I found these great links in Unilang.org about learning Hokkien (in Chinese, unfortunately no English translations):
闽南语学习网
http://www.520hai.com/mn/index.htm
视频: 闽南语教程1 (video lessons)
http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNjUxODYzODA=.html
闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
Re: 闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
Everytime I see the teaching materials, I just feel sad. They bastardize the entire tonal aspect of the Hokkien language.
Stereotony is the most precious aspect of the Hokkien language. It's what makes the language unique and special. The theoretical foundation is not even that complicated. Yet, for some reason, people refuse to get modernized. They go back again and again to the tone-sandhi wheels. It's not that 李勤岸 doesn't know me, we've met before in person. Just over all, I feel that the scholarship level of Hokkien language is so so low. The linguist 丁邦新 left Taiwan, I guess for a good reason. After he left, 洪惟仁 is the only authority in the language, but he is just not at the same academic level of 丁邦新. But on the other hand one can't really blame it on anyone, after all, linguistics does not pay, so smart people usually go into more lucrative fields.
丁邦新 and 橋本萬太郎 have pointed out the 本調/變調 mistake almost 30 years ago. Yet if you look at most of the Hokkien teaching materials, they still follow the same mistake.
From 泉州 to 廈門 to 潮州 , Hokkien stereotones' tonal values change dramatically, but yet the underlying structures are identical. It's OK to regular street folks not to know these details, but for scholars to dwell in the past is inconceivable. So there you go, for 潮州 you get totally different romanization systems, a totally different tone-sandhi wheel, as for 泉州 you tell people to sacrifice their YangShang tone and conform their perfectly fine 8-tone system into a 7-tone system. And the whole Hokkien language world is turned upside down.
I really wish there are more 泉州 dialect materials on the net. UCLA has an OK Quanzhou dictionary (http://solution.cs.ucla.edu/~jinbo/dzl/lookup.php). But as for audio-visual materials, there is just not much on the net. Youtube has a few story-telling video clips in Quanzhou dialect, but that's about it. Only by understanding 泉州 dialect can one really understand the full beauty and symmetry of the Hokkien language, and realize that a lot of the homophone problems today in 廈門/臺灣 dialects were inexistent in the past. We need to save all the 8 tones. It's part of the treasure of the Hokkien language, and the envy of all other Chinese dialects. Quanzhou's 8 tones are the purest heritage of Middle Chinese. I hope one day people learn to appreciate this fact. (Cantonese and Teochew also have 8 tones but they are not nearly as pure as Quanzhou. The 濁上變去 phenomenon or its converse version have their tolls on these languages.)
Enough ranting. For Hokkien's 8-stereotone table, take a look at http://www.tadpolenese.com/tutorial . My hope is that one day people can resuscitate the semi-classical pronunciation of Hokkien, so that from Taiwan to Xiamen to Zhangzhou to Quanzhou to Teochew, people can still communicate with each other. It's a dream. But a doable dream. Much more doable than the resuscitation of Hebrew.
Stereotony is the most precious aspect of the Hokkien language. It's what makes the language unique and special. The theoretical foundation is not even that complicated. Yet, for some reason, people refuse to get modernized. They go back again and again to the tone-sandhi wheels. It's not that 李勤岸 doesn't know me, we've met before in person. Just over all, I feel that the scholarship level of Hokkien language is so so low. The linguist 丁邦新 left Taiwan, I guess for a good reason. After he left, 洪惟仁 is the only authority in the language, but he is just not at the same academic level of 丁邦新. But on the other hand one can't really blame it on anyone, after all, linguistics does not pay, so smart people usually go into more lucrative fields.
丁邦新 and 橋本萬太郎 have pointed out the 本調/變調 mistake almost 30 years ago. Yet if you look at most of the Hokkien teaching materials, they still follow the same mistake.
From 泉州 to 廈門 to 潮州 , Hokkien stereotones' tonal values change dramatically, but yet the underlying structures are identical. It's OK to regular street folks not to know these details, but for scholars to dwell in the past is inconceivable. So there you go, for 潮州 you get totally different romanization systems, a totally different tone-sandhi wheel, as for 泉州 you tell people to sacrifice their YangShang tone and conform their perfectly fine 8-tone system into a 7-tone system. And the whole Hokkien language world is turned upside down.
I really wish there are more 泉州 dialect materials on the net. UCLA has an OK Quanzhou dictionary (http://solution.cs.ucla.edu/~jinbo/dzl/lookup.php). But as for audio-visual materials, there is just not much on the net. Youtube has a few story-telling video clips in Quanzhou dialect, but that's about it. Only by understanding 泉州 dialect can one really understand the full beauty and symmetry of the Hokkien language, and realize that a lot of the homophone problems today in 廈門/臺灣 dialects were inexistent in the past. We need to save all the 8 tones. It's part of the treasure of the Hokkien language, and the envy of all other Chinese dialects. Quanzhou's 8 tones are the purest heritage of Middle Chinese. I hope one day people learn to appreciate this fact. (Cantonese and Teochew also have 8 tones but they are not nearly as pure as Quanzhou. The 濁上變去 phenomenon or its converse version have their tolls on these languages.)
Enough ranting. For Hokkien's 8-stereotone table, take a look at http://www.tadpolenese.com/tutorial . My hope is that one day people can resuscitate the semi-classical pronunciation of Hokkien, so that from Taiwan to Xiamen to Zhangzhou to Quanzhou to Teochew, people can still communicate with each other. It's a dream. But a doable dream. Much more doable than the resuscitation of Hebrew.
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Andrew
Re: 闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
I find your explanation of stereotony very interesting and believable. However, I think your use of a romanisation that most people cannot understand and will not bother learning distracts from this.
Have any mainstream academic papers been written on stereotony?
Have any mainstream academic papers been written on stereotony?
Re: 闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
I hope that they can get their act together and define a standard minnan dialect and get rid of the differences between the various dialects.tadpole wrote: Enough ranting. For Hokkien's 8-stereotone table, take a look at http://www.tadpolenese.com/tutorial . My hope is that one day people can resuscitate the semi-classical pronunciation of Hokkien, so that from Taiwan to Xiamen to Zhangzhou to Quanzhou to Teochew, people can still communicate with each other. It's a dream. But a doable dream.
Only by doing so, can minnan be saved from oblivion in the future.
It would be great if the standard have more unique tones and sounds. Mandarin has too many homophones.
Re: 闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
Hi Tadpole, Xng & all friends here:
Thank you, Tadpole, for the information. However would you kindly enlighten me more about stereotony? What are the differences between it and tone-sandhi? Would you please give simple examples why you said "they bastardize the entire tonal aspect"? Kindly pardon my ignorance.
As a native speaker of a variant of 同安話, I love my mother tongue and surely would like to see Hokkien language thrives. However, I realize that Hokkien Minnan has a lot of variants (dialects) [not even to count those under Teochew Minnan]. Even with standardization, variants are always there to stay, as we can see in any language. Moreover there is no standard Hokkien variant, and I doubt there will be one. Much to the dismay of linguist purists, the fact is that a language's survival lies in its usefulness - most of the time meaning economic usefulness. Whether we like it or not, Hokkien is far behind Mandarin in this aspect. So rather than focusing on linguistic purity [not to say that we should neglect it], I rejoice in every chance of Hokkien being taught.
I am not linguistically trained, but in my limited knowledge I remember that Hebrew is indeed now very much alive in Israel. True is the saying that a language is a dialect with an army! Since Hokkien is official language in nowhere, forgive my skepticism regarding any renaissance of semi-classical pronunciation of Hokkien (or any Chinese "dialects" for that matter). Unless there is a change in the trend, otherwise IMHO all Chinese languages other than Mandarin will keep decreasing in daily usage. Personally I don't see this as a good or bad thing, but just a flow of history. We should do our best to preserve our traditions (including languages), but I think more than that we ought to strive to have a peaceful heart also to accept whatever comes our way.
Thank you, Tadpole, for the information. However would you kindly enlighten me more about stereotony? What are the differences between it and tone-sandhi? Would you please give simple examples why you said "they bastardize the entire tonal aspect"? Kindly pardon my ignorance.
As a native speaker of a variant of 同安話, I love my mother tongue and surely would like to see Hokkien language thrives. However, I realize that Hokkien Minnan has a lot of variants (dialects) [not even to count those under Teochew Minnan]. Even with standardization, variants are always there to stay, as we can see in any language. Moreover there is no standard Hokkien variant, and I doubt there will be one. Much to the dismay of linguist purists, the fact is that a language's survival lies in its usefulness - most of the time meaning economic usefulness. Whether we like it or not, Hokkien is far behind Mandarin in this aspect. So rather than focusing on linguistic purity [not to say that we should neglect it], I rejoice in every chance of Hokkien being taught.
I am not linguistically trained, but in my limited knowledge I remember that Hebrew is indeed now very much alive in Israel. True is the saying that a language is a dialect with an army! Since Hokkien is official language in nowhere, forgive my skepticism regarding any renaissance of semi-classical pronunciation of Hokkien (or any Chinese "dialects" for that matter). Unless there is a change in the trend, otherwise IMHO all Chinese languages other than Mandarin will keep decreasing in daily usage. Personally I don't see this as a good or bad thing, but just a flow of history. We should do our best to preserve our traditions (including languages), but I think more than that we ought to strive to have a peaceful heart also to accept whatever comes our way.
Re: 闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
Hi, niuc,
Yes, as much an idealist as I am, I have to admit that the dialects are fighting a losing battle with the onslaught (pardon the harsh choice of words) of Mandarin. It really does not help that Hokkien suffers the disadvantage of (1) not having a written standard and (2) lack of media support, as compared to Cantonese in Hong Kong.
And really, I feel that this need not be the case. If you think about it, the number of Hokkien-speaking communities across South-East Asia (Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and Philippines), when combined together, could very well surpass Hong Kong's total population. The media and now, the Internet, are excellent tools to bring these communities together. If only there could be a concerted effort by representative members of these disparate communities to come together and develop Hokkien as a true lingua franca among these Hokkien communities. You are right - at this point in time, striving for linguistic purity by retaining every conceivable Hokkien variant may not be the most prudent thing to focus on; attention should first be placed on preserving the dialect as a whole.
To give you an example: Just under a year ago, my wife was pleasantly surprised to learn that some of her new-found acquaintances from Medan (by the way, I am from Kuala Lumpur, and spent 6 years of my working life in Penang) spoke Hokkien that was hardly distinguishable from her native Northern Malaysian (a.k.a. Penang) Hokkien. And I have a friend whose husband who hails from Kelantan, also speaks Hokkien very similar to the Penang variant. When I meet friends from Singapore, I occasionally find myself lapsing into Hokkien, even though they speak a different variant. How often do we encounter situations where Penangites bump into Penangites out of town or overseas, and joyfully engage in their creole? If Hebrew could survive (both in speech and writing) three millennia of almost-nomadic uncertainty before it was finally given a homeland only in the last century, why not Hokkien - which has suffered oppression from Mandarin for barely a century?
For better or for worse, history has played out such that political forces brought about the ascendancy of Mandarin and the suppression of the dialects. History gave Singapore a Prime Minister who sought to eradicate the dialects in favour of Mandarin (and here I run the risk of ending up on Singapore's non gratia list). So equally, it is up to people like us to play a part in determining whether the rest of history-to-come will be a total extinction of the dialects, or a revival of sorts. We can either accept the current trend quietly, or swim upstream. At least with the latter option, we give Hokkien that little bit of a fighting chance.
My rant for today.
Yes, as much an idealist as I am, I have to admit that the dialects are fighting a losing battle with the onslaught (pardon the harsh choice of words) of Mandarin. It really does not help that Hokkien suffers the disadvantage of (1) not having a written standard and (2) lack of media support, as compared to Cantonese in Hong Kong.
And really, I feel that this need not be the case. If you think about it, the number of Hokkien-speaking communities across South-East Asia (Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and Philippines), when combined together, could very well surpass Hong Kong's total population. The media and now, the Internet, are excellent tools to bring these communities together. If only there could be a concerted effort by representative members of these disparate communities to come together and develop Hokkien as a true lingua franca among these Hokkien communities. You are right - at this point in time, striving for linguistic purity by retaining every conceivable Hokkien variant may not be the most prudent thing to focus on; attention should first be placed on preserving the dialect as a whole.
To give you an example: Just under a year ago, my wife was pleasantly surprised to learn that some of her new-found acquaintances from Medan (by the way, I am from Kuala Lumpur, and spent 6 years of my working life in Penang) spoke Hokkien that was hardly distinguishable from her native Northern Malaysian (a.k.a. Penang) Hokkien. And I have a friend whose husband who hails from Kelantan, also speaks Hokkien very similar to the Penang variant. When I meet friends from Singapore, I occasionally find myself lapsing into Hokkien, even though they speak a different variant. How often do we encounter situations where Penangites bump into Penangites out of town or overseas, and joyfully engage in their creole? If Hebrew could survive (both in speech and writing) three millennia of almost-nomadic uncertainty before it was finally given a homeland only in the last century, why not Hokkien - which has suffered oppression from Mandarin for barely a century?
For better or for worse, history has played out such that political forces brought about the ascendancy of Mandarin and the suppression of the dialects. History gave Singapore a Prime Minister who sought to eradicate the dialects in favour of Mandarin (and here I run the risk of ending up on Singapore's non gratia list). So equally, it is up to people like us to play a part in determining whether the rest of history-to-come will be a total extinction of the dialects, or a revival of sorts. We can either accept the current trend quietly, or swim upstream. At least with the latter option, we give Hokkien that little bit of a fighting chance.
My rant for today.
-
Andrew
Re: 闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
Niuc, I was referring to http://www.tadpolenese.com/theory/runni ... ed-default which was posted in another thread.niuc wrote: Thank you, Tadpole, for the information. However would you kindly enlighten me more about stereotony? What are the differences between it and tone-sandhi? Would you please give simple examples why you said "they bastardize the entire tonal aspect"? Kindly pardon my ignorance.
Re: 闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
Hi Mark & Andrew
Mark, glad to know your opinion. I agree with you that we should give Hokkien a fighting chance. Personally I don’t know if there is any international association for Hokkien that can develop Hokkien as a lingua franca. Anyway, Hokkien Huay Kuan here promotes Mandarin instead of Hokkien. I am not a member, so I can’t be certain about that, nevertheless that’s the impression I get as a resident in Singapore. How about Hokkien associations in your places, if any?
It is interesting, for better or for worse, that Hokkien people, unlike Cantonese, usually are very pro-Mandarin. It is kind of ironic, yet that is true not only among Singaporean, but also Indonesian and Malaysian Hokkiens. And since most Hokkiens nowadays do understand Mandarin, usually they don’t care much about preserving their own language. Moreover most have come to believe the distorted dogma that Hokkien is just one of many dialects of Chinese, among which Mandarin is the standard one (and therefore only the standard Chinese is worthy of preservation).
Hebrew is well alive today because it is the official language of Israel. Even Welsh is still alive in Wales, being made an official language together with English there, complete with regulations by local government to show signs in both languages. This is also the case for many other languages. However, sadly, I don’t think PRC or ROC (Taiwan) is going that way. If even PRC/ROC does not care about one of the heritage of Chinese, how can we expect the country like Singapore - that already has 4 official languages and is well know for being die hard utilitarian - to preserve those it calls "dialects"? Without support from authorities (political and cultural), it is very hard to preserve a language. Surely Hokkien will not vanish, at least not so soon, but its importance and practicality is rolling towards museum. Linguists say that Hokkien (Minnan) is a living fossil of Old Chinese, and now that fossil is indeed fossilizing. The lack of support from governments is made worse by utilitarianism of most Hokkien/Chinese people.
Having saying that, surely we are not totally without hope. Personally I don’t have any great idea or access to make that dream comes true, so I hope there will be people who take lead and many more, including I, will gladly contribute accordingly. Any good advise how to start?
Andrew, thank you for the link. I had not visited the forum for a while, so I didn’t know that before. I do find Tadpole’s theory logical. How great if there is an international forum for experts to discuss these things and standardize the way Hokkien being written and taught. I still think that the problem lies in no support from authorities/associations.
Mark, glad to know your opinion. I agree with you that we should give Hokkien a fighting chance. Personally I don’t know if there is any international association for Hokkien that can develop Hokkien as a lingua franca. Anyway, Hokkien Huay Kuan here promotes Mandarin instead of Hokkien. I am not a member, so I can’t be certain about that, nevertheless that’s the impression I get as a resident in Singapore. How about Hokkien associations in your places, if any?
It is interesting, for better or for worse, that Hokkien people, unlike Cantonese, usually are very pro-Mandarin. It is kind of ironic, yet that is true not only among Singaporean, but also Indonesian and Malaysian Hokkiens. And since most Hokkiens nowadays do understand Mandarin, usually they don’t care much about preserving their own language. Moreover most have come to believe the distorted dogma that Hokkien is just one of many dialects of Chinese, among which Mandarin is the standard one (and therefore only the standard Chinese is worthy of preservation).
Hebrew is well alive today because it is the official language of Israel. Even Welsh is still alive in Wales, being made an official language together with English there, complete with regulations by local government to show signs in both languages. This is also the case for many other languages. However, sadly, I don’t think PRC or ROC (Taiwan) is going that way. If even PRC/ROC does not care about one of the heritage of Chinese, how can we expect the country like Singapore - that already has 4 official languages and is well know for being die hard utilitarian - to preserve those it calls "dialects"? Without support from authorities (political and cultural), it is very hard to preserve a language. Surely Hokkien will not vanish, at least not so soon, but its importance and practicality is rolling towards museum. Linguists say that Hokkien (Minnan) is a living fossil of Old Chinese, and now that fossil is indeed fossilizing. The lack of support from governments is made worse by utilitarianism of most Hokkien/Chinese people.
Having saying that, surely we are not totally without hope. Personally I don’t have any great idea or access to make that dream comes true, so I hope there will be people who take lead and many more, including I, will gladly contribute accordingly. Any good advise how to start?
Andrew, thank you for the link. I had not visited the forum for a while, so I didn’t know that before. I do find Tadpole’s theory logical. How great if there is an international forum for experts to discuss these things and standardize the way Hokkien being written and taught. I still think that the problem lies in no support from authorities/associations.
Re: 闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
You should say "the OTHER dialects are fighting a losing battle with the onslaught of Mandarin.I have to admit that the dialects are fighting a losing battle with the onslaught (pardon the harsh choice of words) of Mandarin.
Mandarin is a dialect too!
Re: 闽南语学习网 & 闽南语教程
Missed some punctuation there....