Table 10. Average aggregate number of instances of phonological change per 100 words Overall average
Dialect region
36.4 B
31.6 Y,Z,AA
30.6 E,F,R,S,U
26.7 M
21.9 H,V,W
17.8 X,DD
17.0 J
15.1 G,O
14.6 L,N,T,BB,CC,EE
14.6 C,Q
Table 10 dramatically demonstrates that some dialects have many more instances of phonological change than others, when compared to all the dialect regions. For example, Gopeng B, the dialect with
the highest aggregate, has on average nearly 2.5 times as many instances of phonological change as dialects with the lowest aggregate C, Q, L, N, T, BB, EE.
3.4.5 Summary of phonological changes
This section has looked at the aspect of consistent phonological changes from a variety of angles. These changes are important when establishing dialect boundaries as well as determining the degree of
difference between dialect regions. The previous tables, matrices, and maps provide important information that should be useful in
choosing a standard dialect, if so required. Other factors being equal, dialects with a lower average aggregate number of phonological changes would be better candidates for a standard dialect, since the
lower average aggregate implies there are fewer instances of nonshared phonological change, on average, with other dialects. However, it must be stressed that other factors are not equal, and that this is
just one factor. All the factors, especially sociolinguistic factors, should be considered when making such decisions. For example, the people’s attitude toward their language and dialects can turn out to be even
more important than linguistic factors.
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3.4.6 Limitations of phonological change analysis
In addition to noting that phonological changes are just one indicator of dialect boundaries and variation, it is worthwhile to point out other limitations of this approach. First, as pointed out earlier in
this section, not all phonological changes ought to be considered equal in that some changes have a much more profound impact on the forms of words than others. That is to say, some changes result in a
dramatically different form of a word, compared to the same word that has not changed or changed differently in another dialect, while other changes amount to a slight phonetic shift, easily recognizable
by speakers of other dialects. Unfortunately, it is rather difficult to quantify just how slight or radical a particular phonological change is. Sociolinguistic factors are important, since it ultimately is the
perception of Semai speakers that determines whether a particular phonological change is profound or not.
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For instance, in countries with a caste system or with strong social classes, one would generally expect the languagedialect of the lowest caste or class to be unacceptable as the standard languagedialect, even if it were the
most widely understood.
For the analysis regarding aggregate phonological changes cited earlier Table 10, it is worth noting that the averages were determined from the roughly 436 lexical items that were used in this study. A
larger corpus would theoretically produce more accurate figures. It should also be noted that each dialect region was given equal weight when determining the averages. No adjustment was attempted
based on factors such as the total population in each dialect region. It may be a strategic factor to give more weight to the more populous dialect regions if a standardized form of Semai is to emerge.
Lastly, attention should be given to items of the wordlist in which dialect forms are not similar and apparently are unrelated. When the forms are dissimilar, the matter of aggregate instances of
phonological changes is irrelevant. Therefore if two given dialects have a great number of unrelated lexical items, the approach of looking at aggregate instances of phonological change is much less
insightful since it applies to much less data.
3.5 Comparative reconstruction of Proto-Semai
