Rice University
Linguistics Colloquium

Abstract

Immigration often suddenly brings speakers of one dialect into close, long-term contact with another dialect. Such situations naturally raise questions about how the speech of those in contact may be affected. In many cases, significant dialect change has been reported, and such change is commonly described in terms of convergence, new dialect formation, individual accommodation and acquisition, e.g., Bortoni-Ricardo (1984), Shockey (1984), Kerswill (1994), Munro et al. (1999), Kerswill & Williams (2000), Chambers (1992, 2002), Dyer (2002). By contrast, in the exogamous Sui clans of rural southwestern China, dialect distinctions are closely maintained despite inter-clan immigration and long-term contact. This study examines how such dialect non-convergence occurs; speakers continuously construct and maintain their clan identities through the use of distinct clan-level features (clanlects). In turn, those linguistic performances themselves construct and maintain the local notion of clanlects. Therefore, through quantitative analysis of dialect features as well as ethnographic observations, this Sui study provides progress in the understanding of linguistic contact and immigration, illustrating a case of dialect non-convergence and investigating how it occurs.

An indigenous minority of Guizhou, China, the Sui people practice clan exogamy. Wives and husbands must originate in different clans, and the wife moves permanently to the husband's village at the time of marriage. Subtle dialect differences commonly exist between clans, so an immigrant married woman's speech often differs from local village residents, although clanlects are mutually intelligible.

This study presents results of an investigation of clanlect variation (lexical and phonetic). The speakers interviewed were (1) married women who had immigrated to the husband's village and remained ten years or more, (2) non-mobile residents of the women's original clans (for comparison), and (3) children of immigrant women. Ethnographic interviews explore language ideology and women's views on their own speech.

© 2007 James Stanford
Last updated 26 Nov 07