Linguistic fieldwork in the village of A Ser

The village of A Ser belongs in the same dialect area as the town of Lijiang: that of Western Na (Naxi) dialects. The language variety spoken in A Ser preserves a larger number of phonemic oppositions than that of the city--including some oppositions that I have not observed in other dialects. A Ser is a geographically hemmed-in village; it is not very prosperous, and visitors are few. I stayed in A Ser five times, and worked with five speakers, but I always stayed in the same family. Mr. He Xixian is all at once the master of the house, my main language consultant, and a dear friend. He likes to poke fun at city dwellers, whom he finds fussy and roundabout; he himself is quite outspoken. At first he thought I was out to collect folklore and was concerned that he would not be up to the task; now he understands that my interest is in the spoken language, and he works with me very willingly, correcting me straight away when I make mistakes.

丽 江市古城区文化行政村的语言属于纳语(纳西语)西部方言。它保留着比丽江市内的语言更丰富的音位系统。这里是和学光教授的故乡，是他把我介绍给他的堂弟和 希贤。我调查的时候，和希贤教我纳语，招待我住在他家，给我提供各种方便，使得调查工作进行地愉快而有效率。和希贤爱嘲笑市民有心计，他很直接(比如说我 犯错误的时候他会马上指正)，这一点我非常欣赏。开始他认为我只是来采采风，收集一些民间故事，他觉得他 不够格参加这种工作，但逐渐，他明白我所感兴趣的是老百姓的发 音，于是，他就开始很热心地与我合作。

My hosts, who could see how miserable I felt on the local stools, were relieved to see me arrange this makeshift ergonomic workstation.

这是我在本地，因地制宜灵活机动地利用现有条件进行工作的情景。

Before an electroglottographic recording, take a photo to keep track of how the captors were placed.

在利用喉头音设备进行录音之前，要先拍摄下喉头音设备被安放在被录音者喉头上的具体位置。

For a finicky phonetician, who wants to obtain high-fidelity audio (to create beautiful spectrograms, and set up perception tests), recordings in the field take some doing. They have to be done at a time when it's not pouring, when there's electricity (power cuts are frequent, and can last quite long), when the speaker does not have any work on his hands... As a protection against background noises and against echo, it is very useful to put up a rough insulation in the place where the recording is done. After some testing, the place chosen was a corner of the house which is located under the wooden roof, behind a thick stack of logs. Large pieces of canvas laid on the floor and on large pieces of wickerwork propped against the walls limit the echo of the cement floor and of the wooden panes. Finally, a canvas cover placed at the entrance to this "studio-in-the-field" also contributes to the lining up of the premises, and signals to the whole household that there is a recording going on.

One is then rewarded with an audio signal that compares favourably with those recorded in the studios of Paris, Cambridge or Beijing.

这是我自己在长期的本地调查中摸索出来的一些录音土法，比如用干柴火堆，大 笸萝，家里的被子，布帘等作为隔音材料。录出来的声音有时并不一定比专业录音室效果差。

The place chosen for recordings is in the background, behind the stack of wood.

The "studio" seen from the outside, during recordings.

He Xixian and children from the village. In the countryside, ethnic minorities are allowed to have two children.

The grandparents and their two grandsons. They also have two granddaughters.

Work in the fields. The horse-hair cloak keeps the back dry and warm when it rains.

The house next to that of Mr. He Xixian is inhabited by two octogenarians who prefer to stay in the village, where they are accustomed to live, rather than go and live with their children, grandchildren and grand-grandchildren who have moved to the city of Lijiang. The oldest speakers are often the least bilingual (he can speak a little Yunnan Chinese, she cannot speak Chinese at all) and hence the most proficient speakers of Naxi, but at a certain age speech becomes less audible and communication with strangers more difficult. I mostly work with speakers in their fifties.