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Author's name: Truong Nhat Vinh
Dissertation Title: A Survey of the Methods of Sinicizing Village Place Names in the Northern Delta
Dissertation field: Linguistics
Major: Languages of Vietnamese Ethnic Minorities Code: 62 22 01 09
Name of the postgraduate training unit: University of Social Sciences and Humanities - Vietnam National University, Hanoi.
1. Purpose and scope of the thesis
1.1 Research Objectives
This thesis studies the characteristics of Nôm and Sino-Vietnamese names of villages and communes in Northern Vietnam. Based on the results, the thesis will propose hypotheses and assessments regarding the process of Sino-Vietnamese assimilation of village and commune names in Northern Vietnam from a linguistic perspective.
1.2 Research Subjects
The subject of this thesis is the research of village place names that have both Nôm (Vietnamese script) names and corresponding Sino-Vietnamese names (appearing in Nôm-Sino-Vietnamese pairs).
2. Research methods used
- Linguistic descriptive methods
- Historical-comparative linguistics method
- Interdisciplinary linguistic approach
3. Main results and conclusions
3.1. Main results
- An overview of the research situation on Vietnamese village and commune place names in general, and Northern Vietnamese villages and communes in particular.
- Collect, compile statistics, and identify place names of villages and communes in the Northern Delta region that possess both Nôm and Sino-Vietnamese names.
- Describe the structural, semantic, and textual characteristics of the Nôm and Sino-Vietnamese names of villages and communes in Northern Vietnam.
- Compare the phonetic and grammatical correspondences between the Nôm names and Sino-Vietnamese names of village and commune place names in Northern Vietnam.
3.2. Conclusion
- The thesis identified 794 villages in the Northern Delta that still retain their Nôm names and corresponding Sino-Vietnamese names.
- Regarding structural characteristics: both Nôm names and Sino-Vietnamese names have complex structures consisting of common and specific components. The common component in both types of names has a simple structure. The specific component in Nôm names has a simple structure, while the specific component in Sino-Vietnamese names has a compound structure.
- Regarding semantic characteristics: The meanings of Nôm names are often unclear. Sino-Vietnamese names are generally easier to determine, but special attention should be paid to the correlation between the written form and the phonetics of the name.
- Regarding the relationship between the two types of names, Nôm and Sino-Vietnamese: Phonetic relationships are far more dominant than semantic relationships.
- From the above descriptions, the thesis initially concludes that the phonetic aspect is the aspect that receives special attention in the process of Sinicizing Nôm village names. The semantic aspect seems to receive less attention. From a phonetic perspective, the process of Sinicizing Nôm place names reflects the following principles. First, there are two main methods used in the Sinicization of Nôm names: the method of completely preserving the phonetic form and the method of phonetic correspondence. Second, with the method of phonetic correspondence, both syllables or/or one of the two syllables in the Sino-Vietnamese name will reflect this correspondence. Third, Sino-Vietnamese syllables and Nôm syllables mostly have the same phonetic relationship in the initial consonant part and correspond to each other in the vowel part of the syllable. Overall, the phonetic correspondence between the names of villages and communes in Northern Vietnam not only provides knowledge about the process of Sinicization of village and commune names in particular, and Vietnamese place names in general, but also serves as evidence reflecting the historical transformation of Vietnamese phonetics over time.
SUMMARY OF DOCTORAL THESIS
The author's name:Truong Nhat Vinh
Thesis title:Survey of the integration of Nom geographical names of villages in Red River Delta of Vietnam into Sino-Vietnamese
Scientific branch of the thesis: Linguistics
Major: Minority languages in Vietnam Code: 62 22 01 09
The name of postgraduate training institution: University of Social Sciences and Humanities
1. Thesis purpose and objectives
1.1 Thesis purpose:
Study of the features of Nom and Sino-Vietnamese names of villages in Vietnam. As a result, the thesis will provide theories, claims on the process of integrating names of villages in Red River Delta into Sino-Vietnamese with linguistic approach.
1.2 Thesis objectives:
Objectives of thesis are villages with both Nom and Sino-Vietnamese names. (names in Nom and Sino-Vietnamese are corresponding in pairs).
2. Research methods
3. Major results and conclusions
3.1. The major results
- A broad overview of researches on geographical names of villages in Vietnam in general and in Northern Vietnam in particular.
- Accumulate, analyze concentrated and identify villages in Red River Delta with both Nom and Sino-Vietnamese names.
- Describe form, meaning and characters of Nom and Sino-Vietnamese names of villages in Red River Delta.
- Compare the correspondence in pronunciation and meaning of a pair of Sino-Vietnamese and Nom names.
3.2.Revisions
- The thesis identifies 794 villages in Red River Delta that have both Nom and corresponding Sino-Vietnamese names remained.
- In terms of grammar: both Nom and Sino-Vietnamese names have complex structure with general name and proper name. The general name of both kinds has simple form. The proper name of Nom is simple while that of Sino-Vietnamese is compound.
- In terms of semantics: Nom names do not usually have clear meaning. By and large, it is easier to identify the meaning of Sino-Vietnamese names but the correlation between characters and pronunciation should be well aware.
- In terms of the relationship between Nom and Sino-Vietnamese names: phonetic relationship is significantly more dominant than semantic relationship.
- The findings of this study indicate that the process of converting Nom villages names into Sino-Vietnamese mainly focuses on phonetic features. Semantic features are less emphasized. From the phonetic perspective, the integration of Nom words into Sino-Vietnamese reflects the following rules. First, there are two main ways of changing Nom names into Sino-Vietnamese: conserving pronunciation and correspondence pronuciation. Second, with regard to pronunciation correspondence, both syllables and/or one of the two syllables of Sino-Vietnamese names reflect pronunciation correlation. Third, Sino-Vietnamese and Nom syllables relationships which are in the phonetic mostly have identical head vowels and rhyme corresponding. By and large, pronunciation correspondence of geographical names of villages in Red River Delta does not only provide knowledge of the process of changing village names in specific, geographical names in Vietnam in general into Sino-Vietnamese but is also an evidence of changes in Vietnamese pronuciation over time.
Author:ussh
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