interview
How might Changzhou dialect and local residents’ stories help visitors understand everyday life in Changzhou and develop a stronger connection to the city?
A stronger connection is an outcome you want to investigate. The interviews should explore when dialect helps build that connection and when it creates distance or difficulties in understanding.
Janet: How Does Local Language Shape the Experience of a City?
Janet is a student at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and my notes mention her interest or involvement in language use in Guangzhou Metro announcements. I will first clarify the situation she has explored and whether she has studied it, then ask about her observations. I want to discuss how the same language choices might affect local and non-local listeners differently. When might they create familiarity, and when might they make understanding or participation difficult? These questions can help me consider what support visitors may need when encountering Changzhou dialect.
Xiaoqi: How Can I Collect and Prepare Residents’ Stories?
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Xiaoqi is a student at Sichuan University with experience conducting oral history interviews in Northwest China, including work with an older interviewee and questions around understanding and transcribing dialect. Her experience is directly relevant to my research methods. I want to learn how she helps people feel comfortable sharing their lives, asks about specific details, and handles content that is difficult to understand or translate. I am particularly interested in what can change when spoken dialect becomes written Mandarin, and how speakers can review the result. These insights can help me develop my own process for interviewing residents and preparing their stories.
Junjun: What Meanings in Dialect Need to Be Preserved and Explained?
Junjun is affiliated with Minzu University of China, with interests that include anthropology, semantic analysis, small-scale fieldwork, and using the International Phonetic Alphabet to document dialect. Through specific examples, I want to understand what context someone needs beyond the literal meaning of an expression — for instance, who is speaking to whom, why they use that expression, and what their tone communicates. Her perspective can help me consider what original audio, subtitles, and contextual explanations should each provide, and how to compare residents’ intended meanings with visitors’ interpretations.
Chloe
Chloe has a background in architecture and urban space design. She has worked on community spaces, urban renewal, cultural heritage, wayfinding systems, urban landmarks, walking experiences, and tourism space design. Her work focuses on how residents use, understand, and remember buildings. Through our conversation, I want to understand how buildings, streets, and landmarks carry local memories, and how residents use dialect to describe these places differently from standard maps or travel guides. Her perspective can help me decide what visual context a traveler may need, such as a photograph or simple map, while making sure that visual materials support rather than replace residents’ voices and personal interpretations.
Qingqing
During her undergraduate studies, Interviewee 1 served as president of the Student Union and organized several dialect-related events. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she volunteered in local communities, helping older adults with limited Mandarin proficiency access medical care and manage home isolation. Through our conversation, I want to understand how dialect can affect people’s access to information, their ability to express their needs, and their trust in others. Her experience can help me think beyond dialect as only a form of cultural expression. It can also help me consider how original dialect audio, written transcription, and Mandarin translation might provide different ways for travelers to enter and understand a local story.
