Saga dialect
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The Saga dialect (佐賀弁, Saga-ben) is a dialect of the Japanese language widely spoken in Saga prefecture and some other areas, such as Isahaya. It is influenced by Kyushu dialect and Hichiku dialect. Saga-ben is further divided by accents centered on individual towns.
Saga-ben was heavily spoken in the 2006 film, and now television series, "Gabai bā-chan" (lit. fantastic grandma). The title itself is in Saga-ben.
A popular urban legend has it that two Saga-ben speakers met up in Tokyo and bystanders mistook their dialect for Chinese.
Characteristics
Many of Saga's dialectical properties are variants, in particles or conjugations, of standard Japanese.
- Words are often repeated twice.
- The sentence-ending particle "よ" becomes "ばい" or "たい".
- The contrastive conjunction "ばってん" (somewhat equivalent to English's "however") replaces standard Japanese equivalents.
- The operative particle "を" is replaced with "ば".
Ex.:手紙ば書いた=Wrote [a] letter.
- The particle "が", when referring to other people, is replaced with "の".
Ex.:黒君の書いた=Kuro-kun wrote [it].
- Traditional masu-form keigo is replaced by the suffix "～しんさっ", "～しんさる", "～しよんさっ", or "～しよんさる".
Ex.:手紙をかきよんさった=Wrote [polite] [a] letter.
- The direction particles "に" and "へ" are replaced with "さい".
Ex.:学校さい行く=Go to school.
- The explanatory "の" it replaced by "と".
Ex.:手紙を書いたと？= Wrote [a] letter [explanation request].
- The continuative conjugation "～ている" becomes "とっ".
Ex.:書いとっ=[Someone is] writing.
- In the passive conjugation of a verb, "れ" is taken out and "る" becomes a long vowel, or doubles the next consonant.
Ex.:書かれる (writing; passive voice) becomes replaced with 書かるう or 書かるっ.
- I-adjectives have their "い"s replaced with "か"s.
Ex.: cold (寒い) becomes 寒か.
- Na-adjectives sometimes have a か added on, reminiscent of the above characteristic. This seems to happen more in the south.
Ex.: じょうず becomes じょうずか.
- Pronunciation is similar to Hakata ben in the following: "sa, shi, su, se, so" become "sha, shii, shu, she, sho". In addition, Saga-ben also has the unique pronunciations of "za, zu, ze, da, ga," and "na" rendered as "ja, ju, je, ja, gya," and "nya", respectively.
- "～ない" conjugations become "ん" (the "ない" adjective itself becomes "なか"). This reflects the negative archaic/rude conjugation in standard Japanese. For example, whereas 食べん would be rude in eastern Japan, in Saga-ben it is standard.
Ex.:分からない becomes 分からん
- I-adjectives' "い"s become "さ" in when the speaker wants to add strong emphasis.
- I-adjectives' continuative form's "く" becomes a modifying "う" that elongates and possibly changes the vowel of the character before it.
Ex.:interesting (continuative) (おもしろく) becomes "おもしろう"fun (continuative) (楽しく) becomes 楽しゅう.
これ, それ, あれ, どれ Series
The Demonstrative series is uniquely pronounced in Saga-dialect.
- The normal これ, それ, あれ, どれ series in Japanese (this, that, yon, and which respectively) has its れ sounds replaced with い. 俺 also follows this pattern, and becomes おい. Indeed, many words follow this pattern; even 誰 becomes だい.
- The related words どう, こう, and そう become どがん, そがん, and こがん, respectively. An even more rustic conjugation set of these words is どぎゃん, そぎゃん, and こぎゃん.
Vocabulary
Saga-ben contains lots of characteristic vocabulary. Examples are included (with standard Japanese, where applicable) in the following table:
| Saga-ben | Standard Japanese | English gloss |
|---|---|---|
| おばっちゃん | おば-ちゃん | granny |
| いわじいにゃ | 言わないのよ | I'm not saying |
| きんしゃ | 来る | Come |
| あばかん | / | Too small, and cannot be fit into |
| がばい | すごく | Terribly; extremely |
| ～ごた | のようだ | It's that way |
| うーか | 多い | Many |
| うすか | 怖い | Scary |
| くさい | だ！;だよ！ | (copula; affirmative particle) |
| しぎーのする | しびれる | Fall asleep (of a limb) |
| じゃーた | 出した | came out |
| すらごと | ぞらごと | Falsehood |
| とっとっと | 取っているの | taken/reserved (w/explanation particle) |
| ～とけ | なのに | despite~ |
| ふうけもん | バカ | idiot |
| みたんなか | みっともない | shameful; extremely |
| きゃーないた | 疲れた | tired |
| ぎゃーけした | 風邪をひった | caught a cold |
| ～やろー | 〜なんでしょう;〜だろ | I guess; probably (rhetorical) |
| ～やん | 〜じゃん | isn't it (affirmative). |
| えいくろった | 酔っ払った | inebriated |
| ひやがいーめし | 昼食 | lunch |
| いっちょん | 全く | completely |
| やぐらしい | うるさい | annoying |
| あちゃこちゃ | あちこち | here and there |