Production and Perception of Nasal Coda Mergence in Hohhot Dialect: From a Prosodic Point of View

The present paper conducts two experiments on the nasal coda performance in Hohhot dialect from a prosodic point of view. In the production experiment, acoustic characteristics of nasal codas in Hohhot dialect are shown in comparison with that in Mandarin Chinese in the dimensions of duration, fundamental frequency and intensity, which reveal that Hohhot dialect speakers cannot produce the nasal coda [n]. There appears no significant difference between [n] and [ŋ] in Hohhot dialect, and there exists a mergence from [n] to [ŋ] in Hohhot Dialect. The perception tests indicate that the Hohhot dialect speakers cannot discern the distinction between [n] and [ŋ] in both Hohhot dialect and the Mandarin Chinese. This mergence is an inherent speech perception mode in the Hohhot dialect speaker‟s brain. Moreover, for each individual subject, the accuracy of production of nasal codas is highly correlated with that of perception. And their perception performances of nasal codas in Tone 1 and Tone 4 are much better than those in Tone 2 and Tone 3. Perceptual accuracy of nasal codas in Tone 2 is worst.