A fifth tone in the Mandarin spoken in Singapore
新加坡华语里的 '第五声'
Chungyu Chen 陈重瑜

Abstract 摘要
The great majority of Singaporean Chinese have a southern Chinese dialect background. Mandarin is an acquired language, but a language of daily use. The Middle Chinese Ru-sheng exists partially and inconsistently in the Mandarin spoken in Singapore. Certain Middle Chinese Ru-sheng Zi appear more often than others in this ‘Fifth Tone’; the same Ru-sheng Zi may sometimes appear in this Fifth Tone and at other times in the correct tone in the speech of the same person. This Fifth Tone also has a falling pitch. While it often differs from Mandarin Tone 4 in being shorter or more tense in the whole syllable, it sometimes appears to be identical to Tone 4. Therefore, it cannot be consistently distinguished from Tone 4. M.C. Ru-sheng Zi syllables which have an -i or -e ending in Mandarin never appear in the Fifth Tone. In this study, 70.9% of the Ru-sheng Zi of Mandarin Tones 1, 2, and 3, ending with the nucleus, appeared in the Fifth Tone. The Hokkien group showed the highest frequency of such a tonal reading, 89.4%. Mandarin 1st Tone characters were most susceptible to this feature, 84.1%; and 3rd Tone characters were least affected, 22.8%. No correlations have been found between the frequencies of the Fifth Tone and certain historical categories as preserved in the Southern dialects. Influences of the Southern dialects is probably the source of the Fifth Tone.

大多数的新加坡人都会说一两种闽粤方言。华语是四种官方语言之一，也是日常生活中的用语。中古音与现代方言里的入声字不完整且不规则地存在于本地的华语里。这个第五声是一个下降调，有时带有一个喉塞音韵尾，有时则不带。因此它有时较华语里的第四声短促，有时则没有分别。在这个调查里有70.9%的方言入声字出现与此第五声。福建人有最大的倾向把方言入声字读作第五声，频率为89.4%。华语里第一声的入声字读作第五声的频率最高，有84.1%, 第三声的字频率最低，只有22.8% 。这个第五声可能是源自闽粤方言的影响。

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