Language rights advocates and groups supporting “Taiwanization” have called on the government to change its linguistic designation for Hoklo (commonly known as Taiwanese) from Minnanyu (閩南語, Southern Min) to Taiyu (台語).
The word Minnan has overtones of racial discrimination, and in the past, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) authoritarian government used “unlawful” means when designating it the “official name” for Taiyu, Taiwanese Pen Tai-bun Pit-hoe, the Takao Promote Tai-gi-bun Association and other advocacy groups said in a statement.
When Nvidia cofounder and chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), who was born in Tainan, spoke in Hoklo during a recent visit to Taiwan, he referred to the language as Taiyu, the statement said.
Photo: CNA
“Therefore we urge the Ministry of Education to follow the Executive Yuan’s resolution to prioritize the term Taiyu instead of Minnan,” it said
No article in the Constitution, nor any legal provision requires the use of Minnan when referring to Hoklo, the statement added.
Furthermore, the Min (閩) symbol is composed of the radical for door, and the component for insects (虫) or beast, which in ancient times referred to snakes, it said.
“The use of Minnan by northern Chinese was intended as racial discrimination when referring to the people of the Fujian or Minnan region,” the statement said, adding that some textbooks say the term meant “snake people” or “persons crawling on the ground.”
“Therefore Minnan when applied ... to speakers of the language, is like Han Chinese in the past referring to Taiwan’s indigenous people as fan [番, ‘uncivilized, or barbarians’] who spoke fan languages,” the statement said.
The government’s continued use of the term Minnan violates people’s right to language equality and contravenes the Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights; the UN’s covenants on protecting civil and political rights, and social and cultural rights; and the Development of National Languages Act (國家語言發展法), which went in to effect in 2019, it said.
The groups urged the Ministry of Education “to respect the wishes of Taiwanese, to change the term in school textbooks ... and to take action through an official notification from the ministry” saying that the language should be referred to as Taiyu, not Minnan.
Other organizations involved in the statement included the Taiwanese Romanization Association, the Taiwan-Vietnam Culture Association, Toa-bak-chiu Liam-koa-thoan, National Cheng Kung University’s Department of Taiwanese Literature and the Hoat-Ki Tai-gi Ki-kim-hoe Taiwanese Foundation.
PRAISE: Japanese visitor Takashi Kubota said the Taiwanese temple architecture images showcased in the AI Art Gallery were the most impressive displays he saw Taiwan does not have an official pavilion at the World Expo in Osaka, Japan, because of its diplomatic predicament, but the government-backed Tech World pavilion is drawing interest with its unique recreations of works by Taiwanese artists. The pavilion features an artificial intelligence (AI)-based art gallery showcasing works of famous Taiwanese artists from the Japanese colonial period using innovative technologies. Among its main simulated displays are Eastern gouache paintings by Chen Chin (陳進), Lin Yu-shan (林玉山) and Kuo Hsueh-hu (郭雪湖), who were the three young Taiwanese painters selected for the East Asian Painting exhibition in 1927. Gouache is a water-based
Taiwan would welcome the return of Honduras as a diplomatic ally if its next president decides to make such a move, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday. “Of course, we would welcome Honduras if they want to restore diplomatic ties with Taiwan after their elections,” Lin said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, when asked to comment on statements made by two of the three Honduran presidential candidates during the presidential campaign in the Central American country. Taiwan is paying close attention to the region as a whole in the wake of a
A magnitude 4.1 earthquake struck eastern Taiwan's Hualien County at 2:23pm today, according to the Central Weather Administration (CWA). The epicenter of the temblor was 5.4 kilometers northeast of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 34.9 km, according to the CWA. The earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was the highest in Hualien County, where it measured 2 on Taiwan's 7-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 1 in Yilan county, Taichung, Nantou County, Changhua County and Yunlin County, the CWA said. There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.
OFF-TARGET: More than 30,000 participants were expected to take part in the Games next month, but only 6,550 foreign and 19,400 Taiwanese athletes have registered Taipei city councilors yesterday blasted the organizers of next month’s World Masters Games over sudden timetable and venue changes, which they said have caused thousands of participants to back out of the international sporting event, among other organizational issues. They also cited visa delays and political interference by China as reasons many foreign athletes are requesting refunds for the event, to be held from May 17 to 30. Jointly organized by the Taipei and New Taipei City governments, the games have been rocked by numerous controversies since preparations began in 2020. Taipei City Councilor Lin Yen-feng (林延鳳) said yesterday that new measures by
RSS