An Experimental Study of Citation Tones in Dingzhou Dialect

◆Abstract：This study tries to investigate the tone patterns and pitch values of citation tones in Dingzhou dialect by adopting the software Praat used for experimental phonetics.According to the statistics from the informant，there are four tones，yinping（33），yangping（213），shangsheng（24），qusheng（51） in Dingzhou dialect.

◆Key words：Dingzhou dialect;Praat;Citation tone;Pitch value

1 Introduction

Syntactically，Dingzhou dialect is almost the same as Putonghua and the dialects of much a few neighboring areas around Dingzhou，phonologically，it sounds a litttle bit different from Putonghua and other dialects.Dingzhou dialect has 23 initials and 39 rimes with no rusheng，gu qing ru words were included in yin，yang，shang，and qu four tones，quan zhuo ru was included in yangping，ci zhuo ru was included in qusheng.

2 Literature Review

In The Survey of Heibei Dialect compiled by Beijing Normal University in Hebei province，there are four tones，yinping（33），yangping（213），shangsheng（35），qusheng（51）.In 1986，Chen Shujing’s The characteristics of Dialect of Baoding District in Hebei Province，in 1990，Chai Shisen’s Chinese Mandarin Tutorials，and in 2005，Wu Jizhang’s Hebei Dialect of Local Dialect，they all recorded three tones of Dingzhou Dialect，yinping（33），yangping and shangsheng was combined into one tone，the value of it is 35，qusheng（55）.Both in 2006，Gao Caiying and Li Gaiting’s mater’s thesis of Hebei Normal University，they recorded four tones，there is difference in the values of their yangping，but both contour tones.

3 Experimental Design

3.1 Selection of Recording Materials

Yinping：陰、东、灯、分、边、超、天

Yangping：羊、穷、床、球、平、祥、爬

Shangsheng：好、等、响、走、假、比、打

Qusheng：冻、粪、到、正、醉、共、大

3.2 Informants

The informant is a native speaker who was born and brought up in Dingzhou and has not lived in another place for a time long enough to exert repercussion on the pronunciation of Dingzhou dialect.The informant is a female speaker with age of 24.

3.3 Data Recording and Collection

All together 28 monosyllabic words，seven for each tonal category，were printed and presented to the informants beforehand.The informant pronounced these words in a separate room without any prominent noise and each tonal category was recorded as a separate file without suspension by a laptop.

3.4 Data Processing

In this experimental recording，the informant will read sample words consisting of four tonal categories，each category containing 7 sample words.All recordings will be measured by the software Praat to produce data of fundamental frequency（F0） of all sample words，and 10 points of each word of the recording will be measured when the script file is operating，finally all the recordings will produce 4×7×10=280 data.The raw data have to be converted into T values by the following formula：

T = [（lgx-lgb）/（lga-lgb）]×5（Shi 2006）

4 Pitch of Citation Tones

F0 and Pitch Values.

The table presented here is the average F0 data of four tonal categories of the subject.Yinping is substituted by T1，yangping T2，shangsheng T3，qusheng T4.

Therefore，we can make a conclusion that there are four tonal categories in Dingzhou dialect based on the experimental results from the recordings of the Subject——T1：33，T2：213，T3：24，T4：51.

5 Conclusion

In conclusion，based on the references at hand and the results in this paper，it is safe to say that there are four tonal categories in Dingzhou dialect，that is，yinping，middle level tone; yangping，falling-rising tone; shangsheng，rising tone; qusheng，falling tone.So that the study of Tang’s thesis has also been verified.

References

[1]Moira Jean Yip.The Tonal Phonology of Chinese [D].Cambridge： Massachusetts Institute of Technology，1980.

[2]Ladefoged & Johnson.A Course in Phonetics [M].6th ed.Boston： Wadsworth，2011.

[3]河北北京師范学院编.河北方言概况[M].石家庄：河北人民出版社，1961.

[4]陈淑静.河北保定地区方言的语音特点[J].方言，1986（2）.

[5]定州市地方志编纂委员会编.定州市志[M].北京：中国城市出版社，1998.

作者简介

高静（1997—），女，汉族，河北定州市人，硕士，天津师范大学外国语言学及应用语言学专业。