SALIENT SEGMENTAL FEATURES IN SINGAPORE MANDARIN

新加坡華語裏聲母與韻母的特徵

陳重瑜(Chen Chung-yu)

《Journal of Chinese Linguistics》 14卷1期 (1986/01) Pp. 114-151

摘要

The salient segmental features in the speech of 10 Singaporean informants are summarized as follows: Retroflexive siblilants were extremely rare. 57.0% of the palatal series were replaced by their dental counterparts, which resulted in combinations of dental sibilants before high front blade vowels, clear violations of Mandarin phonotactics. Initial x[□] was particularly apt to be mispronounced. The reading of the retroflexed liquid r involved variations both between full phonemenes (/r/~/l/, and occasionally, ~/n/) and within the phoneme ([r~dz~j]). Only [r], not the incorrect variants [dz, j], varied with /l/ and /n/. The Hokkien Group showed the greatest difficulty in differentiating /r/ from /l/. The lateral l was occasionally replaced by r. Lateral l and nasal n occasionally replaced each other in the environment of a nasal ending. The velar fricative h[x] when occurring before the vowel u was sometimes read as [f] or [w]. The semi-vowel initials y and w were sometimes omitted, especially when the high vowels functioned as the main vowel rather than a medial. Confusion between i and ü was found to be a prominent feature. The informants' readings of such syllables were strikingly unstable. About 13.6% of the i vowels were either replaced by or in variation with ü. The percentage for the reverse was 52.4%. The performance of the Cantonese Group, whose dialect is the only one among the five that has the [ü] sound, was decidedly superior. The Teochew Group, whose dialect does not have the -n ending, showed a greater difficulty in differentiating between -n and -ng. Gradual deviations from the norms on vowel qualities have also been described.

並列摘要

本文所討論的特徵裏，有些與方言背景有關，由一些特徵中可看出，不同方言背景的人彼此相互影响很大。聲母方面最顯著的特點是齒音z，c，s常取代顎音而出現在舌面母音之前。翹舌音zh，ch，sh很少見，但這是南方人的通病。翹舌流音r常與邊音l混淆，偶爾也與鼻音n相混。r也常被誤讀為[dz]與[j]。閩南人這個音尤其發得不好。l與n在帶鼻音韻尾的音節裏偶爾相混。聲母y與w常被省略。母音方面i與ü的讀音很不穩定，二者常相混。韻尾-n與-ng有時相混，潮州人尤其分不清此二音。此外，韻母的音值也有討論。