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Hilary Chappell, Li Ming, Alain Peyraube

Chinese linguistics and typology: The state of the art

1. Introduction

China possesses rich linguistic resources which remain relatively untapped: the ten main Sinitic languages or dialect groups account for roughly 93% of the population (Mandarin, Jin, Xiang, Gan, Hui, Wu, Min, Kejia, Yue, and Pinghua); the remaining 7% comprise the many different “minority” languages in long term contact with Sinitic such as Tibeto-Burman, Mongolian, Hmong, and Tai. In an almost unprecedented state of affairs, written records for Chinese extend without a break 3,000 years into the past, furnishing a rich documentation for any kind of historical study.

Linguistic Typology, Walter de Gruyter

Print ISSN: 1430-0532
Volume: 11, 07/2007
Pages: 187 - 211

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