Jiangsu 40

Listen to Jiangsu 40, a 19-year-old woman from Yizheng, Jiangsu Province, China. Click or tap the triangle-shaped play button to hear the subject.

Both as a courtesy and to comply with copyright law, please remember to credit IDEA for direct or indirect use of samples. IDEA is a free resource; please consider supporting us.

BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

AGE: 19

DATE OF BIRTH (DD/MM/YYYY): 23/10/1990

PLACE OF BIRTH: Yizheng, Jiangsu Province

GENDER: female

ETHNICITY: Han Chinese

OCCUPATION: student

EDUCATION: university

AREAS OF RESIDENCE OUTSIDE REPRESENTATIVE REGION FOR LONGER THAN SIX MONTHS: N/A

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH: N/A

The text used in our recordings of scripted speech can be found by clicking here.

RECORDED BY: Bill McCann

DATE OF RECORDING (DD/MM/YYYY): 05/05/2010

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF SCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): N/A

ORTHOGRAPHIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH:

My hometown is in Yizheng. It belongs to the old and famous city, Yangzhou. Ah, Yizheng has changed a lot during the fol – during the recent ten years, and, ah, the appearance of it has changed a lot. Mmm, my major is English. Ahm, I started to learn English when I was 12, but some of my classmates were began when they are very, ah, young. I like traveling very much. Last summer my father and I went to the beautiful city of Qingdao. We enjoyed the beautiful sceneries there very much, and we went to the, ah, two famous beaches of there. Ah, now I am a college student in Suzhou. Mmm, I like … I used my summer holiday to do some, mmm, jobs to, ah, enlarge my horizon.
[The subject now goes on to read abstracts from the Analects of Confucius in her own Yizhenghua dialect. (See the detailed commentary below.) She has also provided a pinyin transliteration. A reading in Putonghua (Mandarin) can be heard on the Hebei 1 sample.]

TRANSCRIBED BY: Bill McCann

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): 19/08/2013

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): N/A

SCHOLARLY COMMENTARY:

SHORT READINGS FROM THE ANALECTS OF CONFUCIUS

KEY: A = Mandarin (Simplified); B = Mandarin (Pinyin); C = Dialect (Pinyin); D = English.

孔子: 论语 – Kǒng zǐ : lún yǔ – Kong zi: lun yu – Confucius: Lun Yu

 

學而第一 – xué ér dì yī – Xué ér de yī – Chapter One

A: 1-1:-       子曰: 學而時習之、不亦說乎。

B: yī-yī :-    zǐ yuē: xué ér shí xí zhī, bù yì yuè hū.

C: yī-yī :-    zi yeu: xue er shi xie zhi be yi yue hu.

D: 1-1:-       The Master said: Is it not pleasure to learn, and practice what is learned time and again?

A: 1-2:-       有朋自遠方來、不亦樂乎。

B: yī-èr:-     yǒu péng zì yuǎn fāng lái, bù yì lè hū.

C: yī-èr:-     you pen zi yun fan lai, be yi le hu.

D: 1-2:-       Is it not happiness to have friends coming from distant places?

A: 1-3:-       人不知而不慍、不亦君子乎。

B: yī-sān:    rén bù zhī ér bù yùn, bù yì jūn zi hū.

C: yī-sān:    ren be zhi er be yun, be yi jun zi hu.

D: 1-3:-       Is it not virtue for a man to feel no discomposure when others take no note of him?

為政第二 – wéi zhèng dì èr – wéi zhèn de ér – Chapter two

A: 2-2:-       子曰：「詩三百，一言以蔽之，曰：『思無邪』。

B: èr-èr:-     zǐ yuē: shī sān bǎi, yī yán yǐ bì zhī , yuē: sī wú xié.

C: èr-èr:-     Zi yeu: shi san bo, yi yin yi bi zhi, yue: si wu xie.

D: 2-2:-       The Master said: In the Book of Odes there are three hundred poems, but they may be summarised in a single sentence: Think no evil.

A: 2-7:-       子游問孝。子曰：今之孝者，是謂能養。至於犬馬，皆能有養；不敬,    何 以別乎。

B: èr-qī:-     zǐ yóu wèn xiào. zǐ yuē: jīn zhī xiào zhě, shì wèi néng yǎng. zhì wū quǎn mǎ, jiē néng yǒu yǎng; bù jìng, hé yǐ bié hū.

C: : èr-qī:-   zi you wen xiao. Zi yue: jin zhi xiao zhi, shi wei nen yan. Zhe wu qun ma, jie nen you yan, be jin he yi bie hu.

D: 2-7:-       Zi You asked what filial piety was. The Master said: Nowadays, providing support for one’s parents is considered filial piety. But dogs and horses can also do this. If there is no respect, what is the difference?

A: 2-10:-     子曰：「視其所以，觀其所由，察其所安。人焉叟哉？人焉叟哉？

B: èr-shí :- zǐ yuē: shì qí suǒ yǐ , guān qí suǒ yóu, chá qí suǒ ān. rén yān sǒu zāi? rén yān sǒu zāi?

C: èr-shí :- Zi yeu: shi qi suo yi. Gun qi sou bin, cha qi suo an. Ren yin sou zai? Ren yin sou zai?

D: 2-10:-     The Master said: Watch what a man does. Find out his motives. See how he takes his ease. How then can the man hide his true self? How can the man hide his true self?

COMMENTARY

This is a fine, strong accent that is, very interestingly, quite similar to the accent of the subject Tianchang in the Anhui 6 sample, and with many of the same pronunciation problems. This is not greatly surprising as Tianchang is geographically quite close to the current subject’s hometown of Yizheng, a satellite city to the west of Yangzhou,  and both native dialects are members of the same group, albeit with subtle differences. Some of these can be gauged by comparing the two pinyin transliterations in the Readings above. These sub-dialects will be mutually intelligible, but unintelligible to the speakers of the Wu dialects in south Jiangsu.

The Yizheng dialect is a sub-dialect of Yangzhou dialect, the premiere dialect of the Jiang Huai group of Northern Jiangsu, and a full commentary on this, and also on Yizheng, can be found in the Jiangsu 5 sample, whose subject also comes from Yizheng but who did not provide a sample of his own dialect. A comparison of the English accents in both of these samples is also instructive.

COMMENTARY BY: Bill McCann

DATE OF COMMENTARY (DD/MM/YYYY): 19/08/2013

The archive provides:

• Recordings of accent/dialect speakers from the region you select.
• Text of the speakers’ biographical details.
• Scholarly commentary and analysis in some cases.
• In most cases, an orthographic transcription of the speakers’ unscripted speech.  In a small number of cases, you will also find a narrow phonetic transcription of the sample (see Phonetic Transcriptions for a complete list).  The recordings average four minutes in length and feature both the reading of one of two standard passages, and some unscripted speech. The two passages are Comma Gets a Cure (currently our standard passage) and The Rainbow Passage (used in our earliest recordings).

For instructional materials or coaching in the accents and dialects represented here, please go to Other Dialect Services.