I have a question about my variety of Hokkien.
I'm come from Penang, an island off the coast of peninsular Malaysia. The variety of Hokkien I speak differs from that of the rest of Malaysia.
For example
the words for "rice", "break" (e.g. of a rope), "bright", "far", "sour", "to count", "door", "to ask" are:
[ rest of Malaysia ] png3, tng3, kng1, hng3, sng1, sng3, mng2, mng3
vs.
[ Penang ] pui~3, tui~3, kui~1, hui~3, sui~1, sui~3, mui~2, mui~3
and the words for "goat", "ginger", "accent" (e.g. foreign), "box, suitcase":
[ rest of Malaysia ] iu~2, kiu~1, khiu~1, siu~1
vs.
[ Penang ] iau~2, kiau~1, khiau~1, siau~1
Notes:
1) "~" is nasalisation.
2) The tone numbers I use are just the closest ones to the 4 Mandarin ones I know. As far as I can tell, my variety of Hokkien only has these 4 tones.
Questions:
a) Is the Penang form (still) spoken on Taiwan and/or on Mainland China?
b) I would be most interested to know which part of China it came/comes from, and if it is widely spoken there, and whether it has a particular name.
c) If anyone actually speaks or knows of this variety, could they confirm that it really has only 4 tones?
Any help would be most appreciated.
Thank you,
S Lee.
An obcure variety of Hokkien?
-
Ken
Re: An obcure variety of Hokkien?
Hi Sim,
Hope I can help out. I used to have a friend who spoke almost the same kind of Hokkien as you. He told me that his ancestors came from the county of Hui An in Fujian province. Hokkien (Minnan) dialect varies mainly in terms of accent but there are a few that have variation in certain pronunciations.
Taiwanese Hokkien are almost identical to that spoken in Mainland China.
However, a Southeast Asian would find it easier to speak to a Taiwanese from a northern urban city like Taipei where they speak clearer. A southern Taiwanese from Pingtung county speaks faster with a heavy accent, which makes it difficult for us to understand.
By the way, Malaysian and Singaporean Hokkien are unique in the sense that they include certain Malay words, so much so that speakers may not regcognise that and think that they are Hokkien words. For example, the word 'marriage', you hear people using 'kao in', which is actually borrowed from Malay. The actual Hokkien word for marriage should be 'kek Hoon'.
Ken
Hope I can help out. I used to have a friend who spoke almost the same kind of Hokkien as you. He told me that his ancestors came from the county of Hui An in Fujian province. Hokkien (Minnan) dialect varies mainly in terms of accent but there are a few that have variation in certain pronunciations.
Taiwanese Hokkien are almost identical to that spoken in Mainland China.
However, a Southeast Asian would find it easier to speak to a Taiwanese from a northern urban city like Taipei where they speak clearer. A southern Taiwanese from Pingtung county speaks faster with a heavy accent, which makes it difficult for us to understand.
By the way, Malaysian and Singaporean Hokkien are unique in the sense that they include certain Malay words, so much so that speakers may not regcognise that and think that they are Hokkien words. For example, the word 'marriage', you hear people using 'kao in', which is actually borrowed from Malay. The actual Hokkien word for marriage should be 'kek Hoon'.
Ken
-
Sim Lee
Re: An obcure variety of Hokkien?
Hi there Ken,
Thanks for you input.
My mother's side of the family come from peninsular Malaysia (Sitiawan), and they speak more "normal" Hokkien (i.e. more similar to Amoy and Taiwanese Hokkien). However, I understand that my mother's father was actually BORN in Hui An, and his dialect was most definitely the png, mng form, i.e. not the pui, mui form.
You're right about Malay words in Malaysian/Singaporean Hokkien. Because of the strong Baba influence in Penang Hokkien, I think there are even MORE Malay words in Penang Hokkien than in the rest of Malaysia.
I'm going to try and write an article about Penang Hokkien in the future.
Sim.
Thanks for you input.
My mother's side of the family come from peninsular Malaysia (Sitiawan), and they speak more "normal" Hokkien (i.e. more similar to Amoy and Taiwanese Hokkien). However, I understand that my mother's father was actually BORN in Hui An, and his dialect was most definitely the png, mng form, i.e. not the pui, mui form.
You're right about Malay words in Malaysian/Singaporean Hokkien. Because of the strong Baba influence in Penang Hokkien, I think there are even MORE Malay words in Penang Hokkien than in the rest of Malaysia.
I'm going to try and write an article about Penang Hokkien in the future.
Sim.
-
James Campbell
Re: An obscure variety of Hokkien?
Dear Sim Lee,
Hmm, this is very interesting. I have a question, what about vocabulary and grammar, do you actually use the same words as the rest of the Hokkien speakers you know, or do you have separate words for things (besides the pronunciation differences you noted).
Regarding tones, from a speaker's point of view it may be quite confusing to identify all the tones individually especially like Hokkien with all its tone changes, so it may be hard to verify at this point it has only 4 tones, but this is not the most important issue.
For example, check to see how you say words like 不會/不要 or how you ask questions (是不是, 有...無, and so on). If these turn out to be different than Xiamen Hokkien, then we'll have to really check to see where it comes from. If not, then this might just be a naturally-developed language there on Penang island, a branch-off accent of Hokkien. I think I've heard or read something about this Penang dialect, but I'd have to dig through a lot of piles of information to find that article again. (That's why I'm trying to get everything organized on a website
When I visited Penang several years ago I talked with people in Mandarin as I hadn't learned Hokkien yet. And I didn't know at that time about the obscure speech variety there, or else I would have considered getting some recorded samples. I didn't even know they spoke Hokkien!
Hmm, this is very interesting. I have a question, what about vocabulary and grammar, do you actually use the same words as the rest of the Hokkien speakers you know, or do you have separate words for things (besides the pronunciation differences you noted).
Regarding tones, from a speaker's point of view it may be quite confusing to identify all the tones individually especially like Hokkien with all its tone changes, so it may be hard to verify at this point it has only 4 tones, but this is not the most important issue.
For example, check to see how you say words like 不會/不要 or how you ask questions (是不是, 有...無, and so on). If these turn out to be different than Xiamen Hokkien, then we'll have to really check to see where it comes from. If not, then this might just be a naturally-developed language there on Penang island, a branch-off accent of Hokkien. I think I've heard or read something about this Penang dialect, but I'd have to dig through a lot of piles of information to find that article again. (That's why I'm trying to get everything organized on a website
When I visited Penang several years ago I talked with people in Mandarin as I hadn't learned Hokkien yet. And I didn't know at that time about the obscure speech variety there, or else I would have considered getting some recorded samples. I didn't even know they spoke Hokkien!
-
Kobo-Daishi
Re: An obcure variety of Hokkien?
Dear Ken,
Ken wrote:
>> For example, the word 'marriage', you hear people using 'kao in', which is actually borrowed from Malay. The actual Hokkien word for marriage should be 'kek Hoon'.
Are you sure that 'kek hoon' is borrowed from Malay into Malaysian/Singaporean Hokkien and not the other way around? That is, from Chinese into Malay.
In the Taishanese dialect, 台山話 (Mand: tai2 shan1 hua4, Cant: toi4 saan1 wa6) we say 'gaoh Yeehn' for 'wedding, marriage'. I always thought that the character for 'yeehn' was this character, 姻 (Mand: yin1, Cant: yan1), so I always thought 'gaoh yeehn' was a Chinese phrase. I learned my Taishanese from my parents and they've never been to a Malay speaking country in their lives.
Taishan is in Guangdong province and is classified as belonging to the 粵 (Mand: yue4, Cant: yut6) dialect group.
To see the character for 'yeehn' click on the link below.
http://www.chinalanguage.com/cgi-bin/vi ... in,english
You can see in the definition that for the Minnan/Taiwanese pronunciation they have 'in1'
>> The actual Hokkien word for marriage should be 'kek Hoon'.
I guess 'kek hoon' is 結婚 (Mand: jie2 hun1, Cant: git3 fan1). In Taishanese, we say 'gaht foohn'.
Sorry for my weird Taishanese romanization.
I will try to ask some Taiwanese people at work to see what they use for the "gaoh" character.
Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.
Ken wrote:
>> For example, the word 'marriage', you hear people using 'kao in', which is actually borrowed from Malay. The actual Hokkien word for marriage should be 'kek Hoon'.
Are you sure that 'kek hoon' is borrowed from Malay into Malaysian/Singaporean Hokkien and not the other way around? That is, from Chinese into Malay.
In the Taishanese dialect, 台山話 (Mand: tai2 shan1 hua4, Cant: toi4 saan1 wa6) we say 'gaoh Yeehn' for 'wedding, marriage'. I always thought that the character for 'yeehn' was this character, 姻 (Mand: yin1, Cant: yan1), so I always thought 'gaoh yeehn' was a Chinese phrase. I learned my Taishanese from my parents and they've never been to a Malay speaking country in their lives.
Taishan is in Guangdong province and is classified as belonging to the 粵 (Mand: yue4, Cant: yut6) dialect group.
To see the character for 'yeehn' click on the link below.
http://www.chinalanguage.com/cgi-bin/vi ... in,english
You can see in the definition that for the Minnan/Taiwanese pronunciation they have 'in1'
>> The actual Hokkien word for marriage should be 'kek Hoon'.
I guess 'kek hoon' is 結婚 (Mand: jie2 hun1, Cant: git3 fan1). In Taishanese, we say 'gaht foohn'.
Sorry for my weird Taishanese romanization.
I will try to ask some Taiwanese people at work to see what they use for the "gaoh" character.
Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.
-
Kobo-Daishi
Re: An obcure variety of Hokkien?
Dear Ken,
I wrote:
>> Are you sure that 'kek hoon' is borrowed from Malay into Malaysian/Singaporean Hokkien and not the other way around?
Of course, I meant 'kao in' not 'kek hoon'. Sorry about that.
Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.
I wrote:
>> Are you sure that 'kek hoon' is borrowed from Malay into Malaysian/Singaporean Hokkien and not the other way around?
Of course, I meant 'kao in' not 'kek hoon'. Sorry about that.
Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.
-
Ken
Re: An obcure variety of Hokkien?
Hi Kobo Daishi,
'Kek Hoon' is the actual Hokkien term for marriage. This term is used by theTaiwanese, Mainland Chinese and other Hokkiens who speak the language in its authentic form. It is not borrowed from Malay.
However, I think that the word 'Kao In' is borrowed from the Malay word 'Kah Win'.
My humble opinion
Ken
'Kek Hoon' is the actual Hokkien term for marriage. This term is used by theTaiwanese, Mainland Chinese and other Hokkiens who speak the language in its authentic form. It is not borrowed from Malay.
However, I think that the word 'Kao In' is borrowed from the Malay word 'Kah Win'.
My humble opinion
Ken
-
James Campbell
Re: An obcure variety of Hokkien?
Get married in Taiwanese is not pronounced with a 'k' here in Taiwan, it's pronounced with a 't', maybe you guys pronounce it differently in other countries. So I would say to write it as 'ket hun'.
Although in the word 結果 it can sound more like 'kekko' but I think that's because of the 'k' in 'ko'.
Although in the word 結果 it can sound more like 'kekko' but I think that's because of the 'k' in 'ko'.
-
Sim Lee
Re: An obscure variety of Hokkien?
Very interesting thread!
1) Kau-in.
I grew up in Penang, any "kau-in" is my normal way of saying getting married, and I knew that the Malay word for it was "kahwin", so I'd always (like Ken) assumed it was borrowed from Malay into Penang Hokkien.
Kobo-Daishi's entry is very interesting in this regard.
2) kek hoon
My maternal relatives speak a more Amoy / Taiwan form of Hokkien, i.e. NOT Penang Hokkien, and their form agrees with that of James', namely with a final -t rather than -k.
But that form has a lot of palatilization, so it's "kjEt hun" (ASCII-IPA), "kiat hoon" (popular Malaysia orthography (based on English vowel values).
Sim
Footnote
About the palatalization. Here are some other examples: ripe = "sj@k1", colour = "sj@k3", to choose = kj@N4" vs. Penang Hokkien "sek1", "sek3", "keN4".
1) Kau-in.
I grew up in Penang, any "kau-in" is my normal way of saying getting married, and I knew that the Malay word for it was "kahwin", so I'd always (like Ken) assumed it was borrowed from Malay into Penang Hokkien.
Kobo-Daishi's entry is very interesting in this regard.
2) kek hoon
My maternal relatives speak a more Amoy / Taiwan form of Hokkien, i.e. NOT Penang Hokkien, and their form agrees with that of James', namely with a final -t rather than -k.
But that form has a lot of palatilization, so it's "kjEt hun" (ASCII-IPA), "kiat hoon" (popular Malaysia orthography (based on English vowel values).
Sim
Footnote
About the palatalization. Here are some other examples: ripe = "sj@k1", colour = "sj@k3", to choose = kj@N4" vs. Penang Hokkien "sek1", "sek3", "keN4".
-
Sim Lee
Re: An obscure variety of Hokkien?
Dear James (please call me Sim),
>> For example, check to see how you say words like 不會/不要 or how you >> ask questions (是不是, 有...無, and so on).
I'm sorry, I can't read see these symbols (and even if I could, I would not know how to read them, as I can't read Chinese characters - except the odd few simple ones, remembered from Chinese classes).
If you pose your question by describing the English equivalant, or by transcribing the Amoy / Taiwanese form, I may be able to respond.
You do that for the latter part of the quote above, so I can answer that. I'll use ASCII-IPA.
Penang Hokkien asks questions by using the negative particle "bo", put at the end of the positively stated phrase.
e.g. "Do you want to come" = "lu be lai bo"
literally, "you want to come, yes or no". I believe this is no different from Amoy
"li b@ lai bo"
This "bo" also corresponds to the standard question word "ma" in Mandarin (mouth+horse). It even seems probable to me that "bo" is the denasalised form of "ma", but that is just speculation on my part.
The overwhelming majority of words in Penang Hokkien have an equivalent in Amoy Hokkien. The exceptions are Malay borrowings (e.g. food terms, local objects, animals). Some examples below (Malay in brackets)
animal mi-na-tang (binating)
bead ma-nek (manek)
bottle bO-tOi (botol)
bread lo-ti (roti)
saucer pi-ring (piring)
squid sO-tOng (sotong)
stone ba-tu (batu)
and some function words like but = "ta-pi" (tetapi).
Not only do most Penang Hokkien words have Amoy equivalents, they mostly have the same tone as well (and the same consonants). The greatest difference is in the vowels, the most striking example of which I give in my initial posting.
One example of a difference in tone is for "older man, one generation older", "father's elder brother". In Penang Hokkien it is "(a-) pE?3" [ open-e, glottal stop, 3rd tone ], whereas in non-Penang Hokkien, it is "(a)-pe?4 [ closed-e, glottal stop, 4th tone ]. The number of such words is by no means SMALL, but still MOST words match in tone.
All these "facts" lead me to think that this is not a varient which evolved on Penang Island itself.
Further support for this idea is that Penang hasn't been settled by Chinese for that long. Although small numbers of Chinese _may_ have been present there from the Ming dynasty onwards (no actual proof, and certainly not on Penang), the "Baba" (earlier Chinese settlers) who adopted a lot of Malay characteristics (like eating with their hands and (the womenfolk) wearing sarongs) were probably only really a big functioning community from the 19th century onwards.
On the other hand, this form of Hokkien was already established on Penang by the early 1900's. The time span of 50-70 year - early to mid 1800's to early 1900's - seems to me to be too short a period for "s@N1" (seng) to have evolved to "sui~1" (snooi) [ ASCII-IPA, with popular orthography in brackets ].
This is why I'm pretty convinced that these different vowels were already present on the Chinese mainland. Also, I once asked a Taiwanese if he was familiar with this variant, and he said that people spoke like that in some parts of Taiwan, but he didn't know where.
You might find it a lot of fun to go to Penang and listen to the Hokkien spoken there. When my father visited Taiwan, he spoke his Penang Hokkien there, and they understood him.
Sim.
>> For example, check to see how you say words like 不會/不要 or how you >> ask questions (是不是, 有...無, and so on).
I'm sorry, I can't read see these symbols (and even if I could, I would not know how to read them, as I can't read Chinese characters - except the odd few simple ones, remembered from Chinese classes).
If you pose your question by describing the English equivalant, or by transcribing the Amoy / Taiwanese form, I may be able to respond.
You do that for the latter part of the quote above, so I can answer that. I'll use ASCII-IPA.
Penang Hokkien asks questions by using the negative particle "bo", put at the end of the positively stated phrase.
e.g. "Do you want to come" = "lu be lai bo"
literally, "you want to come, yes or no". I believe this is no different from Amoy
"li b@ lai bo"
This "bo" also corresponds to the standard question word "ma" in Mandarin (mouth+horse). It even seems probable to me that "bo" is the denasalised form of "ma", but that is just speculation on my part.
The overwhelming majority of words in Penang Hokkien have an equivalent in Amoy Hokkien. The exceptions are Malay borrowings (e.g. food terms, local objects, animals). Some examples below (Malay in brackets)
animal mi-na-tang (binating)
bead ma-nek (manek)
bottle bO-tOi (botol)
bread lo-ti (roti)
saucer pi-ring (piring)
squid sO-tOng (sotong)
stone ba-tu (batu)
and some function words like but = "ta-pi" (tetapi).
Not only do most Penang Hokkien words have Amoy equivalents, they mostly have the same tone as well (and the same consonants). The greatest difference is in the vowels, the most striking example of which I give in my initial posting.
One example of a difference in tone is for "older man, one generation older", "father's elder brother". In Penang Hokkien it is "(a-) pE?3" [ open-e, glottal stop, 3rd tone ], whereas in non-Penang Hokkien, it is "(a)-pe?4 [ closed-e, glottal stop, 4th tone ]. The number of such words is by no means SMALL, but still MOST words match in tone.
All these "facts" lead me to think that this is not a varient which evolved on Penang Island itself.
Further support for this idea is that Penang hasn't been settled by Chinese for that long. Although small numbers of Chinese _may_ have been present there from the Ming dynasty onwards (no actual proof, and certainly not on Penang), the "Baba" (earlier Chinese settlers) who adopted a lot of Malay characteristics (like eating with their hands and (the womenfolk) wearing sarongs) were probably only really a big functioning community from the 19th century onwards.
On the other hand, this form of Hokkien was already established on Penang by the early 1900's. The time span of 50-70 year - early to mid 1800's to early 1900's - seems to me to be too short a period for "s@N1" (seng) to have evolved to "sui~1" (snooi) [ ASCII-IPA, with popular orthography in brackets ].
This is why I'm pretty convinced that these different vowels were already present on the Chinese mainland. Also, I once asked a Taiwanese if he was familiar with this variant, and he said that people spoke like that in some parts of Taiwan, but he didn't know where.
You might find it a lot of fun to go to Penang and listen to the Hokkien spoken there. When my father visited Taiwan, he spoke his Penang Hokkien there, and they understood him.
Sim.