Hokuriku dialect


The Hokuriku dialect is a Japanese dialect group spoken in Hokuriku region, consists of northern Fukui Prefecture, Ishikawa Prefecture, Toyama Prefecture, and Sado Island in Niigata Prefecture. Mainland Niigata dialect is classified into Tōkai-Tōsan dialect and Tōhoku dialect and southern Fukui dialect is classified into Kansai dialect.

Subdialects

In Hokuriku dialect, vowels at the end of monomoraic nouns often lengthen as well as Kansai dialect, while vowel reduction frequently occurs as well as Eastern Japanese including Standard Japanese.
Some phonetic features are close to Tōhoku dialect. The high vowels "i" and "u" are sometimes pronounced central vowels. "shi" and "su", "chi" and "tsu", "ji" and "zu" are confused in Sado, Toyama, Noto dialects. "i" and "e" are also confused in Toyama and Noto dialects.
In Hokuriku region, various pitch accents can be heard. Varieties of Kyoto-Osaka type accent are heard in Sado, Toyama and eastern Fukui such as Katsuyama and Ōno. In Izumi, easternmost village of Fukui, Tokyo type accent is heard. In central Fukui such as Fukui city and Echizen, monotonous accent is heard - there is no contrast between words based on accent. In Noto, varieties of Kyoto-Osaka type, monotonous accent and Tokyo type accent are heard to each village. In Kaga and part of Fukui, an intermediate accent between Tokyo type and Kyoto-Osaka type is heard.
Except for Sado dialect, intonation in pause of phase is often undulated.

Grammar

Many grammatical features are common to other Western Japanese dialects and see Japanese dialects#Eastern and Western Japanese. Special features of Hokuriku dialect are follows:

Fukui

The dialects of Fukui Prefecture are Fukui dialect spoken in the northern part, and the Wakasa dialect spoken in the southern part. Because Fukui is close to Kansai on the south, Wakasa-ben resembles Kansai-ben closely, while Fukui-ben exhibits changes in pronouncing the sounds of words to make the pronunciation more convenient.
Fukui dialectStandard JapaneseEnglish meaning
ほやほや はい or そうですよ
"Yes," or "That's true."
つるつるいっぱい used when a cup is very full, almost overflowing
もつけねー ざんねん（ですね） "That's too bad."
てきねー きぶんがわるい "I don't feel good."
ぎょうさん たくさん many
おおきに ありがとう "Thank you."
きんの きのう
yesterday
ものごい or えらい つらい painful
ねまる すわる sit down
おぞい ふるい or よくない old, or not good
じゃみじゃみ すなあらし TV static
てなわん いじわるい or やんちゃな naughty or mischievous
えん いない is not
もたもた ぐずぐず slowly
よさり よる night
なげる すてる throw away
おとましい もったいない wasteful

Ishikawa

The dialects of Ishikawa Prefecture are Kaga dialect, spoken in the southern part, and the Noto dialect,　spoken in the northern part. Kaga-ben has the Kanazawa dialect spoken in Kanazawa and the Shiramine dialect, also Gige dialect spoken in Shiramine, a village at the foot of Mount Haku. Kanazawa is a capital of Ishikawa, so Kanazawa-ben is an influential dialect.
The most famous phrase in Kanazawa-ben is the soft imperative suffix -masshi, meaning -nasai in standard Japanese. This phrase is often used in catch phrases for visitors of Kanazawa, for example, Kimasshi Kanazawa!.
Recent works on Kanazawa-ben
The dialect of Toyama is called Toyama dialect or Etchu dialect and consists of West, East and Gokayama.
Instead of the colloquial shitte iru ka?, speakers of the Toyama-ben will ask, shittokke?.
When expressing that something is incorrect, instead of saying the standard phrase iie, users of the dialect will say naan, with a rising tone.
Other regional distinctions include words like kitokito and ikiiki.
Other features :
"kore" /"ka" or "ko", "sore" /"sa" or "so".
Toyama-ben speakers sometimes put "ze" instead of "ne" at the end of the sentence.