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Article published In:
Asia-Pacific Language Variation
Vol. 4:2 (2018) ► pp.161–196

Social meaning in the perception of neutral tone variation in Putonghua

 | University of Nottingham
This study investigates the perception of the variation of neutral tone, a phonetic feature in China’s official language, Putonghua. Specifically, I explore whether native listeners perceive social meanings such as standardness, regional-ness, status and/or solidarity presumably associated with the low-use, standard use, and high-use of neutral tone, and how gender influences the perception of these meanings. Based on the results of a matched-guise test, I argue that the high use of neutral tone, through its link with Beijing dialect, is possibly competing with the standard, though the latter maintains a higher level of positive meanings. I also note that the low use of neutral tone – associated with Southern China and non-Mandarin varieties – carries more negative meanings. The overall gender differences show that gender prejudice towards women still exists in China. This study enriches our understanding of sociolinguistics in China and calls for more research on language variation in China.
Keywords: neutral tone, Putonghua , Chinese, Mandarin, gender, language variation, matched-guise technique
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
    • 1.1Social meaning
    • 1.2Language standardness and language attitudes studies
    • 1.3Social meaning and gender
  • 2.Linguistic and social background
    • 2.1Regional Putonghua: Non-standard varieties of standard Chinese
    • 2.2Tones and neutral tone
    • 2.3Neutral tone variation in regional Putonghua
    • 2.4Gender (in)equality in China
  • 3.Methodology
    • 3.1Stimuli
    • 3.2Questions
    • 3.3Listeners
    • 3.4Procedure
  • 4.Results
    • 4.1Standardness
    • 4.2Perceived accent
    • 4.3Status
    • 4.4Solidarity
    • 4.5Occupational suitability
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Standardness and perceived accent
    • 5.2Status and solidarity
    • 5.3Occupational suitability
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 6 February 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/aplv.18003.zha
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