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Wutun, a Tibetanized Variety of Northwest Mandarin in the Amdo Sprachbund

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Wutun, a Tibetanized Variety of Northwest Mandarin in the Amdo Sprachbund International Journal of Eurasian Linguistics 1 (2019) 205–209 JEAL brill.com/jeal Wutun, a Tibetanized Variety of Northwest Mandarin in the Amdo Sprachbund Erika Sandman University of Helsinki [email protected] Typological variation across Sinitic languages is an intriguing topic in modern diversity linguistics. While traditional Chinese dialectology has mainly focused on phonology and lexicon, much more work needs to be done on morphology and syntax. In addition, the role of language contact in explaining the vari- ation among Sinitic languages is one of the most popular topics in the field today. Several scholars have noted since the 1970s that varieties of Northern Chinese have been influenced by “Altaic” (Mongolic, Turkic and Tungusic) languages, while varieties of Southern Chinese have been oriented towards Mainland Southeast Asian languages. However, there are also Sinitic languages that have been heavily influenced by long-term language contact with Tibetic, and so far, very little is known about these Sinitic varieties. My PhD disserta- tion (Sandman 2016) is a deep-study of one such a language, Wutun. It is a reference grammar of a Tibetanized variety of Mandarin based on first-hand fieldwork among the language community. Wutun is a distinct local form of Northwest Mandarin spoken by ca. 4000 people in Upper Wutun, Lower Wutun and Jiacangma villages located in Tongren County, Huangnan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province, P.R. China. While Wutun lexicon and most of the grammatical morphemes are of Sinitic origin with unambiguous cognates in other varieties of Mandarin, its morphology and syntax are heavily influenced by Amdo Tibetan. In addition, Wutun has also interacted with the Mongolic language Bonan, which is also spoken by ca. 4000 people in four villages located in the immediate vicinity of the Wutun-speaking villages. This language contact has yielded many gram- matical features that are quite atypical of Sinitic languages, and some of them are even uncommon from a cross-linguistic perspective. Because of its com- bination of identifiable contact languages, the case of Wutun is relevant for recent discussion on ‘mixed’ languages (Meakins 2013). © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2019 | doi:10.1163/25898833-12340010 206 Sandman From the areal perspective, Wutun is spoken in a context of a linguistic area best termed the Amdo Sprachbund, which comprises Eastern Qinghai and Southern Gansu provinces of Northwest China. The total number of dis- tinct languages in the area is ca. 15–20 and they belong to four genetic groups: Sinitic, Tibetic, Mongolic and Turkic (Janhunen 2007, Sandman & Simon 2016). Due to centuries of mutual interaction, the languages of the Amdo Sprachbund have approached a common typological goal and they have deve- loped shared features not found in their genetic relatives spoken elsewhere. All the Sinitic languages of the region can be described as “Altaicized”; their tonal systems have been simplified, their basic word order is generally SOV, they have developed an agglutinative morphology, and they have generally lost most of their numeral classifiers. The emergence of Wutun language is pro- bably due to the establishment of military garrisons in the border area of China and Tibet during the Ming Dynasty, with Wutun being the result of mixed mar- riages between Chinese and Tibetan speakers, with an impact also from the neighbouring Mongolic speakers. The present day Wutun people are almost all bilingual in Amdo Tibetan, the locally dominant regional language and lin- gua franca in the area, and the knowledge of both local Northwest Mandarin and Standard Mandarin is also common among younger generations. Wutun speakers used to be officially classified as ‘Monguor’ (Turen or Tuzu), but they identify themselves culturally as Tibetans (Zangzu) and are today officially recognized as such. In terms of religious orientation, they follow the Gelukpa (Yellow Hats School) of Tibetan Buddhism, with local features shared also by the neighbouring Bonan speakers. Despite the small number of speakers, Wutun is still a vigorous language spoken by all generations in the community, and it is learned as a first language by children. However, it goes without saying that such a small language community is vulnerable to any demographic or economic changes that might take place in the area in the near future. Before 1980s, Wutun was virtually an undocumented language, and very few studies existed before this millennium. Before the work conducted in Helsinki, the only available studies written by professional linguists were articles by Chen (1982, 1986, 1988, 1989, in Chinese) and Li (1983, 1984, 1985), as well as an entirely secondary treatise by Lee-Smith & Wurm (1996). I first started my fieldwork in connection with the research project Patterns of Ethnic Interaction and Adaptation in Amdo-Qinghai (2005–2008) funded by the Academy of Finland. The fieldwork involved collaboration of several scho- lars from Helsinki, as well as native speakers of Wutun, and it resulted a brief grammatical sketch (Janhunen et al. 2008). After the publication of this first sketch I continued fieldwork on Wutun and carried out additional field trips International Journal of Eurasian Linguistics 1 (2019) 205–209.
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