Hong Kong Chinese and Mandarin are two different varieties of the Chinese Language in terms of lexicology. For over three decades, new words from Hong Kong Chinese have swarmed into Mandarin and related researches also flourished. Yet the reverse is a trend somehow going about more or less unnoticed, which is perhaps mostly due to the scantiness of amount of words involved as a contrast. However, its importance has surfaced along with a growing number of Putonghua words imported into Hong Kong Chinese in the early twenty-first century, as a result of the increasing interaction between Mainland China and Hong Kong. Therefore, the thesis sets to examine the phenomenon of language migration to the South by investigating the use of Putonghua words in Hong Kong written Chinese, so as to better observe the language exchange between Hong Kong and Mainland China. The main body of this paper comprises three parts. First it seeks to identify a body of such Putonghua words entering Hong Kong in a vast corpus of formal publications and web publications and look into the lexicological significance of such words. A total number of 359 words have been collected and semantic categories have been identified based on selected Hong Kong texts. Meanwhile, the semantic meaning, pragmatic meaning and contexts of the words collected have been analysed. Second, this paper examines this body of borrowed Putonghua words from a wide span of aspects in lexicology, including its syntactic and pragmatic features, its different levels of being accepted in Hong Kong, its significance and migration incentives. Meanwhile, The thesis also conducts a diachronic comparison study of this body of loanwords centered on last decade. Third, This paper carries out a synchronic comparison of borrowed words in both directions (Hong Kong Chinese to Mandarin and Mandarin to Hong Kong Chinese), to map out possible similarities and differences that reflect linguistic exchange. It is found that the northward language migration prevails over its southward counterparts regarding time, number, impact and other aspects. Theories and research methods from social linguistics are widely employed in this paper, in hopes of studying the language migration to the south in a scientific and systematic way. It is found that southward migration of words into Hong Kong will be a long-term and slow process, and that the bilateral language exchange between Hong Kong and Mainland China will last continuously, thus allowing Mandarin and Hong Kong Chinese share greater similarities while preserving differences. / published_or_final_version / Chinese / Master / Master of Philosophy

by Wai-Hoo Au Yeung. / Thesis submitted in 1997. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1998. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves i-v (3rd gp.)). / Abstract also in Chinese. / Acknowledgments / Abstract / Contents / Abbreviations & Tables / Chapter 1. --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1. --- What is a parameter? / Chapter 1.2. --- Parameter resetting in SLA / Chapter 1.3. --- Parameter as feature checking / Chapter 1.4. --- Research goals and outline of the thesis / Chapter 2. --- PARAMETERIZATION IN CHINESE NOMINALS --- p.18 / Chapter 2.1. --- DP-analysis and its parameterization / Chapter 2.2. --- Evaluation of the four models of Chinese nominal structures / Chapter 2.3. --- Parameterization in Cantonese and Mandarin nominals / Chapter 2.4. --- The Lexical CL Parameter / Chapter 3. --- METHODOLOGY --- p.86 / Chapter 3.1. --- The subject / Chapter 3.2. --- Timing of recording / Chapter 3.3. --- What is recorded / Chapter 3.4. --- The corpus / Chapter 3.5. --- Criteria of counting utterances and point of acquisition / Chapter 4. --- THE ACQUISITION OF CANTONESE NOMINALS --- p.92 / Chapter 4.1. --- Overall development of Cantonese nominal structure / Chapter 4.2. --- Acquisition of Cantonese-specific CLP properties / Chapter 4.3. --- Comparison with native Cantonese children's data / Chapter 4.4. --- Acquisition by resetting the Lexical CL Parameter / Chapter 5. --- AN INFORMAL EXPERIMENT ON GENERIC di AND di-N PHRASES --- p.118 / Chapter 5.1. --- Design of the experiment / Chapter 5.2. --- Materials / Chapter 5.3. --- Procedures and results / Chapter 5.4. --- Comparison between Ching's and native children's results / Chapter 6. --- CONCLUSION --- p.134 / Chapter 6.1. --- Theoretical and acquisition findings / Chapter 6.2. --- Further evidence for parameter resetting / Chapter 6.3. --- Implications for future research / Chapter 6.4. --- Concluding remarks / References / Appendix A: 3 sample files of the corpus

published_or_final_version / Linguistics / Master / Master of Arts

published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education