Tone mergers in Cantonese

This study investigates tone mergers in the Cantonese spoken in Hong Kong, Macao, and Zhuhai. From these three cities, 150 native Cantonese speakers were recruited, stratified by gender and age. Acoustic analyses show that Hong Kong Cantonese and Macao Cantonese are actively merging T2[25] and T5[23], T3[33] and T6[22], thus becoming similar to Zhuhai Cantonese in tonal inventory. The social motivations of the changes are attributed to contact among these Cantonese-speaking communities as well as their contact with Putonghua. Responses to a questionnaire on language use in different domains shows the spread of Putonghua in Hong Kong and Macao and seems to correlate with the advance of the tone mergers. More specifically, the spread of Putonghua in Hong Kong seems to be rolling back the effects of Cantonese standardization, as shown by the tone mergers in the youngest generation in Hong Kong.

本研究调查了香港、澳门和珠海三地粤语的声调合并现象。笔者收集了三地共一百五十名以粤语为母语的讲话人的语音数据。除地点外，讲话人还按性别和年龄分层。语音数据分析，显示香港粤语和澳门粤语中的阴上调 T2 [25] 和阳上调 T5 [23] 正在合并，阴去调 T3 [33] 和阳去调 T6 [22] 正在合并，两组声调合并使得港澳两地的粤语声调系统与珠海粤语更相似。这些合并的社会动因可以归结于粤语言语社区之间的接触以及它们与普通话社区的接触。不同语域的语言使用数据展现了普通话在港澳地区的推广，并且普通话的推广似乎与两地正在进行中的声调合并有关。具体来说，普通话在香港的推广抵消了粤语正音的作用，年轻一代逐渐放弃标准粤音而发生声调合并。