International Conferences on Taiwanese Literature -- Did you know about them?

Searching the blog links on the Siá Tâi-oân ê Oē "Write Taiwan's Languages" website, I belatedly found out about an international conference on Taiwanese Literature hosted this past weekend on October 23 and 24th. The site, litintaiwanese.blogspot.com/ reports on this years events and also links to prior years' 2005-2009 conferences.

Here is the title: "2010 Tē 6 kài Tâi-gí bûn-ha̍k kok-tsè ha̍k-su̍t gián-thó-huē." You'll note two things from the title:
1. They are using the Ministry of Education romanization instead of the more wide-spread POJ. This is particularly strange since most Taiwanese Literature is written in POJ. Fortunately, the MOE romanization so closely follows POJ that the reader of one can easily adjust to the other.
2. Note also that these conference organizers knew English well enough to capitalize the entire title in English, but did not have any specific standard for capitalization of Taiwanese. Probably, the conference title should have been done as follows: "2010 Tē 6 kài Tâi-gí Bûn-ha̍k Kok-tsè Ha̍k-su̍t Gián-thó-huē"

We would like to resoundingly cheer on these efforts and make the above notes to illustrate how the work needs to continue so we have completely functional and standardized writing systems for all of Taiwan's non-Mandarin languages. We hope there will be new literature and new conferences in the other languages of Taiwan.

Posting Facebook updates in a non-Mandarin language of Taiwan

We've been happy to notice an upswing recently in the number of facebook status updates posted in a non-Mandarin language of Taiwan.

Following are two status updates recently seen. These update create a lot of interest and comment by facebook friends of those posting these status updates.


Chit-ê sī góa khǹg--teh piān-só ê chú-pn̄g-tâi, in-ūi góa-ê piān-só siuⁿ-tōa, só͘-í ū chi̍t-ê só͘-chāi ōe-tàng chú-pn̄g mā-sī ū-thang :)

A very important experience in Taiwan where real estate prices are very high is to maximize the use of space. Basically, the status update translates, "I put this kitchen shelf in my bathroom because my bathroom is too big and there is a useful space for cooking."

16 comments followed this post. Such a post is an excellent way to get a younger generation interested in reading and writing in the non-Mandarin languages of Taiwan. People will feel like it is short enough to attempt to read it even when it looks so alien not written using Mandarin Chinese characters.


A second post states, "Gín-á tōa-hàn chin kín, ū-tām-po̍h m̄-kam :)" It got twelve comments. Among them was one replying in written Taiwanese: Góa mā-sī án-ne siūⁿ. Lán ta̍k-kang liān-si̍p chi̍t-kù, hó-bò?


How can they type? There are now several software input options available. You can find links at taigi.fhl.net as well as sia-taiwan.blogspot.com.

Also, in a new development, the Maryknoll Language Center has posted an entire Taiwanese-English and an English-Taiwanese dictionary online at taiwanesedictionary.org.