Differences between Southwest Mandarin and Mandarin

The dividing line between Southwest Mandarin and Central Plains Mandarin is: the upper reaches of Huaihe River-Tongbai Mountain-Nanyang/Zhumadian City Boundary-Niutoudian-Zhenpingbei-Chongqing Shaanxi Province Boundary-Zhengyang Southwest-Huali-Langaobei-Donghe-Ziyang East-Hanwang-Hanyin West-Wang Mu-Zhenanbei-Shiweng-Zhashui East-Yingpan-Huo Guang Street-Foping Northwest.

Atlas of Chinese Language classifies all the Southwest Mandarin in southern Shaanxi into Southwest Mandarin. However, there are obvious differences between the east and the west of southwest mandarin in southern Shaanxi. The southwest mandarin in Ankang area in the east is similar to that in northern Hubei, and has the same historical origin. The southwest mandarin in Hanzhong area in the west is similar to that in Chengdu and has the same historical origin. According to the dialect characteristics and historical sources, the east and west of Southwest Mandarin in southern Shaanxi should belong to the north of Southwest Mandarin (or Wutian) respectively.

Hanyin Dialect: Hanyin Dialect belongs to the southwest mandarin area, located in the transitional zone between north and south dialects, at the junction of southwest mandarin, central plains mandarin and Jianghuai mandarin, and has obvious characteristics of dialect integration. Hanyin immigrants are mainly from Hunan, followed by Hubei, Henan and Guangdong. So there are a large number of Xiang words and some Cantonese words in pronunciation and vocabulary. Compared with Shiquan County, Hanyin County is greatly influenced by Sichuan.

There are three or four schools of thought about Hanyin dialect. One school thinks Hanyin dialect belongs to Qin Long dialect in the Central Plains, and the other school thinks it belongs to Southwest Mandarin. However, it is controversial which Hanyin dialect belongs to Chengdu-Chongqing dialect in Southwest Mandarin. However, due to the obvious differences between Hanyin dialect and Shiquan dialect (from the perspective of dialect vocabulary and tone value, it is similar to Jingzhou Changde dialect at the junction of Hunan and Hubei), Shiquan dialect is more typical.