Sino-Vietnamese Linguistics by Mark Alves
Austroasiatic Linguistics in Honour of Michel Ferlus (1935-2024), 2025
DOWNLOAD: https://icaal.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/AA-Linguistics-in-Honour-of-Michel-Ferlus-... more DOWNLOAD: https://icaal.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/AA-Linguistics-in-Honour-of-Michel-Ferlus-2025.pdf
Video lecture: https://youtu.be/q3LsHYUT1kA Abstract: This article presents research on the vowels in early Chinese loanwords (ECLs) in Vietnamese borrowed in the 1st millennium, that is, before the layer of Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary associated with Late Middle Chinese. Crucially, the vowels of ECLs are studied with respect to developments in vowels in native Vietic words from Proto-Vietic or Proto-Austroasiatic. It does the following: (a) reviews issues of Vietic, Sinitic, and Vietnamese historical phonological matters and describe the methods of this study; (b) presents data for three categories: ECLs with vowels likely retained from early Chinese, words with possibly retained vowels, and words with diphthongs; and (c) summarizes the key findings. While some patterns of vowels in native vocabulary are shared by those in ECLs, and others show observable patterns that are distinct from those in native etyma, a number of vowels in ECLs exhibit as yet unexplainable distinct historical developments. Accounting for the history of vowels in posited ECLs is challenging due to (a) variations in vowels potentially due to varied borrowing situations, (b) variations in early Chinese reconstructions of different scholars, and (c) assumed variation in the source varieties of Chinese in time of borrowing and dialectal diversity. Despite such complications, the updated observations of the data increase the certainty of the status of ECLs as loanwords. They also give insights into the timing of the borrowing of ECLs and could offer comparative data to consider in reconstructions of vowels in Vietic and potentially early stages of Sinitic.
Ngôn Ngữ, 2025
王力在1948年出版的《汉越语研究》中，将越南语中的汉语借词分为三层：古汉越语、汉越语与“汉语越化”。他及不少越南学者认为，“汉语越化”源于汉越语词在越南语内部“再越南化一次”，但并未说明其发生... more 王力在1948年出版的《汉越语研究》中，将越南语中的汉语借词分为三层：古汉越语、汉越语与“汉语越化”。他及不少越南学者认为，“汉语越化”源于汉越语词在越南语内部“再越南化一次”，但并未说明其发生动因与具体机制。
本文依据若干关键历史音系线索：（1）汉—越语言接触与声调形成；（2）古汉越语与汉越语之间的声调交替，即上声（源自*-ʔ）与去声（源自*-s）互换，以及（开音节）平声与去声互换；（3）倍半音节词 (sesquisyllables）次要音节脱落与重音节起首音段的擦化，重新检视王力所列“汉语越化”127词。结果显示，其中89词实属古汉越语层；其余39词亦更可能属于古汉越语，可由其他历史音系特征加以解释，拟另文详论。基于上述证据，本文认为“汉语越化”作为独立层次的术语与概念不宜继续使用。
Ngôn Ngữ, 2025
In The Study of Chinese Loanwords in Vietnamese (汉越语研究,1948), Wang Li categorized these loanwords... more In The Study of Chinese Loanwords in Vietnamese (汉越语研究,1948), Wang Li categorized these loanwords into three layers: Old Sino-Vietnamese words (OSV), Sino-Vietnamese words (SV), Vietnamized Sino-Vietnamese words (VSV). He and Vietnamese researchers believed VSV resulted from the subsequent native changes of SV. However, they did not explain how or why these words were nativized. Based on key historical-phonological characteristics: (i) Contact between Chinese and Vietnamese and their tonogenesis; (ii) Alternating of tones between the OSV and SV periods, including shangsheng (B tone; previous *-ʔ) shifting to qusheng (C tone; previous *-s), qusheng shifting to shangsheng, pingsheng (A tone) shifting to qusheng (C tone); (iii) The loss of presyllables and spirantization of intervocalic segment of sesquisyllables; we have found 89 out of WL's proposed 128 VSV words are Old Sino-Vietnamese words. They did not result from continuous changes inside Vietnamese but from changes in Chinese before they were borrowed. The remaining 39 words are also OSV words which can be explained by other historical phonological characteristics that hopefully will be presented in another article. That is why the term and concept of VSV should no longer be used. (The article is written in Vietnamese.).
Exploring statistical regularities in the syllable canon of Sino-Vietnamese loanmorph phonology
Proceedings of the 30th North American Conference on Chinese Linguistics (NACCL-30). 2019. Volume 2., 2019
The Vietnamese system of color terms contains at least a dozen items from Late Old Chinese (LOC) ... more The Vietnamese system of color terms contains at least a dozen items from Late Old Chinese (LOC) and Early Middle Chinese (EMC), though core color terms in Vietnamese are still largely native items (Vietic, Viet-Muong, or Vietnamese (i.e. no other identifiable source)). Some of the Sino-Vietnamese (SV) terms have retained their older senses in earlier stages of Sinitic (‘yellow/gold’, ‘white/silver’, and ‘pink’), thereby supporting phonological evidence that places these loans in the early to mid-first millennium CE. That Sinitic had such a lexical impact on the color system in this variety of Vietic supports the assumed period of Sinitic-Vietic language contact from the Han to Tang Dynasty. While there is archaeological evidence to associate words for metals with related colors, accounting for the borrowing of other color terms will require further ethnohistorical study to determine specific sociocultural factors (e.g. cultural customs/practices, clothing and implements, art and decorations, etc.).
This presentation file provides LISTS of groups of Sino-Vietnamese sounds in Chinese historical c... more This presentation file provides LISTS of groups of Sino-Vietnamese sounds in Chinese historical comparative categories (initials, finals, and tones). Many of these come from Nguyen Tai Can's major 1979 work, published in Vietnamese and largely unknown outside of Vietnam.
Bulletin of Chinese Linguistics, 2018
Vietnamese has numerous early-era Chinese loanwords with ngang and huyền tones, which in Middle C... more Vietnamese has numerous early-era Chinese loanwords with ngang and huyền tones, which in Middle Chinese loanwords correspond to the pingsheng level tone category, for words that should have sắc or nặng tones, corresponding to the Middle Chinese non-level qusheng departing tone category.1 It is proposed that this layer of Early Sino-Vietnamese represents borrowing of Chinese words in the period after which Old Chinese had lost final *-s and prior to tonogenesis in Viet-Muong, thus leading to words with the level-tone category when tones emerged in Viet-Muong. This paper provides 60 items of Early Sino-Vietnamese that exemplify this phenomenon of ngang/huyền tones in qusheng words, but also 120 items exemplifying the previously noted reversal of sắc/nặng and hỏi/ngã tones between Early Sino-Vietnamese and later Sino-Vietnamese (the formalized readings of Chinese characters). Altogether, this allows for an overall relative chronology of the development of tones in both Sinitic and Vietic.
Presented at the Viện Ngôn Ngũ Học Hà Nội (The Institute of Linguistics in Hanoi), 2019
Đây là một bài trình bày cho thấy bằng chứng về việc từ tiếng tiền Hán-Việt nên có thanh sắc v... more Đây là một bài trình bày cho thấy bằng chứng về việc từ tiếng tiền Hán-Việt nên có thanh sắc và nặng (thanh khứ của tiếng Hán) có thanh ngang và huyền. Nó cũng cho thấy điều này có liên quan đến sự hình thành của thanh điệu trong cả tiếng Hán và tiếng Việt.
Proceedings of the 29th North American Conference on Chinese Linguistics (NACCL-29), Volume 1, 286-303., 2019
Chinese loanwords have played a significant role in the Vietnamese system of pronouns and terms o... more Chinese loanwords have played a significant role in the Vietnamese system of pronouns and terms of address and reference. Semantic and pragmatic features of Chinese kinship terms and names have been transferred into the overall Vietnamese referential system. However, many of the Chinese loanwords in this semantic domain have undergone grammaticalization quite distinct from those in any variety of Chinese, thereby mitigating the notion of Chinese as being a primary source of the structure of in that system. This paper also considers how kinship terms, titles, and names came to have 1st and 2nd person reference potentially via language contact with Chinese, areal linguistic influence in Southeast Asia, or both. Many related questions will require future studies.
Tạp Chí Ngôn Ngữ, 2018
This paper provides evidence that Vietnamese cũng 'also' and cùng 'with' are both loanwords of th... more This paper provides evidence that Vietnamese cũng 'also' and cùng 'with' are both loanwords of the same Chinese word 共 gòng. 1 However, unlike the standard Sino-Vietnamese reading cộng, formally recognized as a reading of 共 gòng, cũng and cùng were borrowed earlier in the first millennium CE, as shown by comparative data in both Chinese and Vietnamese historical phonology and textual evidence in ancient Chinese and Vietnamese writings. The three distinct tones in each Vietnamese word represent different eras of borrowing in the process of tonogenesis in Chinese. These two grammatical Early Sino-Vietnamese loanwords, likely borrowed via large Sino-Vietnamese bilingual communities, share some semantico-syntactic properties with the Chinese etymon at points in its history. But they have also innovated in various ways since the absorption of earlier Chinese communities into the Vietic speech community after the period of Chinese administration. Thus, this Chinese etymon has status as a triplet loanword in Vietnamese and is an example of the long history of Sino-Vietnamese language contact. These Vietnamese words are also an example of the tendency of grammaticalized morphemes to continue to develop grammatical functions.
Tạp Chí Ngôn Ngữ, 2018
Tóm Tắt: Bài này cung cấp những bằng chứng cho thấy cũng và cùng là hai từ vay mượn có nguồn gốc ... more Tóm Tắt: Bài này cung cấp những bằng chứng cho thấy cũng và cùng là hai từ vay mượn có nguồn gốc từ từ 共 <gòng> cộng trong tiếng Hán. Tuy nhiên, khác với từ Hán-Việt 2 cộng chính thức được công nhận là cách đọc của 共 <gòng>, hai từ cũng và cùng được vay mượn sớm hơn, trong đầu thiên niên kỷ thứ nhất SCN, theo cứ liệu so sánh ngữ âm học lịch sử và tài liệu thành văn tiếng Hán và tiếng Việt (văn bản Nôm). Ba thanh điệu khác biệt ở ba từ này trong tiếng Việt hé lộ cho thấy những giai đoạn vay mượn từ gốc Hán khác nhau trong quá trình hình thành thanh điệu tiếng Hán. Hai từ cùng và cũng vay mượn sớm hơn, trong thời kỳ tiền Hán Việt, có thể vay mượn qua các cộng đồng song ngữ Hán-Việt lớn, đều có chung một số đặc điểm cú pháp ngữ nghĩa với từ Hán 共 <gòng> vào mấy thời điểm trong lịch sử. Nhưng chúng cũng thay đổi từ khi cộng đồng tiếng Hán cộng cư với cộng đồng tiếng Việt sau thời Bắc thuộc (tức là "language shift" của Sinitic với Vietic 3). Do đó, từ gốc Hán này là từ được vay mượn ba lần ("triplet") và là một ví dụ 1 Xin cảm ơn TS. Nguyễn Tuấn Cường (Viện trưởng Viện nghiên cứu Hán Nôm) đã giúp tôi xác định vị trí của một số chữ Nôm và trao đổi một số vấn đề về dữ liệu trong bài này, và TS. Edith Aldridge (University of Washington) và TS. Marc Miyake (the British Museum) đã đọc bài này và cung cấp ý tưởng. Nguyễn Đức Nghiệu (Đại Học Quốc Gia, Hà Nội) cũng đưa ra rất nhiều gợi ý làm cho bài này tự nhiên hơn theo kiểu tiếng Việt. 2 Trong bài này, từ viết tắt bao gồm: HV = Hán Việt, THV = tiền Hán Việt (như Nguyễn N. S. 2003), HC = Hán cổ, HTĐ = Hán trung đại. Phục nguyên Hán cổ và phiên mã Hán trung đại là của Baxter và Sagart [4, 5]. Tôi cho rằng tù Hàn-Việt là cách đọc của Hán trung đại, và tiền Hán-Việt là từ được vay mượn trước đó.Tôi không sử dụng "cổ Hán-Việt" theo Vương Lực vì "cổ" thường xuyên biểu thị phục nguyên (theo ý kiến của Phan, mà sử dụng "Early Sino-Vietnamese" song song với THV). Về "Hán-Việt Việt-hóa" của Vương Lực, nghiên cứu đã chỉ ra rằng những từ được coi là nhiều từ Hán-Việt Việt-hóa thực sự là tiền Hán Việt, như từ cung trong bài này. 3 Mặc dù từ "Hán" thường được sử dụng để chỉ ngôn ngữ Trung Quốc quá khứ cổ đại, từ "Sinitic" tiếng Anh rất hữu ích vì nó phân biệt rõ ngôn ngữ và văn hóa. Hơn nửa, từ Sinitic chính sách: nó là tổ tiên của tất cả biến thể Trung Quốc hiện nay. Từ Vietic cũng vậy: nó chỉ một cộng động ngôn ngữ là tổ tiên của cả tiếng Việt, mường, Chứt..., không phải là tiếng Việt cổ.
SEALS 28, 2018
This was a presentation given at SEALS 28 (Wenzao Ursuline University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, May 17-... more This was a presentation given at SEALS 28 (Wenzao Ursuline University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, May 17-19, 2018). It presents Early Sino-Vietnamese data that suggests borrowing during a period in Sinitic had lost final fricatives in words that developed qusheng/Type C tones. In Vietnamese, for these Sinitic words, the earlier period have level ngang/huyền tones (e.g. pingsheng), whereas the later standard Vietnamese have the expected qusheng tones, or Vietnamese sắc/nặng tones. Following the ideas of Pulleyblank 1962, the most likely scenario is a period in which Vietic in that period did not yet have tones, but and so speakers borrowed the Sinitic words, which had lost final fricatives, and later, after tonogenesis in Viet-Muong, these words simply had level tones. The later later of Sino-Vietnamese was in the period in which Viet-Muong had tones. This ping-for-qu layer of Early Sino-Vietnamese was thus borrowed approximately in the 300s to 600s.
This is a presentation at the NACCL-30 on March 10, 2018. It presents lexical data of Vietnamese ... more This is a presentation at the NACCL-30 on March 10, 2018. It presents lexical data of Vietnamese color terms and notes the significant number of Chinese loanwords, mostly of the Early Sino-Vietnamese layer (i.e. Early Middle Chinese or Late Old Chinese). The implication is that, while most of the primary color terms are native in Vietnamese, the overall color term system of Vietnamese during the Vietic period (i.e. before the emergence of Viet-Muong) gained a significant number of color words and was restructured by language contact with Sinitic in the first millennium CE.
A noticeable portion of grammatical vocabulary in Vietnamese is Chinese in origin. While many of ... more A noticeable portion of grammatical vocabulary in Vietnamese is Chinese in origin. While many of these words were borrowed from Chinese already grammaticalized, others were grammaticalized only after being borrowed into Vietnamese. In other cases, words originally grammaticalized in Chinese have developed new grammatical functions in Vietnamese. This study presents Sino-Vietnamese grammatical vocabulary in several grammatical categories and discusses the grammatical clines involved.
Cahiers de Linguistique Asie Orientale, 2017
Specialists in Chinese historical phonology have claimed that some Vietnamese words with final /-... more Specialists in Chinese historical phonology have claimed that some Vietnamese words with final /-j/ come from Old Chinese words with final *-r. This is reasonable to speculate as Proto-Austroasiatic finals *-r and *-l became final /-j/ in Vietnamese, parallel to the case in Sinitic. However, these Vietnamese words offer little evidence for oc *-r. Vietnamese did borrow a number of Late Old Chinese or Early Middle Chinese words reconstructed with final *-r after *-r merged with *-n in Eastern Han or later, and thus these words also have /-n/ in Vietnamese. Several other Vietnamese words with final /-j/ which are possibly from Old Chinese words having *-r were borrowed earlier in the bce period, likely before large migrations of Sinitic speakers arrived. Those words include verbs and an adjective, words less likely than nouns to be borrowed without large bilingual communities. The small number of words and general uncertainty suggests some Vietnamese words with /-j/ purportedly from Old Chinese words with *-r may be chance similarities. Few are probable Chinese loanwords from that period.
http://booksandjournals.brillonline.com/content/journals/10.1163/19606028-04602003
Bulletin of Chinese Linguistics, 2017
This article is a linguistics paper but with an interdisciplinary approach. Chinese loanwords in ... more This article is a linguistics paper but with an interdisciplinary approach. Chinese loanwords in Vietnamese from the first half of the 1st millennium CE are grouped by semantic domains (along with ethnohistorical and archaeological support), thereby offering a way to explore the sociocultural circumstances of Sino-Vietnamese contact in that early period.
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In this study, over 60 Chinese loanwords in Vietnamese are claimed to have been borrowed during the East Han or West Jin Dynasties. These Early Sino-Vietnamese (ESV) words are identified via a combination of linguistic, historical, archaeological, and ethnological data sources and frameworks. Such an interdisciplinary method helps to confirm or refute these words’ status as loanwords and as belonging to this specific historical period. The combined linguistic and extralinguistic data also leads to hypotheses about possible phonological changes in Chinese from the Old Chinese (OC) to Middle Chinese (MC) periods. In particular, while Sino-Vietnamese words from the mc period have expected qusheng tones for Chinese qusheng loanwords, OC-era ESV words have either shangsheng or, unexpectedly, pingsheng tones. It is hypothesized that esv words with shangsheng tones for OC qusheng words were borrowed earliest, while ESV items with pingsheng represent a later stage in OC in which final *-s was in the process of being lost in the first few centuries CE.
This is a PowerPoint presentation given at the NACCL-29 at Rutgers University on June 16, 2017. I... more This is a PowerPoint presentation given at the NACCL-29 at Rutgers University on June 16, 2017. It reviews lexical and sociopragmatic aspects of the Vietnamese system of terms of reference and address, including pronouns, kin-derived terms, titles, and names, and considers the impact that Chinese has historically had from the Han Dynasty up through the pre-modern era. While lexical and pragmatic aspects clearly have Chinese influence, Southeast Asian regional influence and internal innovation have also been major parts of the process of development of the overall system. Periods of timing are considered, partly based on historical phonological patterns in Sino-Vietnamese and partly based on historically documented periods of more intense Chinese language contact. Phan's 2013 hypothesis of Annamese Chinese is supported as the data requires a large bilingual population for such vocabulary and sociopragmatics to spread. Notes are embedded in the PDF.
This is a presentation given to Foreign Service Institute students of Vietnamese who had previous... more This is a presentation given to Foreign Service Institute students of Vietnamese who had previous advanced knowledge of the Chinese language. The goal was to give them knowledge of the historical and linguistic connections between Vietnamese and Chinese in order to utilize their knowledge of Chinese to advance their Vietnamese vocabulary. It also identifies points of contrast between the languages.
This list of 112 Sino-Vietnamese readings of characters, with representation two-syllable compoun... more This list of 112 Sino-Vietnamese readings of characters, with representation two-syllable compounds, is intended for beginning learners of Vietnamese with some literacy in Chinese for vocabulary development.
This is a handout for a talk given at ''Recent Advances in Old Chinese Historical Phonology" at t... more This is a handout for a talk given at ''Recent Advances in Old Chinese Historical Phonology" at the University of London, SOAS on the 6th of November, 2015. Old Chinese era loanwords in Vietnamese are considered in light of both linguistic and extralinguistic evidence. Presentation notes are embedded on each page. The video version is available on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUtZoCWvQM0.
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Sino-Vietnamese Linguistics by Mark Alves
Video lecture: https://youtu.be/q3LsHYUT1kA Abstract: This article presents research on the vowels in early Chinese loanwords (ECLs) in Vietnamese borrowed in the 1st millennium, that is, before the layer of Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary associated with Late Middle Chinese. Crucially, the vowels of ECLs are studied with respect to developments in vowels in native Vietic words from Proto-Vietic or Proto-Austroasiatic. It does the following: (a) reviews issues of Vietic, Sinitic, and Vietnamese historical phonological matters and describe the methods of this study; (b) presents data for three categories: ECLs with vowels likely retained from early Chinese, words with possibly retained vowels, and words with diphthongs; and (c) summarizes the key findings. While some patterns of vowels in native vocabulary are shared by those in ECLs, and others show observable patterns that are distinct from those in native etyma, a number of vowels in ECLs exhibit as yet unexplainable distinct historical developments. Accounting for the history of vowels in posited ECLs is challenging due to (a) variations in vowels potentially due to varied borrowing situations, (b) variations in early Chinese reconstructions of different scholars, and (c) assumed variation in the source varieties of Chinese in time of borrowing and dialectal diversity. Despite such complications, the updated observations of the data increase the certainty of the status of ECLs as loanwords. They also give insights into the timing of the borrowing of ECLs and could offer comparative data to consider in reconstructions of vowels in Vietic and potentially early stages of Sinitic.
本文依据若干关键历史音系线索：（1）汉—越语言接触与声调形成；（2）古汉越语与汉越语之间的声调交替，即上声（源自*-ʔ）与去声（源自*-s）互换，以及（开音节）平声与去声互换；（3）倍半音节词 (sesquisyllables）次要音节脱落与重音节起首音段的擦化，重新检视王力所列“汉语越化”127词。结果显示，其中89词实属古汉越语层；其余39词亦更可能属于古汉越语，可由其他历史音系特征加以解释，拟另文详论。基于上述证据，本文认为“汉语越化”作为独立层次的术语与概念不宜继续使用。
http://booksandjournals.brillonline.com/content/journals/10.1163/19606028-04602003
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In this study, over 60 Chinese loanwords in Vietnamese are claimed to have been borrowed during the East Han or West Jin Dynasties. These Early Sino-Vietnamese (ESV) words are identified via a combination of linguistic, historical, archaeological, and ethnological data sources and frameworks. Such an interdisciplinary method helps to confirm or refute these words’ status as loanwords and as belonging to this specific historical period. The combined linguistic and extralinguistic data also leads to hypotheses about possible phonological changes in Chinese from the Old Chinese (OC) to Middle Chinese (MC) periods. In particular, while Sino-Vietnamese words from the mc period have expected qusheng tones for Chinese qusheng loanwords, OC-era ESV words have either shangsheng or, unexpectedly, pingsheng tones. It is hypothesized that esv words with shangsheng tones for OC qusheng words were borrowed earliest, while ESV items with pingsheng represent a later stage in OC in which final *-s was in the process of being lost in the first few centuries CE.