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Languages Of Taiwan
The languages of Taiwan consist of several varieties of languages under the families of Austronesian languages and Sino-Tibetan languages. The Formosan languages, a branch of Austronesian languages, have been spoken by the Taiwanese indigenous peoples for thousands of years. Owing to the wide internal variety of the Formosan languages, research on historical linguistics recognizes Taiwan as the Urheimat (homeland) of the whole Austronesian languages family. In the last 400 years, several waves of Han emigrations brought several different Sinitic languages into Taiwan. These languages include Taiwanese Hokkien, Hakka, and Mandarin, which have become the major languages spoken in present-day Taiwan. Formosan languages were the dominant language of prehistorical Taiwan. Taiwan's long colonial and immigration history brought in several languages such as Dutch, Spanish, Hokkien, Hakka, Japanese, and Mandarin. Due to its colonial history, Japanese influences the language in Taiwan, f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Taiwanese Mandarin
Taiwanese Mandarin, ''Guoyu'' ( zh, s=, t=國語, p=Guóyǔ, l=National Language, first=t) or ''Huayu'' ( zh, s=, t=華語, p=Huáyǔ, first=t, l=Mandarin Language, labels=no) refers to Mandarin Chinese spoken in Taiwan. A large majority of the Taiwanese population is fluent in Mandarin, though many also speak Taiwanese Hokkien, commonly called ''Minnanyu'' ( ''Mǐnnányǔ'') or Southern Min, a variety of Min Chinese. This language has had significant influence on Mandarin as spoken on the island. ''Guoyu'' is not the indigenous language of Taiwan. Chinese settlers came to Taiwan in the 16th century, but spoke other Chinese languages, primarily Southern Min. Japan annexed Taiwan in 1895 and governed the island as a colony for the next 50 years, during which time Japanese was introduced and taught in schools, while non-Mandarin languages were spoken at home. With the defeat of Imperial Japan in World War II, Taiwan was returned to the Republic of China under the Kuomintang (KMT), ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sakizaya Language
Sakizaya is a Formosan language closely related to Amis. One of the large family of Austronesian languages, it is spoken by the Sakizaya people, who are concentrated on the eastern Pacific coast of Taiwan. Since 2007 they have been recognized by the Taiwan government as one of the sixteen distinct indigenous groups on the island. History After the of 1878, the Sakizaya people hid among the Nataoran Amis. Scholars mistakenly categorised the Sakizaya language as a dialect of Amis. In 2002, the Center of Aboriginal Studies of National Chengchi University in Taiwan corrected this error when they edited the indigenous languages textbooks. That year, the Sakizaya language was designated both as a Chilai and Amis sublanguage. Both are included in the family of Austronesian languages. On 17 January 2007, the Sakizaya community became the thirteenth distinct indigenous ethnic group recognised by the Taiwanese government. A total of 985 people are registered as Sakizaya. They live ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Korean Language
Korean ( South Korean: , ''hangugeo''; North Korean: , ''chosŏnmal'') is the native language for about 80 million people, mostly of Korean descent. It is the official and national language of both North Korea and South Korea (geographically Korea), but over the past years of political division, the two Koreas have developed some noticeable vocabulary differences. Beyond Korea, the language is recognised as a minority language in parts of China, namely Jilin Province, and specifically Yanbian Prefecture and Changbai County. It is also spoken by Sakhalin Koreans in parts of Sakhalin, the Russian island just north of Japan, and by the in parts of Central Asia. The language has a few extinct relatives which—along with the Jeju language (Jejuan) of Jeju Island and Korean itself—form the compact Koreanic language family. Even so, Jejuan and Korean are not mutually intelligible with each other. The linguistic homeland of Korean is suggested to be somewhere in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Japanese Language
is spoken natively by about 128 million people, primarily by Japanese people and primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language. Japanese belongs to the Japonic or Japanese- Ryukyuan language family. There have been many attempts to group the Japonic languages with other families such as the Ainu, Austroasiatic, Koreanic, and the now-discredited Altaic, but none of these proposals has gained widespread acceptance. Little is known of the language's prehistory, or when it first appeared in Japan. Chinese documents from the 3rd century AD recorded a few Japanese words, but substantial Old Japanese texts did not appear until the 8th century. From the Heian period (794–1185), there was a massive influx of Sino-Japanese vocabulary into the language, affecting the phonology of Early Middle Japanese. Late Middle Japanese (1185–1600) saw extensive grammatical changes and the first appearance of European loanwords. The basis of the standard dialect moved f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
English Language
English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the island of Great Britain. Existing on a dialect continuum with Scots, and then closest related to the Low Saxon and Frisian languages, English is genealogically West Germanic. However, its vocabulary is also distinctively influenced by dialects of France (about 29% of Modern English words) and Latin (also about 29%), plus some grammar and a small amount of core vocabulary influenced by Old Norse (a North Germanic language). Speakers of English are called Anglophones. The earliest forms of English, collectively known as Old English, evolved from a group of West Germanic (Ingvaeonic) dialects brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the 5th century and further mutated by Norse-speaking Viking settlers starting in the 8th and 9th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Malay Language
Malay (; ms, Bahasa Melayu, links=no, Jawi alphabet, Jawi: , Rejang script, Rencong: ) is an Austronesian languages, Austronesian language that is an official language of Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore, and that is also spoken in East Timor and parts of the Philippines and Thailand. Altogether, it is spoken by 290 million people (around 260 million in Indonesia alone in its own literary standard named "Indonesian language, Indonesian") across Maritime Southeast Asia. As the or ("national language") of several states, Standard Malay has various official names. In Malaysia, it is designated as either ("Malaysian Malay") or also ("Malay language"). In Singapore and Brunei, it is called ("Malay language"). In Indonesia, an autonomous normative variety called ("Indonesian language") is designated the ("unifying language" or lingua franca). However, in areas of Central to Southern Sumatra, where vernacular varieties of Malay are indigenous, Indonesians refe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vietnamese Language
Vietnamese ( vi, tiếng Việt, links=no) is an Austroasiatic languages, Austroasiatic language originating from Vietnam where it is the national language, national and official language. Vietnamese is spoken natively by over 70 million people, several times as many as the rest of the Austroasiatic family combined. It is the native language of the Vietnamese people, Vietnamese (Kinh) people, as well as a second language, second language or First language, first language for List of ethnic groups in Vietnam, other ethnic groups in Vietnam. As a result of overseas Vietnamese, emigration, Vietnamese speakers are also found in other parts of Southeast Asia, East Asia, North America, Europe, and Australia (continent), Australia. Vietnamese has also been officially recognized as a minority language in the Czech Republic. Like many other languages in Southeast Asia and East Asia, Vietnamese is an analytic language with phonemic tone (linguistics), tone. It has head-initial directionali ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tagalog Language
Tagalog (, ; ; '' Baybayin'': ) is an Austronesian language spoken as a first language by the ethnic Tagalog people, who make up a quarter of the population of the Philippines, and as a second language by the majority. Its standardized form, officially named ''Filipino'', is the national language of the Philippines, and is one of two official languages, alongside English. Tagalog is closely related to other Philippine languages, such as the Bikol languages, Ilocano, the Bisayan languages, Kapampangan, and Pangasinan, and more distantly to other Austronesian languages, such as the Formosan languages of Taiwan, Indonesian, Malay, Hawaiian, Māori, and Malagasy. Classification Tagalog is a Central Philippine language within the Austronesian language family. Being Malayo-Polynesian, it is related to other Austronesian languages, such as Malagasy, Javanese, Indonesian, Malay, Tetum (of Timor), and Yami (of Taiwan). It is closely related to the languages spoken in the Bi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Indonesian Language
Indonesian ( ) is the official language, official and national language of Indonesia. It is a standard language, standardized variety (linguistics), variety of Malay language, Malay, an Austronesian languages, Austronesian language that has been used as a lingua franca in the multilingual Indonesian archipelago for centuries. Indonesia is the fourth most list of countries by population, populous nation in the world, with over 270 million inhabitants—of which the majority speak Indonesian, which makes it one of the most List of languages by total number of speakers, widely spoken languages in the world.James Neil Sneddon. ''The Indonesian Language: Its History and Role in Modern Society''. UNSW Press, 2004. Most Indonesians, aside from speaking the national language, are fluent in at least one of the more than 700 indigenous languages of Indonesia, local languages; examples include Javanese language, Javanese and Sundanese language, Sundanese, which are commonly used at home a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yami Language
Yami language (), also known as Tao language (), is a Malayo-Polynesian language spoken by the Tao people of Orchid Island, 46 kilometers southeast of Taiwan. It is a member of the Ivatan dialect continuum. Yami is known as 'human speech' by its native speakers. Native speakers prefer the 'Tao' name. Classification Yami is the only native language of Taiwanese aborigines that is not a member of the Formosan grouping of Austronesian; it is one of the Batanic languages also found in the northern Philippines, and as such is part of the Malayo-Polynesian branch of Austronesian. Phonology Yami has 20 consonants and 4 vowels: Vowels * /o/ can be heard as after labial stop consonants. Iraralay Yami, spoken on the north coast, distinguishes between geminative consonants (e.g., 'thigh' vs. 'hen' form one such minimal pair). Consonants * /k ʁ/ can also be heard as sounds ɦwhen between vowel /a/ intervocalically. * Sounds /n l ʂ/ can be heard as sounds ɮ ʃbefor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tsou Language
Tsou () is a divergent Austronesian language spoken by the Tsou people of Taiwan. Tsou is a threatened language; however, this status is uncertain. Its speakers are located in the west-central mountains southeast of the Chiayi/ Alishan area in Taiwan. Name The name ''Tsou'' literally means "person", from Proto-Austronesian ''*Cau'' through regular sound changes. It is therefore cognate with the name of the Thao. Classification Tsou has traditionally been considered part of a Tsouic branch of Austronesian. However, several recent classifications, such as Chang (2006)Chang, Henry Yungli. 2006. "Rethinking the Tsouic Subgroup Hypothesis: A Morphosyntactic Perspective." In Chang, H., Huang, L. M., Ho, D. (eds.). ''Streams converging into an ocean: Festschrift in honor of Professor Paul Jen-Kuei Li on his 70th birthday.'' Taipei: Institute of Linguistics, Academia Sinica. and Ross (2009)Ross, Malcolm. 2009. "Proto Austronesian verbal morphology: A reappraisal." In Alexander Adelaar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
