Hi Kaiah,
It seems the Hakkas are uniting against the Hokkiens in Taiwan because of the alleged use of Hokkien language using Chinese characters in the government exams. Are the Hokkiens in Taiwan who are the overwhelming majority giving in to the Hakkas who are in the minority but yet provided with many privileges such as having their own Ministerial Council for Hakka Affairs and even all-Hakka TV fully financed by the government? Hope to get some insight into this matter.
Kam sia
[%sig%]
Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
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Dylan Sung
Re: Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
If you're gonna want a united Taiwan, the last thing you need is division across the language divide. Isn't it better to have a writing system in which all people have an equal and fair chance of succeeding in exams? If you're going to create a class divide, language is the sure thing.
Taiwanese need internal unity, and perhaps the Mandarin policy is at the heart of the problem in the past causing much harm by denying the use of dialects. Now after relaxing the Mandarin policies, you get this backlash. It is quite sad really. Perhaps going back to Classical Chinese might be a radical solution which doesn't favour any of the current dialects
Dyl.
Taiwanese need internal unity, and perhaps the Mandarin policy is at the heart of the problem in the past causing much harm by denying the use of dialects. Now after relaxing the Mandarin policies, you get this backlash. It is quite sad really. Perhaps going back to Classical Chinese might be a radical solution which doesn't favour any of the current dialects
Dyl.
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Andrew Yong
Re: Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
Any references to this available online?
a.
a.
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yeobh
Re: Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
Hi Andrew Yong,
You can log on to www.taipeitimes.com for news on this matter for the past 2 weeks.
I think it is a matter of given an inch want a foot. It looks like the minority Hakkas are trying to ensure the overwhelming majority Hokkiens in Taiwan do not enjoy more privileges than them. It is high time the majority Hokkiens in Taiwan stand up for their right to use their own language including in official capacity more so when they constitute the vast majority of the population.
Best regards,
You can log on to www.taipeitimes.com for news on this matter for the past 2 weeks.
I think it is a matter of given an inch want a foot. It looks like the minority Hakkas are trying to ensure the overwhelming majority Hokkiens in Taiwan do not enjoy more privileges than them. It is high time the majority Hokkiens in Taiwan stand up for their right to use their own language including in official capacity more so when they constitute the vast majority of the population.
Best regards,
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James C
Re: Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
The situation I believe is that Pres Chen wants to push for allowing anybody to use any of the 20 languages in Taiwan. And he's pushing for a new constitution but it seems not too many people are paying much attention to him.
I think that elevating Minnan and Kejia (among others) to official status is a good thing, but fear how exactly the government's going to standardize it all or whether they'll just choose one dictionary over others to become the standard. And not to mention all the extra translation work that will be required by everybody (which might create jobs). If they officialize that many languages, the government will have more of a linguistic burden on its hands than the UN itself which could cost huge, unnecessary costs for taxpayers. I'm not sure how much is actually written in any of the aboriginal languages or how many people can read them, but I have a feeling that much of the daily work in the government would not require translation into these languages. It should be based on a case-by-case basis.
Anyhow, if Minnan and Kejia get standardized, this will have an impact on Taiwan's writing systems including the addition of Chinese characters not previously in standard dictionaries and computers, which will probably have an effect on Unicode as well.
Linguistic freedoms are a very good thing. I just hope they don't try to make English the official language. That would be very strange.
I think the Hakkas brought up a very important point. If they're going to make exams in Taiwanese, then they should also make them in Hakka as well. That reminds me of a man I once knew in Taiwan. He spoke with a very strong Mainland accent but had been living in Taiwan most of his life. He was actually quite irritated by people always speaking to him in Taiwanese because he really didn't understand, and so he told them to please speak Putonghua, to which he got a response like, 'you've lived in Taiwan for so long and still can't speak Taiwanese!' But this man was actually a Hakka and spoke Hakka very fluently, so he would reply in Hakka: 'you've lived in Taiwan for so long and still can't speak Hakka!'. Actually, the man could have acted like most Taiwanese and just assumed everybody would and could speak Hakka with him, but he was being merely polite enough to use "Putonghua" (using this term and not Guoyu) on purpose so as to facilitate communication.
Reflecting on China, due to there being so many dialects, any out-of-towner needs to rely on Putonghua for communication. You don't just assume everybody else speaks your local variety. This is what most Taiwanese do anyway. Many people only switch to Taiwanese or Hakka once they feel that it is just as easy to communicate with the other person in this way. But there are those people who are always in Taiwanese mode.
I have posted some of the news articles mentioned above at my website. Type Chinese Dialects at Google, then hit I'm Feeling Lucky, then click on Current News.
James C
[%sig%]
I think that elevating Minnan and Kejia (among others) to official status is a good thing, but fear how exactly the government's going to standardize it all or whether they'll just choose one dictionary over others to become the standard. And not to mention all the extra translation work that will be required by everybody (which might create jobs). If they officialize that many languages, the government will have more of a linguistic burden on its hands than the UN itself which could cost huge, unnecessary costs for taxpayers. I'm not sure how much is actually written in any of the aboriginal languages or how many people can read them, but I have a feeling that much of the daily work in the government would not require translation into these languages. It should be based on a case-by-case basis.
Anyhow, if Minnan and Kejia get standardized, this will have an impact on Taiwan's writing systems including the addition of Chinese characters not previously in standard dictionaries and computers, which will probably have an effect on Unicode as well.
Linguistic freedoms are a very good thing. I just hope they don't try to make English the official language. That would be very strange.
I think the Hakkas brought up a very important point. If they're going to make exams in Taiwanese, then they should also make them in Hakka as well. That reminds me of a man I once knew in Taiwan. He spoke with a very strong Mainland accent but had been living in Taiwan most of his life. He was actually quite irritated by people always speaking to him in Taiwanese because he really didn't understand, and so he told them to please speak Putonghua, to which he got a response like, 'you've lived in Taiwan for so long and still can't speak Taiwanese!' But this man was actually a Hakka and spoke Hakka very fluently, so he would reply in Hakka: 'you've lived in Taiwan for so long and still can't speak Hakka!'. Actually, the man could have acted like most Taiwanese and just assumed everybody would and could speak Hakka with him, but he was being merely polite enough to use "Putonghua" (using this term and not Guoyu) on purpose so as to facilitate communication.
Reflecting on China, due to there being so many dialects, any out-of-towner needs to rely on Putonghua for communication. You don't just assume everybody else speaks your local variety. This is what most Taiwanese do anyway. Many people only switch to Taiwanese or Hakka once they feel that it is just as easy to communicate with the other person in this way. But there are those people who are always in Taiwanese mode.
I have posted some of the news articles mentioned above at my website. Type Chinese Dialects at Google, then hit I'm Feeling Lucky, then click on Current News.
James C
[%sig%]
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A-Hiong
Re: Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
I wouldn't blame any Hakkas who are angry at this. I would be too if I was Hakka. This is the problem with there being so many languages. There are some Taiwanese out there that are arrogant and seem to forget that Taiwan is a diverse island with some 20 odd languages. Come on, we can't officialize all of them. It would be chaos and no one would bother to speak in a common language everyone understands. There's a reason Guo Yu is called Guo Yu, its supposed to be the National language, the equivalent of Latin during the Roman ages. DPP leaders seems to have forgotten about the other minorities on the island, I personally think some of these policies are almost racist. Well, have to see how they want to fix this problem but I don't see anything like that working. You need one unifying way to communicate with everyone and that way should be Mandarin. Its really arrogant and racist policy, what ends up happening is that Taiwanese speakers can only gain high positions in bureacracy while non-Taiwanese speakers can't. If that happened in the States, everyone would be all over this and state how racist it is! I think Chen has very poor policies socially. He does a really bad job unifying Taiwan. Its ashame.
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yeobh
Re: Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
A-bian claiming himself to be a Hakka seems to be going all out to revive the Hakka language though he got the presidency mainly due to the votes of the Hokkiens. He helped to set up the Council for Hakka Affairs, Hakka Cultural Building and Hakka TV and seems to be associating himself more with the Hakkas than the Hokkiens. Yet some Hakka politicians particularly those from the opposition are putting up a front against the Hokkiens. I should say they risk antogonising the vast majority of Taiwanese who happens to be Hokkiens and might even lose whatever privileges which even the majority Hokkiens do not enjoy if A-bian get bouted out for favouring the Hakkas who are still not satisfied.
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Andrew Yong
Re: Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
James: in many of your phonetic tables I get squares instead of letters. Is there a font I need to download? (I use IE 6)
andrew
andrew
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Ong
Re: Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
Hi everyone,
Thanks to everyone particularly Niuc, Sim Lee, Andrew Yong and Casey who have contributed a lot to this Hokkien forum to make the total postings to 1K within a short time span. Keep up the effort to make Hokkien a living language not only in Taiwan but in other parts of the world where there is sizable Hokkien ppl.
I feel extremely disappointed that the Hokkiens have apparently been manipulated by other interested parties which might slowly lead to the demise of their language. In Singapore where Hokkien language once predominated, it was a PM of Hakka origin who mastered the Hokkien language as an adult to win the confidence of majority Hokkiens but who later introduced a Mandarin-only policy which has drastically eroded the once dominant position of Hokkien language. In Taiwan, there is this A-bian, again of Hakka origin, who ascended to the presidency mainly on Hokkien votes but who is putting in place policies promoting Hakka language and culture which are working against the dominant position of Taiwanese Hokkiens who form the overwhelming majority of the ppl. I hope all Hokkiens should by now realise the underlying forces which are working against them and undertake measures to address the situation.
By the way, why are the abovementioned regulars keeping quiet on this subject? Are Hokkiens generally docile and easily manipulated particularly by Hakkas as vividly reflected in the above scenario.
Thanks to everyone particularly Niuc, Sim Lee, Andrew Yong and Casey who have contributed a lot to this Hokkien forum to make the total postings to 1K within a short time span. Keep up the effort to make Hokkien a living language not only in Taiwan but in other parts of the world where there is sizable Hokkien ppl.
I feel extremely disappointed that the Hokkiens have apparently been manipulated by other interested parties which might slowly lead to the demise of their language. In Singapore where Hokkien language once predominated, it was a PM of Hakka origin who mastered the Hokkien language as an adult to win the confidence of majority Hokkiens but who later introduced a Mandarin-only policy which has drastically eroded the once dominant position of Hokkien language. In Taiwan, there is this A-bian, again of Hakka origin, who ascended to the presidency mainly on Hokkien votes but who is putting in place policies promoting Hakka language and culture which are working against the dominant position of Taiwanese Hokkiens who form the overwhelming majority of the ppl. I hope all Hokkiens should by now realise the underlying forces which are working against them and undertake measures to address the situation.
By the way, why are the abovementioned regulars keeping quiet on this subject? Are Hokkiens generally docile and easily manipulated particularly by Hakkas as vividly reflected in the above scenario.
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Andrew Yong
Re: Hakkas Uniting Against Hokkiens In Taiwan
I don't know if I should get involved being a Hakka myself! (And not Taiwanese).
Personally I welcome formal Hokkien teaching, standardisation and government involvement in such issues such as UTF. At the same time I would welcome the same things for Hakka and other non-Mandarin Chinese languages.
National language issues are invariably political and involve your idea of what the nation is and what it represents. My view is that Lee Kuan Yew as ever enforced an excessively strict language policy, and one that in my view was beyond the proper remit of the government. Singapore is a multi-racial country, so by all means make English the official language for national unity. But it is inconsistent with a multiracial state to say "the Indian minority can have Tamil as a national language (rather than Hindi) despite the fact that there are also Sikhs and Bengalis, but I want the Chinese race to be united, so Mandarin will be a national language but Hokkien will not".
Not being Taiwanese I would hesitate to venture an opinion, but having been asked, as someone who feels that Taiwan is a first and foremost a province of the Republic of China (provisional capital Taipei) I think have no problem with Mandarin being the sole primary official language. People who feel that Taiwan should be a separate country no doubt will have other views.
Hokkien has survived hundreds of years without being the Guanhua. In fact it would be a completely different (and less rich/complex) language if it did not have the external guanhua influence. I see no reason why it cannot do the same now, as long as it is taught as an optional subject in schools.
If I were in charge of Penang or Singapore, I would make English the primary official language and have Malay, Mandarin, Hokkien and Tamil as secondary official languages, i.e. you can speak them in Parliament and learn them in schools, but cannot e.g. address the courts or sit civil service examinations in them.
But there are still problems. In Penang do you teach Emng or Chiangchiu Hokkien? To my mind here is no point teaching the native language if you don't teach the version that is spoken locally, so that would mean teach Penangised Chiangchiu Hokkien in Penang and a mix of Emng/Chiangchiu/Chinchiu in Taiwan, since if you're going to learn goan2 you might as well learn wo3men. But then there is no standardisation and no prospect of a common literature. In Switzerland they teach German as spoken in Berlin, and the local Schwyzertu:u:tsch dialect is a purely spoken language which varies from canton to canton. Tuscan became the standard written Italian mainly because of Dante (although other dialects are still spoken).
Here you have a political question again. Do you see Hokkien-speakers as having a common identity (in which teach the language based on the Amoy standard), or do you see yourself primarily as Taiwanese? There is also a question of what literature there is and what films etc will be made in?
andrew
Personally I welcome formal Hokkien teaching, standardisation and government involvement in such issues such as UTF. At the same time I would welcome the same things for Hakka and other non-Mandarin Chinese languages.
National language issues are invariably political and involve your idea of what the nation is and what it represents. My view is that Lee Kuan Yew as ever enforced an excessively strict language policy, and one that in my view was beyond the proper remit of the government. Singapore is a multi-racial country, so by all means make English the official language for national unity. But it is inconsistent with a multiracial state to say "the Indian minority can have Tamil as a national language (rather than Hindi) despite the fact that there are also Sikhs and Bengalis, but I want the Chinese race to be united, so Mandarin will be a national language but Hokkien will not".
Not being Taiwanese I would hesitate to venture an opinion, but having been asked, as someone who feels that Taiwan is a first and foremost a province of the Republic of China (provisional capital Taipei) I think have no problem with Mandarin being the sole primary official language. People who feel that Taiwan should be a separate country no doubt will have other views.
Hokkien has survived hundreds of years without being the Guanhua. In fact it would be a completely different (and less rich/complex) language if it did not have the external guanhua influence. I see no reason why it cannot do the same now, as long as it is taught as an optional subject in schools.
If I were in charge of Penang or Singapore, I would make English the primary official language and have Malay, Mandarin, Hokkien and Tamil as secondary official languages, i.e. you can speak them in Parliament and learn them in schools, but cannot e.g. address the courts or sit civil service examinations in them.
But there are still problems. In Penang do you teach Emng or Chiangchiu Hokkien? To my mind here is no point teaching the native language if you don't teach the version that is spoken locally, so that would mean teach Penangised Chiangchiu Hokkien in Penang and a mix of Emng/Chiangchiu/Chinchiu in Taiwan, since if you're going to learn goan2 you might as well learn wo3men. But then there is no standardisation and no prospect of a common literature. In Switzerland they teach German as spoken in Berlin, and the local Schwyzertu:u:tsch dialect is a purely spoken language which varies from canton to canton. Tuscan became the standard written Italian mainly because of Dante (although other dialects are still spoken).
Here you have a political question again. Do you see Hokkien-speakers as having a common identity (in which teach the language based on the Amoy standard), or do you see yourself primarily as Taiwanese? There is also a question of what literature there is and what films etc will be made in?
andrew