Differences between Modern Standard Cantonese and the Xiantang sub-dialect in terms of phonological oppositions

Abstract

The term ‘modern standard Cantonese’ (hereafter referred to as MSC) as used in this paper refers to the language spoken by the majority of people in Guangzhou (Canton) and in nearby places such as Macau and Hong Kong. It is well known that many varieties (or sub-dialects) of Cantonese are found in the various counties and districts of the Guangdong (Kwantung) province. The sub-dialect under discussion (hereafter referred to as XSD) is spoken in a village called Xiantang (‘fairy pond’) in the commune of Longjiang of the Shunde county. This paper is based on field work done during a visit to the village and material gathered from interviews with informants in Guangzhou and Hong Kong. As a speaker of MSC trying to communicate with speakers of XSD I found that the main obstacle to intelligibility is the fact that certain phonological oppositions in MSC do not exist in XSD. Once this hurdle is cleared there is not much communication problem. I have decided to use MSC as a sort of basis in this purely synchronic study mainly because it would facilitate discussion, as a lot of work has been done on this dialect already.