S. L. Wong (phonetic symbols)
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Wong Shik Ling (also known as S. L. Wong) published a scheme of phonetic symbols for Standard Cantonese based on International Phonetics Alphabet (IPA) in the book A Chinese Syllabary Pronounced according to the Dialect of Canton. The scheme has been widely used in Chinese dictionaries published in Hong Kong. The scheme is a broad phonemic transcription system based on IPA.Before devising the system, Wong studied many phonetic transcription and romanisation system for Cantonese. He found that many of them are not accurate enough for use. He researched in Standard Cantonese and published his results in the book.
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[edit] Phonology
Cantonese like other Chinese languages is monosyllabic. Each syllabus is divided into initial (consonant), final (vowel and following consonant) and tone.
[edit] Finals
Chinese phonology traditionally stresses on finals because it is related to rhymes in the composition of poems, proses and articles. There are 53 finals in Standard Cantonese.
[edit] Vowels
The 10 basic vowel phonemes are: /a/, /ɐ/, /ei/, /ɛ/, /i/, /ou/, /ɔ/, /œ/, /u/ and /y/ as shown in the following table:
| Front | N.-front | Central | N.-back | Back | ||
| Close | Image:Blank vowel trapezoid.png
| |||||
| Near-close | ||||||
| Close-mid | ||||||
| Mid | ||||||
| Open-mid | ||||||
| Near-open | ||||||
| Open | ||||||
- For the open back unrounded vowel, <a> is used instead of <ɑ> in IPA.
- For the long Close-mid front unrounded vowel /e/, <ei> is used instead of <eː> in IPA.
- For the long Close-mid back rounded vowel /o/, <ou> is used instead of <oː> in IPA.
- /ɐ/ must be followed by vowels /i/, /u/ or finals /m/, /n/, /ŋ/, /p/, /t/, /k/.
[edit] Falling diphthong finals
All vowel phonemes except /ɐ/ form vowel 9 finals themselves.
Some vowel phonemes can followed by vowel phonemes /i/, /u/ or /y/ to form 8 falling diphthong finals:
| /a/ | /ɐ/ | /ei/ | /ɛ/ | /i/ | /ou/ | /ɔ/ | /œ/ | /u/ | /y/ | |
| - | /a/ | /ei/ | /ɛ/ | /i/ | /ou/ | /ɔ/ | /œ/ | /u/ | /y/ | |
| /i/ | /ai/ | /ɐi/ | /ɔi/ | /ui/ | ||||||
| /u/ | /au/ | /ɐu/ | /iu/ | |||||||
| /y/ | /œy/ |
[edit] Nasal phoneme finals
Some vowel phonemes can followed by nasal consonants /m/, /n/ or /ŋ/ to form 17 nasal phoneme finals:
| /a/ | /ɐ/ | /ei/ | /ɛ/ | /i/ | /ou/ | /ɔ/ | /œ/ | /u/ | /y/ | |
| /m/ | /am/ | /ɐm/ | /im/ | |||||||
| /n/ | /an/ | /ɐn/ | /in/ | /ɔn/ | /œn/ | /un/ | /yn/ | |||
| /ŋ/ | /aŋ/ | /ɐŋ/ | /ɛŋ/ | /iŋ/ | /ɔŋ/ | /œŋ/ | /uŋ/ |
[edit] Plosive phoneme finals
Some vowel phonemes can followed by unaspirated plosive consonants /p/, /t/ or /k/ to form 20 stop phoneme finals:
| /a/ | /ɐ/ | /ei/ | /ɛ/ | /i/ | /ou/ | /ɔ/ | /œ/ | /u/ | /y/ | |
| /p/ | /ap/ | /ɐp/ | /ip/ | |||||||
| /t/ | /at/ | /ɐt/ | /it/ | /ɔt/ | /œt/ | /ut/ | /yt/ | |||
| /k/ | /ak/ | /ɐk/ | /ɛk/ | /ik/ | /ɔk/ | /œk/ | /uk/ |
[edit] Syllabic nasal finals
Syllabic /m/ and /ŋ/ are also two finals in Cantonese: /m̩/ and /ŋ̩/.
[edit] Summary
Here are the 53 finals in a table:
| ending | Principal vowels | fully voiced nasal consonant | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| /a/ | /ɐ/ | /ei/ | /ɛ/ | /i/ | /ou/ | /ɔ/ | /œ/ | /u/ | /y/ | /m̩/ | /ŋ̩/ | ||
| independent vowel final | /a/ 呀 | /ei/ 欺 | /ɛ/ 些 | /i/ 衣 | /ou/ 澳 | /ɔ/ 痾 | /œ/ 靴 | /u/ 烏 | /y/ 於 | /m̩/ 唔 | /ŋ̩/ 吾 | ||
| vowel | /i/ | /ai/ 唉 | /ɐi/ 翳 | /ɔi/ 哀 | /ui/ 回 | ||||||||
| /u/ | /au/ 拗 | /ɐu/ 歐 | /iu/ 夭 | ||||||||||
| /y/ | /œy/ 居 | ||||||||||||
| nasal consonant | /m/ | /am/ 菡 | /ɐm/ 庵 | /im/ 淹 | |||||||||
| /n/ | /an/ 晏 | /ɐn/ 根 | /in/ 烟 | /ɔn/ 安 | /œn/ 津 | /un/ 豌 | /yn/ 鴛 | ||||||
| /ŋ/ | /aŋ/ 罃 | /ɐŋ/ 鶯 | /ɛŋ/ 廰 | /iŋ/ 英 | /ɔŋ/ 盎 | /œŋ/ 香 | /uŋ/ 甕 | ||||||
| plosive consonant | /p/ | /ap/ 鴨 | /ɐp/ 粒 | /ip/ 葉 | |||||||||
| /t/ | /at/ 壓 | /ɐt/ 不 | /it/ 熱 | /ɔt/ 喝 | /œt/ 卒 | /ut/ 活 | /yt/ 月 | ||||||
| /k/ | /ak/ 鈪 | /ɐk/ 厄 | /ɛk/ 隻 | /ik/ 益 | /ɔk/ 惡 | /œk/ 腳 | /uk/ 屋 | ||||||
- ↑ Character example with initial. No character with exact pronunciation.
- ↑ Character example with initial [j]. In absent of initial, /i/ pronounced with [j] becomes [ji], /iu/ becomes [jiu], /im/ becomes [jim], /ip/ becomes [jip], and so forth.
- ↑ Character example with initial [w]. In absent of initial, /u/ pronounced with [w] becomes [wu], /ui/ becomes [wui], /un/ becomes [wun], /ut/ becomes {{IPA|[wut]}.
- ↑ Character example with initial [j]. In absent of initial, /y/ pronounced with [j] becomes [jy], /yn/ becomes [jyn], /yt/ becomes [jyt].
[edit] Initials
Initials are made up of consonants. Most of characters are preceding finals with initials while some characters are pronouced without initials. There are 19 initials in total.
Unlike English language, Standard Cantonese is absent of voiced-voiceless contrast. Instead, aspirated-unaspirated constrast plays an important role in distiguishing meanings. Since there is no voiced plosive and affricative consonants in Standard Cantonese, the scheme make use of these unused voiced symbols for unaspirated.
[edit] Single articulation
[edit] Coarticulation
| s | Voiceless palatalized postalveolar (alveolo-palatal) fricative |
| w | Voiced labialized velar approximant |
| gw | Aspirated voiceless labialized velar (labial-velar) plosive |
| kw | Unaspirated voiceless labialized velar (labial-velar) plosive |
[edit] Affricates
| Unaspirated | aspirated | Description |
|---|---|---|
| dz | ts | voiceless alveolar affricate |
| dz | ts | voiceless postalveolar affricate |
| dz | ts | voiceless alveolo-palatal affricate |
[edit] Summary
| Place of articulation → | Labial | Coronal | Dorsal | (none) | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Manner of articulation ↓ | Bilabial | Labio‐ dental | Dental | Alveolar | Post‐ alveolar | alveolo‐ palatal | Palatal | Velar | labial‐ velar | Glottal | ||
| Nasal | voiced | [m] 嗎 | [n] 拿 | [ŋ] 牙 | ||||||||
| Plosive | voiceless | unaspirated | [b] 巴 | [d] 打 | [g] 家 | [gw] 瓜 | ||||||
| aspirated | [p] 扒 | [t] 他 | [k] 卡 | [kw] 誇 | ||||||||
| Affricate | voiceless | unaspirated | [dz] 資(揸) | |||||||||
| aspirated | [ts] 雌(差) | |||||||||||
| Fricative | voiceless | [f] 花 | s [思] (沙) | [h] 蝦 | ||||||||
| Approximant | voiced | [j] 也 | [w] 華 | |||||||||
| Lateral‐ Approximant | voiced | [l] 拉 | ||||||||||
- ↑ In Standard Cantonese, [dz] in scheme is the allophone of [ts], [tʃ] and [tɕ] in IPA; [ts] is the allophone of [tsʰ], [tʃʰ] and [tɕʰ]; [s] is the allophone of [s], [ʃ] and [ɕ].
- ↑ For aspiration, [p] in the scheme is for [pʰ] in IPA and [b] for [p]; [t] for [tʰ] and [d] for [t]; [k] for [kʰ] and [g] for [k]; [kw] for [kʷʰ] and [gw] for [kʷ];[ts] for [tsʰ], [tʃʰ] and [tɕʰ] and [dz] for [ts], [tʃ] and [tɕ].
- ↑ For labialisation, [kw] is for [kʷʰ] and [gw] for [kʷ].
[edit] Tones
There are basically 9 tones in Standard Cantonese. Tones play an important role to distinguish meanings in Cantonese. Tones also forms melodies in poem and prose composition.
In classical Chinese, four basic tones are the level (平 ˌp‘iŋ), the rising (上 ˏsœŋ), the going (去 ˉhœy) and the entering (入 ˍjɐp). The entering is not turely a special tone but a syllabus ends with [p], [t] and [k] that shows short in quality of other tones.
In Cantonese, the tones are furthur divided into upper and lower of the level, the rising and the going. The entering tone divided into upper entering, middle entering and lower entering. The upper entering is the same tone as upper level; middle entering as upper going; lower entering as lower going.
There are two ways to mark tones in the scheme. One is by number and another by marks.
| level | rising | going | entering | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| upper | ˈx (1) | ˈx (7) | upper | ||
| ˊx (2) | ˉx (3) | ˉx (8) | middle | ||
| lower | ˏx (5) | ˍx (6) | ˍx (9) | lower | |
| ˌx (4) |
[edit] See also
[edit] Reference
- Wong, S. L. (1941) A CHINESE SYLLABARY PRONOUNCED ACCORDING TO THE DIALECT OF CANTON. Hong Kong: Chung Hwa Book Co.,(H.K.) Ltd.
