There is a misconception in the study of dialects in Chinese literature: due to the repeated copying and engraving by literati, there are few traces of dialects in historical texts. Language masters after Yang Xiong, such as Guo Pu, Yan Zhitui, Lu Fayan, Lu Deming, Gu Yanwu, Dai Zhen, Wang Niansun, Jiang Yong, Jiang Yougao, Zhang Taiyan, Huang Kan, etc., have a relatively clear understanding and in-depth research on this. They either annotated, corrected, or supplemented historical dialects, collected dialect sayings at that time, explored the pronunciation and origins of dialects, or analyzed the vocabulary and grammar of dialects. Scholars with profound insights have even pointed out the existence of dialects in the classics. Such as Huang Jiadai's "The Analects of Qi and Lu Dialects" and Chunyu Hong'en's "Annotations on Gongyang Dialects" from the Qing Dynasty. But their work has not been widely recognized, and even scholars have criticized it. At present, research on dialects in literature requires further clarification on the following cognitive issues.
Ancient and modern. Literature dialects are not limited to ancient times, they can be divided into historical literature dialects and modern literature dialects. The corpus of modern literature dialects comes from, but is not limited to, local chronicles, dialect maps, dialect treatises, dialect survey reports, language resource collections, dialect dictionaries, and other achievements. They are both corpus clusters and academic research achievements. For example, is dialect survey a study? Of course, it is research, and it is a very difficult research. When we use a vocabulary to investigate dialect words, we need to study the vocabulary, selection points, objects, and transcription. The word list for different regions should be 'generally available, but not specific', and cannot be 'measured to the end with one ruler'. The widespread existence of "white reading" and the ancient pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammar of southern dialects are the "living evidence" of ancient language. Correspondingly, morphological organization, chronological identification, pronunciation verification, and regional analysis are a form of research. As for dialect dictionaries and dialect maps, they require a huge amount of research, rather than just simple collection of materials.
Above and below ground. Literary dialects are not limited to handed down documents, but must include unearthed documents, both of which are essential "basic plates" for the study of literary dialects. In the handed down literature, it is not limited to the dialect specific books recorded in the catalogs of previous dynasties, nor is it limited to scattered materials in various handwritten texts and annotations; In unearthed documents, there are materials such as armor, gold, jade, stone, bamboo slips, silk, stone inscriptions, epitaphs, brick inscriptions, etc. excavated from the "underground", as well as "paper books" and "written books" such as Dunhuang manuscripts. The two should not be neglected.
Explicit and implicit. There are few documents that specifically collect dialect materials, whether they are passed down or unearthed. The common feature of dialect materials in handed down literature is' scattered '. 'San' refers not only to its distribution in various types of literature like a vast ocean, but also to its different forms of presentation. Some dialect materials have been clearly marked by predecessors; Some dialect materials that have not been told to us by predecessors require modern people to verify and compare them in order to determine their dialectal nature. In other words, dialects that have been explicitly pointed out by predecessors as "explicit" but are only prevalent in certain dialect regions and submerged in literature are also the source and focus of research in the field of literary dialectology.
Dialects and common language. Literary dialects are a complex system. Dialects and common language are intertwined in literature: what was previously referred to as a "dialect" may not necessarily be used only in a certain place, but may also be common language or even elegant language; Those who did not specify the nature of dialects by predecessors may not necessarily be dialects. The ancients said it was a dialect of this place, but it may have been widely used elsewhere. When studying dialects in literature, it is often necessary to use common language corpus as evidence. Dialects and non dialects are dynamic, and dialects from the previous historical period may be transformed into common language in the next historical period; On the contrary, if the previous generation spoke the same language, the descendants may become dialects. Former generations sometimes treated some common colloquialisms as dialects, and later generations often proved through literature that they are not dialect words, which is why.
Space and time. Each generation has its own dialect. The dialects mentioned by our predecessors in the literature of a certain era have been copied and engraved through generations, and we need a lot of effort to identify and recognize them. There is a viewpoint in the study of ancient history that 'the layered formation of Chinese ancient history', and in terms of dialect materials, it is also the layered formation of dialects in literature. The changes in dialects can vary from time to time or from place to place. Dialects have "transformation" as their essential characteristic. In the Ming Dynasty, Fang Yizhi's "Tongya · Yanyuan" said, "Fangyin is a natural transformation between heaven and earth. The ancient transformation was the Han and Jin dynasties, and the Han and Jin dynasties were the Song and Yuan dynasties, as well as the trend." "Tongya · Yinyi ZaLun" also said, "The transformation of dialects is like the transformation of plants and trees." "The trend" is its inherent objective law.
Region and carrier. The dialects in unearthed documents are precious and auspicious. However, the mismatch between the place of dialect transmission and the location of the carrier is a common phenomenon in unearthed literature dialects, and it is also an important issue that is easily overlooked in research. It is generally believed that the dialects in unearthed documents are clear in terms of era and region. But the dialect materials unearthed from a certain place cannot be regarded as dialects of a certain place or time. For example, artifacts produced in Shu can be found in Zhao and even further away. Therefore, the place where objects appear does not equal the place where dialects are popular. In addition, the characters used in unearthed documents have also been passed down through generations, and the author, copyist, caster, and burial person are unknown, which cannot accurately delineate their passage area.
Dialect characters and dialect words. Using Chinese characters to record dialects, characters and words are not related. Some of them only have phonetic symbols, while others have both phonetic and semantic symbols; Some use homophones, some use homophones, and some use self-made characters. Dialect characters cannot be analyzed for meaning using the "Six Books": adding certain symbols to the original characters, using different components to create characters, or creating characters by replacing components. Some components may also change their shape, position, space, size, etc. The meaning of a word does not equal its meaning, and analyzing the word formation of Chinese dialects often falls short. For example, some dialect words that have sound but no words are not truly sound but no words. We need to trace their origins through phonological evolution to find the true "fossil layer". The same word may have different dialects and usage of characters; When our predecessors recorded, some carefully considered and selected characters, while others were highly arbitrary. This issue is both a theoretical and practical problem in the study of literary dialects, and needs to be considered from multiple perspectives such as linguistics, philology, history, archaeology, etc.
Subjectivity and objectivity. Dialects have separability. Objectively speaking, the boundaries of dialects are not only clearly defined, such as mountains, rivers, etc., but also have a large number of vague boundaries, forming a tangled "belt". Is there a fixed and universally applicable standard for dialect zoning? The answer is negative. The number of standards is directly proportional to the number of partitions. According to the research objectives and the amount of materials used, as well as homogeneity and heterogeneity, zoning can be standardized and diversified. If a large number of people have migrated to different places in history and integrated with local dialects, even if big data is used to draw the same dialect line, it is difficult to define a universally recognized dialect area, and only dialect mixed areas are separated. Because this is the result of human operation, not an objective existence.
The core of the above eight questions is whether one has dialect awareness. It can be seen that some research results on dialects are based on dialect materials, while the evidence materials, research methods, and argumentation process are all in common language. It is believed that research on dialects in literature should focus on the following six aspects.
Clear concept. Literature dialect "is a complex system. Firstly, ancient dialect words included loanwords. The term 'loanwords' here includes two types: loanwords and foreign language words; Each category includes words from various ethnic minorities within China as well as other ethnic groups outside of China. Secondly, some materials have annotations and definitions, but some materials only annotate square sounds, which are not phonetic training and do not have universality, and cannot be analogized through literature. Again, the "literature" of literary dialects is not limited to historical documents, and today's dialect survey reports, dialect dictionaries, dialect maps, dialect chronicles, dialect treatises, etc. are also literature. Since dialects are also present in contemporary literature, they should be the subject of study in literary dialectology. Finally, and most importantly, the term 'literary dialect' here refers more to the language spoken by people from a certain place, rather than the 'dialect' that is opposed to the common language today.
Divide the region. It is unimaginable to study dialects without discussing regions. The division of Chinese dialects is both the starting point and the destination of dialect research. The study of regional pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, graphic description, historical tracing, and dialect mapping all rely on existing Chinese dialect divisions or serve Chinese dialect divisions. Classification and zoning are different, and if both are unclear, objectivity and scientificity cannot be achieved. Scholars have done many studies on the classification of dialects in literature, often based on materials previously identified as dialects, but this itself is "incomplete". We need to conduct a specific analysis of each dialect word and each phonetic phenomenon mentioned by our predecessors: what is their range of use? What criteria are used to divide the area? Have you taken into account the implicit dialect materials revealed through textual research? On the basis of dialect classification, it is necessary to divide according to a certain era and standard. Dialects are dynamic entities: dialects of a certain region are often unproven by materials, and materials from different times are not the same as those from previous times; Wang Guowei, Huang Kan, and Wei Jiangong have long revealed the dynamic nature of dialect materials.
Divided by time. Each generation has its own dialect, and the overall appearance and spatial distribution of dialects in each era are inevitably different. The distinction between different eras is not clear-cut, there must be a transitional zone between dialects. The literature of a certain era records the dialect words of that time or previous generations, but it cannot be concluded that its appearance or use is limited to this era. The author believes that it is necessary to greatly expand the period of literary dialectology, and the Chinese dialect materials in modern literature are still literary dialect materials. In other words, 'literary dialects' can be broadly or narrowly defined. Narrowly defined literature dialect research refers to dialect materials found in ancient books, while broadly defined literature dialect research should include dialect materials from various literature since the Republic of China. Here we particularly propose the concept of "dialectal chronology", whose task is to examine the historical hierarchy of Chinese dialects, strictly distinguish between simultaneous and metachronous materials, and identify the emergence, development, disappearance, and patterns of every word, every grammatical phenomenon, and every phonetic feature. Chronology, domain segmentation, and stratification are major projects in the study of dialectology in literature.
Don't use words. The relationship between dialect words and word usage is a difficult problem in the study of literary dialects. Some people refer to the use of dialect words as dialect words, which is not accurate enough. Do you have any dialect words? There are also some. That is the words specially created for dialect words, which have no other meaning and can therefore be called 'dialect words'. Words are linguistic units, and a large number of so-called 'dialect words' are just phonetic symbols of dialect words. There are both single meanings and common characters such as "Fang Fang" and "Fang Ya". Someone has proposed the viewpoint of "dialect based characters", and there have been many achievements in the examination of dialect based characters. Here, it is believed that "ben zi" is a concept in the field of philology, and its original meaning needs to be obtained from the analysis of its form. There should be a dialect 'native character', but the total amount is very small. Huang Kan highly praised Wang Niansun's "Guangya Shuzheng" for "specializing in searching for evidence of righteousness, rather than relying on the original character". Every time I see someone discussing dialect words based on grammar, it's because they don't distinguish between dialect words and phrases, and there's a suspicion of using glue and drums.
Be cautious. The dialect words spoken by ancient people cannot be easily determined to be dialect words of a certain region. Even with literature support, multiple verifications are still needed. To determine the dialect words in literature, the five elements of "time," "place," "sound," "form," and "meaning" are indispensable. Ancient dialect words and common language words were in a constantly changing state. The common language words of a certain era have evolved into dialect words due to the development of language. Similarly, the dialect words in this area may become dialect words in other places. For example, in "Shuowen Jiezi", it is said that the Chu dialect "yu", which represents the pen, is called "bulu" in Wu and "fu" in Yan. And another earlier pre Qin document, "Er Ya · Shi Qi," states: "The absence of rules is called a pen." Jin Guo Pu's annotation: "The Shu people call a pen 'non rules', which is a change in language." So, was it during the era of "Er Ya" that it was the Shu dialect? Or is it based on the nature of "Er Ya" that the elegant language of the pre Qin period became Wu language during the Han Dynasty, and then became Shu language during the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties?
It is worth noting that due to the limitations of ancient scholars' observations and investigation methods, it can often be found in literature from other places that indicate language spoken in a certain place. The "Dialect" written by Yang Xiong of the Western Han Dynasty is the first dialect survey work in China, with over 600 entries. More than half of the entries do not indicate the passage area, and some entries do not indicate the passage area. There are also cases without literature use cases, such as Guo Pu's annotations of "not detailed", "not detailed in pronunciation and meaning", "not detailed out", "not detailed in this pronunciation and meaning", etc. The proportion of the three added together is not small. In addition, it is necessary to have a clear understanding of the dual language mechanism of using elegant language and dialects in ancient social language communication, and to adopt a cautious attitude towards dialects in previous literature.
Good synthesis. Research on dialects in literature requires a systematic perspective. The system has hierarchy, and each type of word in dialect words is a system. When studying, it is important to pay equal attention to the subsystems of form, sound, meaning, usage, and character. Although they are not on the same level, this is precisely the characteristic of Chinese literary dialectology. The dialect collection of each region is also a large system, subordinate to the larger system of literary language. The so-called good synthesis refers to fully considering the expansion and contraction of regions when studying the evolution of the times and the development of dialects, with both vertical and horizontal aspects. Dialect research must pay attention to materials and sources, which are the foundation of all dialect research. At every level, it is necessary to first separate the era and limit the region, and then conduct research on literary dialectology. The method of separating the era is through documentary evidence. Whether it is passed down or unearthed documents, attention should be paid to the authenticity of the documents. In the era of big data, comprehensive research can only be conducted based on literature review and the establishment of annotated dialect corpora, combined with political history, cultural history, immigration history, customs history, border history, and ethnic history.