Purpose
I’ve set up this blog to catalog the various encounters I have with Wu dialects in order to better understand what it at work. Rather than fill up my other blog and lose any focus it may have otherwise had, I’ve created this one. I will not be recreating information on all dialects but rather limit myself to those with which I am having direct contact. This means I will likely only directly address those dialects spoken in Jiangnan. I will also not be recreating information which can be found on Wikipedia. I’ve spent a fair amount of time writing the Changzhou dialect page from scratch and cleaning up the others when needed. While I don’t really recommend Wikipedia as anything more than a starting point, I’ve cited my edits and so it’s just easier to send you there from time to time. Take it with a grain of salt. For all I know someone just deleted the table that I was referring to in whatever post sent you there.

Speakers from the Samples
For the most part, the voices you’ll hear on this site are taken from crowded restaurants, early morning taxis and long elevator rides. A few of the samples have been provided by friends, former students or anyone else I could convince to sit down with me for two minutes while I shoved a microphone in their face.

I would like to be able to give a detailed background for each speaker but the truth is it’s just not possible. When able, I will give what I can including age of the speaker, where they grew up and anything else that may be relevant to the way they speak.

There is no standardised Wu against which to gauge the accents or variations of the speakers. There is Shanghai and there is the downtown of whatever city in which the recording took place. Prestige accents shift and the dialects develop in different ways over time. I will make every effort to indicate these differences where relevant.

If you have specific questions about any one sample that aren’t answered in the post, drop me a line and I’ll do what I can to fill you in.

Written Sources
The following are texts which I have or will likely reference on the site. In some cases I have tried to reconstruct transcriptions into IPA thus changing the information contained within the text. When this has happened I have tried to reconstruct it as faithfully as possible when appropriate.

- Chao, Yuen Ren (1976). Aspects of Chinese Sociolinguistics: Essays. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press. ISBN 978-0804709095

- Branner, David Prager (2006). The Chinese Rime Tables: Linguistic philosophy and historical-comparative phonology. John Benjamins Publishing Co. ISBN 978-9027247858

- Thurgood, Graham & LaPolla, Randy J. (2003). The Sino-Tibetan Languages. Routledge Curzon. ISBN 978-0700711291

- Zhang Jie (2002)The Effects of Duration and Sonority on Countour Tone Distribution: A Typological Survey and Formal Analysis. Routledge. ISBN 978-0415941563

- Chappell, Hilary (2002) Sinitic Grammar. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0198299776

- the Sino Platonic Papers, available online at sino-platonic.org