Wu Chinese

Wu Chinese is a group of languages mainly spoken in Shanghai, Zhejiang province, and parts of Jiangsu province. These places are south of the Yangtze River and are called the Wu cultural region. People often call Wu Chinese "Shanghainese" when talking to people from outside the area, especially with foreigners.

In the 1800s, the form of Wu Chinese from Suzhou, called Suzhounese, was thought to be the most important. But by the early 1900s, Shanghainese became more important, especially as Shanghai grew fast.

Language experts think Wu Chinese is very special. It keeps sounds from very old Chinese that many other forms lost. It also has its own ways of building and arranging words. A famous expert, Chao Yuen Ren, grew up speaking a form of Wu Chinese from Changzhou. Because of its gentle and pleasant sound, Wu Chinese is often called "the tender speech of Wu."

Names

See also: Varieties of Chinese

Most people who speak Wu Chinese don't usually call it "Wu." This name is used by language experts. It's like saying someone speaks a "Romance language" instead of naming a specific one like Standard Mandarin or Hochdeutsch.

People usually just call their own way of speaking by adding the word for "speech" to the name of their place. For example, people in Wenzhou call their language Wenzhou speech, shown as 溫州話. In some northern Wu areas, they might add the word for "chat" instead, like in Jiaxing where they say Jiaxing chat, written as 嘉興閒話.

There are several names used for the whole group of Wu languages:

• Wu language (吴语; 吳語; Wúyǔ), which is the formal name used in books about languages.
• Wu topolect (吴方言; 吳方言; Wú fāngyán), another common name that some people might see as less respectful.
• Wuyue language (吴越语; 吳越語; Wúyuèyǔ), a poetic name that connects the language to ancient cultures of the Wu and Yue states from a long time ago during the Warring States period.
  • Goetian, a name that comes from a Japanese way of saying Wuyue, is also sometimes used.
• Jiang–Zhe speech (江浙话; 江浙話; Jiāngzhè huà), a name meaning the speech from Jiangsu and Zhejiang.
• Jiangnan speech (江南话; 江南話; Jiāngnán huà), another name linking the language to the Jiangnan area. This is different from another language called Jiangbei speech, which is a type of Huai Chinese.

History

It is believed that Han Chinese peoples first arrived in the area during very old times. After people moved during the Upheaval of the Five Barbarians, the way of speaking that would become modern Wu Chinese began to form, though the court language of Jiankang (today Nanjing) was still different from that of ordinary people. A second wave of people moving during the Southern Song dynasty, this time to Lin'an (Hangzhou), led to the formation of the modern literary layer, and during the Yuan and Ming dynasties, many traditions of acting and everyday texts began to appear. Later, during the Qing dynasty, people began translating the Bible into local ways of speaking, recording how many local words were said for the first time. This was also when the city growth of Shanghai happened, leading to its city way of speaking becoming more important than that of Suzhou. The 20th century was a big moment for Wu speaking, as Standard Mandarin was encouraged across the country, though the 21st century is seeing efforts to bring back many Wu Chinese ways of speaking.

Before the migration of the Han Chinese peoples, the Jiangnan region was lived in by Kra-Dai or Austroasiatic peoples, who were called barbarians by early Chinese.

According to old history, Taibo of Wu settled in the area during the Shang dynasty, bringing many people and Chinese ways of governing to form the state of Wu. Most people living there would have been the ancient Baiyue peoples, who had different customs and ways compared to the Chinese.

It is said in Master Lü's Spring and Autumn Annals that the customs and ways of speaking of the states of Wu and Yue were the same. This refers not just to the Baiyue way of speaking of the area, but also of "Ancient Wu", a Chinese-like way of speaking that was likely used only by leaders. The northern border of this Ancient Wu way of speaking is at the Huai River rather than the Yangtze like it is today, and its southern borders may have reached as far as Fujian, as Proto-Min may have been a child way of speaking of Ancient Wu, though this is not fully agreed. As early as the time of Guo Pu (275–324), speakers noticed differences between ways of speaking in different parts of China, including the area where Ancient Wu was spoken. The way of speaking slowly moved north because of growing pressure from the Central Plains, until its northern limit was set near the Yangtze River towards the end of the Western Jin dynasty. However, all modern Wu ways of speaking work within the Qieyun system and so Old Chinese cannot be the main origin of Wu Chinese today.

It is known that Wu ways of speaking took in many words from Kra-Dai. A study of the way of speaking in Maqiao, a town near Shanghai, found that 126 out of about a thousand words looked at were of Kra-Dai origin. Words such as 落蘇 (Wugniu: 8loq-su "aubergine") are also shared between other Sinitic languages (eg. Teochew, Peng'im: lag8 sou1) as well as Kra-Dai languages (cf. Standard Zhuang lwggwz). Shared words with Austroasiatic languages have also been suggested, though many of them, such as Vietnamese đầm, bèo, and kè, have also been argued to be areal features, Chinese words in disguise, or long shots.

Though Sino-Tibetan, Kra-Dai, Austronesian and Austroasiatic are mostly considered to be not connected to one another, Laurent Sagart has proposed some possible links. Specifically, Tai–Kadai and Sino-Tibetan could possibly both belong to the Sino-Austronesian family of languages because of some similar words between their oldest forms, and there is also some, though much weaker, evidence to suggest that Austroasiatic should also be included. However, his ideas are just one among many about the links of these languages, and is not widely agreed. See the Sino-Austronesian languages article for some more detail.

It seems that Wu ways of speaking have had influences from non-Chinese languages, and many contain words related to other languages in various levels. These words however are few and far between, and Wu on the whole is most strongly influenced by other Chinese ways of speaking rather than any other language influence.

This time is marked by two big moves of people into the Wu-speaking area. The first was in the 4th century from mainly the mountains of Shandong, whereas the second happened during the 12th century, and came from the Heluo region.

Events such as the Wu Hu uprising and the Disaster of Yongjia during the Western Jin dynasty, together known as the Upheaval of the Five Barbarians, caused the imperial court to move from the Heluo region, along with a big move of people from the north that lasted 150 years, mainly northern Jiangsu and much of Shandong, moving into the Jiangnan region, making a new capital at Jiankang, modern-day Nanjing.

People moved as far south as central Zhejiang, though many settled in the easier areas in the north, that is to say, the Yangtze Delta and the Hangjiahu Plain. Early steps of this time of change was likely marked by different ways of speaking used together, with ordinary people typically speaking Ancient Wu or their own Shandong or northern Jiangsu Chinese, and the leaders, both new arrivals and old nobility, typically speaking a way not very different from that of early medieval Luoyang. This situation with different ways of speaking eventually led to the forming of modern Wu, with many early mixed levels that are hard to separate today. It is not known exactly when the language of the Baiyue stopped being used, though during the Eastern Han dynasty, Kra-Dai words were heard in the everyday way of speaking of people in the region, and by the end of the Western Jin, the common way of speaking of the region was Chinese, as will be explained below.

As early as the Eastern Wu dynasty, writers talked about the way of speaking of the Southern people (that is of the Wu-speaking areas), saying that it is neither Wu-sounding nor Northern. However, evidence suggests that the main way of speaking among ordinary people was, in fact, Chinese, although not one that was seen as "proper". This possible everyday Chinese would be a common Jiangdong Chinese (古江東方言), as is seen in the Book of Wei, which unkindly says the way of speaking of Jiangdong sounds like calls of wild animals. The court way of speaking of Jiankang at this time would not have been the same as the everyday Wu way of speaking, though it would have been closely related. This would also be the time where Japanese Go-on (呉音; Hepburn: go-on; pinyin: Wúyīn) sound readings were taken in, and it is agreed that these readings would have been taken from the way of speaking of medieval Jiankang.

One well-known old speaker of the medieval Wu way of speaking was Emperor Yangdi of the Sui dynasty and his Empress Xiao. Emperor Xuan of Western Liang, a member of Emperor Wu of Liang's court, was Empress Xiao's grandfather and he most likely learned Wu at Jiankang. It is also noted in the writing of the Qieyun, a Sui dynasty rime dictionary, that the way of speaking of Wu, as well as that of Chu, is "at times too soft and light". A story known as The Story of Xue Rengui Crossing the Sea and Pacifying Liao (薛仁貴跨海征遼故事), which is about the Tang dynasty hero Xue Rengui, is believed to have been written in Suzhouenese. After the An Lushan rebellion, big moves of people into the north Wu-speaking areas happened, which some believe made the north-south difference we see today. Yongjianese [[zh]], a way of speaking of Oujiang Wu, was first recorded during the Song dynasty. Yongjianese is the way of speaking in which the Liushugu [[zh]] (六書故) by Dai Tong [[zh]] (戴侗, 1200-1285) is written. This writing about writing was published in 1320.

After the Jingkang incident, the imperial capital of the Song dynasty was moved from Bianjing (modern-day Kaifeng) to Lin'an (Hangzhou), starting the Southern Song time. This also matched a big move of people mostly from the Heluo region, a part of the Central Plains south of the Yellow River that roughly goes from Luoyang to Kaifeng, which also brought a way of speaking that was not only phonologically and in words different from the Wu Chinese of the time but also was syntactically and in shape different. The Old Mandarin influence showed in the form of the modern literary layer, as it was also the court way of speaking of the time. Coblin believes that this literary layer is also the start of Huai Chinese.

Unlike earlier times, the history of Wu Chinese after the Mongol conquest of China becomes much clearer because of the start of everyday texts.

After the Mongol conquest of China, a time of calm followed, and everyday ways of speaking started being used more. This is clear in the fact that Chinese opera shows, including those of places speaking either Northern or Southern Wu, started using their own ways of speaking, rather than Classical Chinese, as had been the normal during and before the Song dynasty.

The Tō-on (唐音; Hepburn: tō-on; Pinyin: Tángyīn) sound readings brought in during the Japanese Kamakura period were mainly based on the everyday way of speaking of northern Zhejiang at around the end of the Song dynasty or start of the Yuan dynasty, despite what its name may suggest. Looking at writings of the time shows big voice differences between the Wu of today and that of the 13th century.

The Ming dynasty saw more growth of local operas, such as Suzhou pingtan, and more everyday texts being written. In particular, the well-known Classic Chinese Novels, such as Water Margin, are believed to have taken in many words and ways of shaping from Hangzhounese.

The Yuan-Ming change saw a huge loss of life in the Jianghuai area because of things such as the Red Turban Rebellions. The Hongwu Emperor told people from Jiangnan, mainly in Suzhou, Songjiang, Jiaxing, Hangzhou, and other Northern Wu-speaking places, to move to the now empty places in modern central Jiangsu. More moving happened some years later to get away from wokou pirates. These moves are believed to have added to the Wu-like features in western Huai Chinese groups, such as Tongtai.

Differences between ways of speaking were not as clear in writings until Ming times, and so special ways of speaking were seen in acting only after the fall of the Yuan. These differences are mainly found in music such as old folk songs and tanci (a kind of song or poem). For instance, the Shange (山歌; Shāngē; 'Mountain songs'), a group of folk songs put together during the Ming dynasty by Feng Menglong in southern Jiangsu and northern Zhejiang, where Northern Wu is spoken today, shows clear marks of modern Wu Chinese in its words. Other Ming writings that are either written in Wu or have parts where Wu is used include:

• Sanyan (三言), a group of three stories also put together by Feng Menglong
• Erpai (二拍), two short story groups by Ling Mengchu
• Xingshiyan (型世言), a long story recorded by Lu Renlong (陸人龍)
• Huanshaji (浣紗記), an opera by Liang Chenyu (梁辰魚)
• Mo Hanzhai Dingben Chuanqi (墨憨齋定本傳奇), by Feng Menglong
• Guzhang Juechen (鼓掌絕塵), a late Ming group of novels
• Bozhonglian (缽中蓮), written by an unknown writer

These writings have a small number of special ways of forming words, some of which are not found in modern Mandarin, old Chinese, or in modern Wu ways of speaking. They do have many of the special words in its speaking found in modern Wu, such as ways of speaking I, you, but clearly show that not all of the earlier special features of these Wu ways of speaking were kept into present ways of speaking. These writings also have a number of letters made only to show features not found in the old language and used some common letters as sound help (see Chinese character classification) to show other special Wu words.

A 16th century writing called the Wenqiji (問奇集; 問奇集; Wènqíjí) has a part called Gedi Xiangyin (各地鄉音) that records the local sound of words in various places. Unlike the Qieyun writing, it separates the early Southwestern Mandarin of Huguang, that is of Chu, from Wu Chinese. The part records typical features of modern Wu, such as:

• the /ŋ/ end in the word 打; 'to strike' (打為黨)
• the loss of the last sound in words such as 解; 'to untie' (解為嫁)
• the pointy sound -yu_ (Wugniu) (豬為知)
• the voice putting on sound (potentially even the breathy voice or "murmur" that Northern Wu is known for) of old voiced first sounds (辰為人, 范為萬, etc.)

Writings in the early Qing dynasty stayed much the same as that of the Ming dynasty. Writings of the time include the Qingzhongpu and Doupeng xianhua, an early Qing normal novel. During the 18th century, big changes in words happened away from that seen in Shange; many writings we have of the time are acting in nature. Writings from this part include the operas (especially kunqu operas) by Qian Decang (錢德蒼) in the group Zhuibaiqiu (綴白裘), and the stories written by Shen Qifeng [[zh]] or what are known as Shenshi Sizhong (沈氏四種), as well as huge numbers of tanci (彈詞) songs.

From the late Qing time to Republican China (the 19th and early 20th centuries), long everyday novels (蘇白小說 or 吳語小說) such as The Sing-song Girls of Shanghai (海上花列傳) and The Nine-tailed Turtle (九尾龜) started to appear.

At the same time, missionary Joseph Edkins put together big amounts of information and published several learning writings on Shanghainese, as well as Bibles in a few main Wu ways of speaking, including Southern Wu ways of speaking such as Jinhuanese and Wenzhounese.

After the Taiping Rebellion, many people moving from Mandarin-speaking places moved into the Wu-speaking area. Xuanzhou Wu therefore moved back, which is shown in the fact that it is now spoken only in the mountain parts of southern Anhui. Some land changes and steps happened, mainly near the Yangtze River. The new arriving Huai Chinese ways of speaking have been slowly taking over the town and country Wu ways of speaking. For instance, in Lishui county, Nanjing area, the Huai way of speaking was only inside the town itself until the 1960s; it is now taking over the Wu way of speaking even in country areas.

Several important supporters of everyday Chinese for official use, such as Lu Xun and Chao Yuen Ren, were speakers of Northern Wu ways of speaking, in this case Shaoxingese and Changzhounese respectively. Wenzhounese was used during the Second World War to avoid Japanese catching messages.

After the start of the People's Republic of China, the strong support of Mandarin in the Wu-speaking area again changed the use of Wu Chinese. Interestingly, Wenzhounese was used again during the Vietnam War to avoid enemy understanding messages. Wu ways of speaking were slowly taken out of most modern acting and schools. With the coming of a moving group of people not speaking Wu, the almost full change of public acting and groups to only Mandarin as well as some steps to support Mandarin, support and making Wu languages regular became hard and left them more likely to take in Mandarin. In 1992, students in Shanghai were not allowed to speak Shanghainese at all times on school grounds. As of now, Wu has no public place, no law support and there is no officially agreed romanization.

It is common to find children who grew up with a local kind of Mandarin as their first way of speaking with little or no knowing of a Wu way of speaking at all. This led to more work to keep and write about Wu Chinese, with the first big try being the Linguistic Atlas of Chinese Dialects, which looked at 2,791 places across the country, including 121 Wu places (an increase from the two places in PKU's earlier looks). This also led to the making of a big group of digital recordings of all places, however, this group is not available to the general public. The atlas's writer, Cao Zhiyun, sees many of these ways of speaking as "in danger" and has brought in the name 濒危方言 ('ways of speaking in danger' or 'in danger local ways of speaking') to make people notice the problem, although big world groups, such as Glottolog and Ethnologue, do not share these feelings.

Although more TV shows are showing in Wu ways of speaking, they are not allowed to show during main times. They are generally more fun than serious and many of these shows, such as Hangzhou's "阿六頭説新聞" ("Old Liutou tells you the news"), give local or area news in the way of speaking, but most are only fifteen minutes of air time. Popular video sites such as Youku and Tudou also hold a group of user-put audio and video acting in many Wu ways of speaking, most of which are area TV shows, although some are user-made songs and the like. A number of books are also showing up to teach people how to speak Wu ways of speaking such as Suzhouenese and Shanghainese, the last of which even having world titles.

Today, popular support to keep Wu languages is very strong, while full-length movies such as B for Busy and very popular TV shows such as Blossoms Shanghai have been made in Wu ways of speaking (in both before-mentioned cases, Shanghainese). It is now common to see ads and notices, as well as government acting, using Wu Chinese written in not-ad hoc ways of writing.

Classification

Wu Chinese is a group of languages mainly spoken in Shanghai, Zhejiang, and Jiangsu. It is different from other Chinese languages like Mandarin or Cantonese.

Wu Chinese is split into two main groups: Northern Wu and Southern Wu. These groups are very different, and people who speak one usually cannot understand the other easily. There is also a smaller group called Western Wu, which is influenced by nearby Mandarin languages. The Southern Wu group has many different varieties.

Phonology

See also: Northern Wu phonology

Wu varieties have more sounds than many other Chinese languages. They also have complex tone systems that change with the words around them. The sounds in Wu languages vary a lot, making them hard to describe simply.

In terms of consonants, Wu languages often have more at the start of words than at the end. The endings usually only allow two specific consonant sounds. Some Wu varieties may add or change these endings.

Wu languages also have many vowel sounds, similar to some European languages. For example, the variety spoken in Shanghai's Fengxian District has around 20 different vowel sounds. This large number of vowels comes from unique sound changes in the language.

Wu varieties also use special voice qualities in their tones, such as breathy and creaky voices, which affect how words sound.

Tones

Wu varieties usually have 7 to 8 tones, but some can have as few as 5 or as many as 12. These tones can change based on the words they are used with, a feature called tone sandhi. This happens in words made of multiple parts, in certain word pairs, and with small words that add meaning to sentences.

The tone sandhi in Wu can change depending on the type of words used together. Some Wu languages change the tone of the word on the right, while others change the tone of the word on the left. Both types can be found in Wu languages.

Grammar

The grammar of Wu languages is mostly like Standard Chinese, but there are some interesting differences. Wu languages use special phrases to connect verbs and objects.

Like other Chinese languages, Wu uses words called classifiers and adds particles to the end of sentences. The usual word order in Wu is subject-verb-object, but sometimes it changes to put important ideas at the front of the sentence. This happens more often in Wu than in other Chinese languages.

Wu languages also use repeated words more often than Standard Chinese. They can repeat verbs to show commands or finished actions.

Vocabulary

For more terms, refer to the Wu Swadesh lists on Wiktionary.

Wu Chinese has its own special words and ways of speaking. It shares many words with other Chinese languages but also has unique ones. Some of these words come from very old Chinese.

Wu Chinese includes special words for family members, things, and actions. For example, it has its own words for "mother," "to wash," and "to tie." Many of these words are also used in a dialect called Hangzhounese.

Because Shanghai was a busy port, Wu Chinese picked up words from other languages, especially English and French. Some of these words are now used in many Chinese languages.

Wu Chinese also has two ways to say many words: one for reading and writing, and another for everyday speaking. For example, the word for "horse" can sound different depending on whether you are reading or talking with friends.

Orthography

Wu Chinese is mainly written using Chinese characters. Because most speakers live in the People's Republic of China, they often use Simplified Chinese characters. People sometimes use words that sound right, and books like the Great Dictionary of Shanghainese help choose the best way to write things.

Romanization

Main article: Romanization of Wu Chinese

Wu Chinese does not have an official way to write it using only letters. Many people use a version of Hanyu Pinyin because it is familiar. Online groups like Wu-Chinese and Wugniu have made their own systems to write Wu Chinese with letters, using old books as guides.

Literature

The Wu dialect first appeared in books during the Ming dynasty in plays and songs. By the early 1900s, it was used in some novels, especially in the conversations of some characters. One famous book, Shanghai Flowers by Han Bangqing, had all its dialogue in Wu.

Even though Wu was used in some popular books at the time, it didn't stay in writing for long. By 1910, Wu's role in literature started to fade because other forms of Chinese writing became more important and popular.