The Persistence of Register in the Vietnamese Tonal System of 4th Generation Viet Kieu In Nakhon Phanom Province, Thailand

Abstract

This paper aims to analyze the register characteristics in the Vietnamese tonal system of the 4th generation of four Viet Kieu participants between 20 to 40 years old who were born and raised in Nakhon Phanom province, Thailand. This is one of many provinces in Thailand which has a large Vietnamese community, commonly referred to Vietnamese people living outside Vietnam in the diaspora as the ‘Viet Kieu’. The 54 word list of open syllables and the Praat program was used to conduct an acoustic analysis of the phonetic characteristics. The study found the register, which is an identifying characteristic in the Austroasiatic language family, occured in the words of sắc (high-rising tone), hỏi (low-falling rising broken), ngã (high-rising broken) and nặng (low-falling) in informants. Moreover, there was language interference which occurred through the transfer the contour of the Thai tonal system, but they still retained the pitch and duration similar to the characteristics of Vietnamese tonal system. The conclusion is not only that the appearance of register has changed, but also other characteristics of Vietnamese tones through an internal factor-the differences of the language system, as well as through an external factor-language contact, which leads to language change or language variation.