t rying t o ident ify phonological dialect charact erist ics in Wuhan) . @ ht t p: / / zhangj ingxunxun.blogspot .com .au/ 2013/ 01/ originalsam ple- of- w uhan- dialect .ht m l " The Dialect s of Wuhan" © Thor May 2000; all right s reserved Professional bio: Thor May's PhD dissert at ion, Language Tangle, dealt wit h language t eaching product ivit y. Thor has been t eaching English t o non - nat ive speakers, t raining t eachers and lect uring linguist ics, since 1976. This w ork has t aken him t o seven count ries in Oceania and East Asia, m ost ly wit h t ert iary st udent s, but wit h a couple of det ours t o t each secondary st udent s and young children. He has t rained t eachers in Aust r alia, Fij i and Sout h Korea. I n an earlier life, prior t o becom ing a t eacher, he had a decade of drift ing t hrough unskilled j obs in Aust ralia, New Zealand and finally England ( aft er backpacking across Asia in 1972) . cont act : ht t p: / / t horm ay.net Thor’s China Diary index ( ht t p: / / t horm ay.net / chinadiary/ diarysit em n.ht m l ) t horm ay AT yahoo.com All opinions expressed in t his paper are ent irely t hose of t he aut hor, w ho has no aim t o influence, proselyt ize or persuade ot hers t o a point of view. He is pleased if his writ ing generat es reflect ion in readers, eit her for or against t he sent im ent of t he argum ent . 6