Tai Muong (Châu Phong Commune, Quỳ Châu District, Nghệ An Province): a tone diagram and an audio word list (40 recordings)
Creators: name: Pacquement, Jean
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2022
Subjects: Tai Muong, Tai dialects of Western Nghệ An (Vietnam), tone systems

description: The speaker, Lương Thị Dung, 28 years old at the time of the first interviews, is from Châu Phong Commune, Quỳ Châu District, Nghệ An Province. She calls the Tai dialect she speaks “Tai Muong”. I could work online with her first from February to April 2021, and then again in February 2022. The languages she uses in her daily life are Vietnamese and Tai Muong. She can read and write English, and she says that she also understands Lao and Thai. In the region where she lives, the language name “Tai Muong” refers to the Tai dialects spoken in this Western part of Nghệ An (e.g., Tai Yo and Tai Pao), when not Tai Daeng varieties. According to James R. Chamberlain (1984, 1991), Mène, or Tai Maen, nowadays spoken in a few districts (Khamkeuth, Viengthong, etc.) of Bolikhamxay Province (Laos), is related to these Tai dialects of Western Nghệ An. If we follow Chamberlain (1991:118-119), “Mène is a language that shows: many but not a complete set of Northern Branch lexical features; a few forms typical of the Central Branch languages; and a large amount of Southwestern Branch vocabulary.” He further suggests that “Mène is thus best characterized as a NT language with significant exposure to SWT languages.” Against that placement, Michel Ferlus (2008:309), referring specifically to a Tai Yo variety spoken in Quỳ Châu, states that, with the exception of a short list of words, the vocabulary of Western Nghệ An Tai dialects is Southwestern Tai. Although the Tai dialects of Western Nghệ An seem to share many characteristics, it is important to take into account their diversity, as well as the ethnolinguistic background of the particular groups linked to their varieties, before speaking of them as subdialects of a same language. The Tai Muong lexical items which the speaker recorded were first submitted to her in Vietnamese. On the basis of the F0 measurements obtained for each tone in the monosyllabic words she recorded, a tentative tone diagram (Gedney 1972) was created and subsequently included in a presentation at the 31st Annual Meeting of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgZPU8Vxp8U). A particular feature of this tone diagram is that the DL column has only one tone [221]. This tone also appears in the DS4 box of the DS column, and one can posit a merger DL1234 = DS4, because DL syllables are of the same duration as DS4 syllables in the variety spoken by this speaker (the overall average for syllable duration in the DL column was found to be 0.15 secs). Ferlus (2008:305-306) noted the same feature in the Tai Yo variety of Quỳ Châu for which he gives a tone diagram, but his account countains a confusion between the etymology of the syllables and the tone itself. Even if DL syllables are pronounced short in that variety, they remain etymologically long syllables and cannot be considered as DS4 syllables (DS2 syllables in Ferlus’ presentation). As against the Tai Yo variety of Quỳ Châu documented by Ferlus which displays a 123-4 split in the B column, the Tai Muong variety spoken by the speaker in the same district has no split in this column. Other cases of Western Nghệ An Tai dialects with no split in the B column include: - a “Tay Muong” variety, also referred to as “Tay Pao”, spoken in Tương Dương District, Nghệ An Province (Ferlus 2008:309-311); - the Mène of Khamkeuth District (Bolikhamxay, Laos) documented by Chamberlain (1991:108); - and also some Tai Yo varieties investigated by Sầm Công Danh, which he recently discussed in a presentation at the 31st Annual Meeting of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLQ0Ucr85lw). With respect to the 12-3-4 split in the A column, further interactions with the speaker in February 2022 confirmed this feature, which reflects a diversity of rising tones in that particular column. This split can be compared with the 123-4 split in A in most Tai Yo varieties on the one hand and with the 12-34 split in a Tai Yo variety in Quỳ Hợp District documented by Sầm Công Danh on the other. References Chamberlain, James R. 1984. The Tai dialects of Khammouan province: their diversity and origins. <em>Science of Language Papers</em> 4:62–95. Bangkok: Chulalongkorn University (Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Arts). Chamberlain, James R. 1991. Mène: a Tai dialect originally spoken in Nghê An (Nghê Tinh), Vietnam: preliminary linguistic observations and historical implications. <em>Journal of the Siam Society</em> 79.2:103–123. Ferlus, Michel. 2008. The Tai Dialects of Nghệ An, Vietnam (Tay Daeng, Tay Yo, Tay Muong). In Anthony V.N. Diller, Jerold A. Edmondson and Yongxian Luo (eds.), <em>The Tai-Kadai Languages</em>, 298–316. London and New York: Routledge. Gedney, William J. 1972. A Checklist for Determining Tones in Tai Dialects. In M. Estellie Smith (ed.), <em>Studies in Linguistics in Honor of George L. Trager</em>, 191–205. The Hague: Mouton.
description: From the words, phrases, or sentences recorded by the speaker, the following items were selected to provide examples of monosyllabic words for each of the twenty boxes in Gedney's tone diagram. 1-10: một [nɯŋB1]; hai [sɔ:ŋA1]; ba [sa:mA1]; bốn [si:B1]; năm [ha:C1]; sáu [hokDS1]; bảy [cetDS2]; tám [pɛ:tDL2]; chín [kawC2]; mười [sipDS1]. 1. ngon [cɛ:pDL4] 'tasty'; 2. đi [pa:A4] 'go'; 3. cá [mɛ:B4 pa:A2] 'fish'; 3. cá [pa:A2] 'fish'; 4. gà [mɛ:B4 kajB2] 'chicken'; 5. vai [ba:B3] 'shoulder'; 6. mệt [nɯajB1] 'tired'; 7. ăn [kinA2] 'eat'; 7. muốn ăn [za:kDL3 ki:A4] 'want to eat'; 8. trời [faaC4] 'sky'; 9. mưa [fonA1] 'rain'; 10. trứng [sajB1] 'egg'; 10. trứng [ma:kDL1 sajB1] 'egg'; 11. kiến [mɛ:B4 motDS4] 'ant'; 12. ếch [mɛ:B4 khiatDL1] 'small frog'; 13. chim [mɛ:B4 nokDS4] 'bird'; 14. muốn [za:kDL3] 'want'; 14. muốn có [za:kDL3 dajC3] 'want to have'; 14. muốn làm [za:kDL3 ʔi:B3 ʔe:A4] 'want to do'; 15. ba [phɔ:B4, pɔ:B4, ʔa:jC3] 'father'; 16. mẹ, má [me:C4, ʔu:jA3, ʔɤ:jC3] 'mother'; 17. mặt trăng [ma:kDL1 bɯanA3] 'moon'; 18. sao [ma:kDL1 da:wA3] 'star'; 19. nấm [hetDS1] 'mushroom'; 20. rau [phakDS1] 'vegetable'; 21. thích [ʔi:B3] 'like, love'; 22. móng tay móng chân [lepDS4 ti:nA2 lepDS4 mɯ:A4] 'nails of the hands, nails of the feet'; 23. bụng [pu:mA2] 'stomach'; 24. răng [hɛ:wC1] 'tooth'; 25. máu [lɯatDL4] 'blood'; 26. xương [kaɁ du:kDL3] 'bone'; 27. em gái [nɔ:ŋC4 sa:wA1] 'younger sister', chị [ʔɤ:jC3 sa:wA1] 'elder sister'; 28. em trai [nɔ:ŋC4 ca:jA4] 'younger brother'; 29. con vắt [mɛ:B4 ta:kDL4] 'land leech'; 30. sấm [fa:C4 lɯamC1 phɛ:C1] 'thunder'; 31. dao [vɛŋA4] 'knife'; 32. vào [hawC1] 'enter'; 33. rừng [pa:B2] 'forest'; 34. đen [damA3] 'black', đỏ [daɲA3] 'red', đẹp [di:A3] 'beautiful', bay [binA3] 'fly'.