The Chinese Rime Tables

Linguistic philosophy and historical-comparative phonology

Editor

David Prager Branner | University of Maryland

Hardbound – Available

ISBN 9789027247858 | EUR 120.00 | USD 180.00

e-Book –

ISBN 9789027288479 | EUR 120.00 | USD 180.00

This book, the first in its field in a Western language, examines China’s native phonological tool with regard to reconstruction, theory, and linguistic philosophy.

After an introductory essay on the nature of the tables and the history of their interpretation, the book concentrates on three areas: application of rime table theory to reconstruction, the history of rime table theory, and the application of the tables to descriptive linguistics. An appendix details a number of 20th century systems for transcribing their phonology into Roman letters.

Major topics include Altaic contact-influence on Chinese, early native understanding of the tables’ meaning, the phonological work of Yuen Ren Chao, and Stammbaumtheorie/diasystemic thinking about Chinese. New reconstructions of Han and “Common Dialectal” phonology appear here, as do complete texts and translations of the Shouwen fragments and Yunjing preface.

[Current Issues in Linguistic Theory, 271] 2006. viii, 358 pp.

Publishing status: Available

https://doi.org/10.1075/cilt.271

Table of Contents

Introduction: What Are Rime Tables and What Do They Mean?

David Prager Branner | pp. 1–34

Part I: Rime-Tables in Chinese Reconstruction

On the Principle of the Four Grades

Abraham Chan | pp. 37–46

The Four Grades: An Interpretation from the perspective of Sino-altaic language contact

Chris Wen-Chao Li | pp. 47–58

On Old Turkic Consonanticism and Vocalic Divisions of Acute Consonants in Medieval Hàn Phonology

An-King Lim | pp. 59–82

The Qièyùn System ‘Divisions’ as the Result of Vowel Warping

Axel Schuessler | pp. 83–96

Part II: The History of Rime Table Texts and Reconstruction

Reflections on the Shouwen Fragments

W. South Coblin | pp. 99–122

Zhāng Línzhī on the Yùnjìng

W. South Coblin | pp. 123–150

Simon Schaank and the Evolution of Western Beliefs About Traditional Chinese Phonology

David Prager Branner | pp. 151–167

Part III: Rime Tables as Descriptive Tools

How Rime-Book Based Analyses Can Lead Us Astray

Richard VanNess Simmons | pp. 171–182

Modern Chinese and the Rime Tables

Jerry Norman | pp. 183–188

Common Dialect Phonology in Practice.: Y.R. Chao’s Field Methodology

Richard VanNess Simmons | pp. 189–208

Some Composite Phonological Systems in Chinese

David Prager Branner | pp. 209–232

Common Dialectal Chinese

Jerry Norman | pp. 233–254

Appendix I: Pronunciation Guide to Boodberg's Alternative Grammatonomic Notation

Gari K. Ledyard | pp. 255–264

Appendix II: Comparative Transcriptions of Rime Table Phonology

David Prager Branner | pp. 265–302

Index of Biographical Names | pp. 327–332

General Index | pp. 333–358

Cited by (13)

Cited by 13 other publications

Order by:

CHEN, Ziche & Qi RAO

2024. A formalized statement of traditional terminology in Middle Chinese phonology. Cahiers de Linguistique Asie Orientale 53:2 ► pp. 198 ff.

Daniels, Peter T.

2023. “Look with thine ears”: Why Writing Is Syllable-based. <i>WORD</i> 69:1 ► pp. 91 ff.

Lu, Wen & Pui Yiu Szeto

2023. Polyfunctionality of ‘Give’ in Hui Varieties of Chinese: A Typological and Areal Perspective. Languages 8:3 ► pp. 217 ff.

Wendy Ayres-Bennett & John Bellamy

2021. The Cambridge Handbook of Language Standardization,

McLelland, Nicola

2021. Grammars, Dictionaries and Other Metalinguistic Texts in the Context of Language Standardization. In The Cambridge Handbook of Language Standardization, ► pp. 263 ff.

Orlandi, Georg

2021. On the four grades / four calls of Chinese rime tables. Historiographia Linguistica 48:1 ► pp. 1 ff.

Orlandi, Georg

2022. The Birth of a Field: Joshua Marshman and the Beginning of Systematic Transcriptional/Reconstructive Studies on Chinese Historical Phonology. Transactions of the Philological Society 120:2 ► pp. 185 ff.

Orlandi, Georg

2022. On the Notion of “Vowel” and “Consonant” in Chinese Linguistic Tradition. Monumenta Serica 70:1 ► pp. 209 ff.

Shen, Zhongwei

2020. A Phonological History of Chinese,

Tam, Gina Anne

2020. Dialect and Nationalism in China, 1860–1960,

ORLANDI, GIORGIO

2019. Joseph Edkins and the “Discovery” of Early Chinese: the linguistic ideas behind the first (partial) reconstruction of the sound system of Early Chinese. Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 29:3 ► pp. 519 ff.

Zhu, Qingzhi & Bohan Li

2018. The language of Chinese Buddhism. International Journal of Chinese Linguistics 5:1 ► pp. 1 ff.

Harbsmeier, Christoph

2016. Irrefutable Conjectures. A Review of William H. Baxter and Laurent Sagart,Old Chinese. A New Reconstruction. Monumenta Serica 64:2 ► pp. 445 ff.

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 25 september 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

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