Languages of Taiwan
The most commonly used home language in Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu, 2010. ('cmn' = "Mandarin" 'nan' = "Hokkien"/"Min Nan" 'hak' = "Hakka" 'map' = Austronesian languages)
Official	de jure: N/A de facto:Mandarin
National	Formosan languages[1] Mandarin[a] Matsu[a] Hokkien[a] Hakka[3]
Main	Mandarin
Indigenous	Formosan languages (Amis,Atayal,Bunun,Kanakanavu,Kavalan,Paiwan,Puyuma,Rukai,Saaroa,Saisiyat,Sakizaya,Seediq,Thao,Truku,Tsou),Philippine (Tao)
Immigrant	Indonesian,Tagalog (Filipino),Thai,Vietnamese,Malay
Foreign	English,Indonesian,Japanese,Korean,Tagalog (Filipino),Thai,Vietnamese[4][5]
Signed	Taiwanese Sign Language
Keyboard layout	QWERTY withBopomofo, Cangjie andDayi

Thelanguages of Taiwan consist of several varieties of languages under the families ofAustronesian languages andSino-Tibetan languages. TheFormosan languages, a geographically designated branch of Austronesian languages, have been spoken by theTaiwanese indigenous peoples for thousands of years. Owing to the wide internal variety of the Formosan languages, research onhistorical linguistics recognizes Taiwan as theUrheimat (homeland) of the whole Austronesian languages family. In the last 400 years, several waves ofHan emigrations brought several differentSinitic languages into Taiwan. These languages includeTaiwanese Hokkien,Hakka, andMandarin, which have become the major languages spoken in present-day Taiwan.

Formosan languages were the dominant language ofprehistorical Taiwan. Taiwan's long colonial and immigrationhistory brought in several languages such asDutch,Spanish,Hokkien,Hakka,Japanese, andMandarin. Due to the formerJapanese occupation of the island, theJapanese language has influenced the languages of Taiwan, particularly in terms of vocabulary, with manyloanwords coming from Japanese.

After World War II, a longmartial law era was held in Taiwan. Policies of the government in this erasuppressed languages other than Mandarin in public use. This has significantly damaged the evolution of local languages, including Taiwanese Hokkien, Hakka, Formosan languages, and theMatsu dialect. The situation had slightly changed since the 2000s when the government made efforts to protect andrevitalize local languages.^[6] Local languages became part ofelementary school education in Taiwan, laws and regulations regarding local language protection were established for Hakka and Formosan languages, and public TV and radio stations exclusively for these two languages were also established. Currently, the government of Taiwan also maintains standards for several widely spoken languages listed below; the percentage of users are from the2010 population and household census in Taiwan.^[7]

TheTaiwanese indigenous languages orFormosan languages are the languages of theTaiwanese indigenous peoples. Taiwanese aborigines currently comprise about 2.3% of the island's population.^[10] However, far fewer can still speak their ancestral language after centuries oflanguage shift. It is common for young and middle-aged Hakka and aboriginal people to speak Mandarin and Hokkien better than, or to the exclusion of, their ethnic languages. Of the approximately 26 languages of the Taiwanese aborigines, at least ten areextinct, another five aremoribund,^[11] and several others are to some degreeendangered. The government recognizes 16 languages and 42 accents of the indigenous languages.

The governmental agencyCouncil of Indigenous Peoples maintains the orthography of thewriting systems of Formosan languages. Due to the era ofTaiwan under Japanese rule, a large number ofloanwords fromJapanese also appear in Formosan languages. There is alsoYilan Creole Japanese as a mixture of Japanese andAtayal.

All Formosan languages are slowly being replaced by culturally dominant Mandarin. In recent decades the government started an aboriginal reappreciation program that included the reintroduction of Formosanmother tongue education in Taiwanese schools. However, the results of this initiative have been disappointing.^[12][13] The television stationTaiwan Indigenous Television and radio stationAlian 96.3 were created as efforts to revive the indigenous languages. Formosan languages were made an official language in July 2017.^[14][15]

TheAmis language is the most widely spoken aboriginal language on the eastern coast of the island, where Hokkien and Hakka are less present than on the western coast. The government estimates put the number ofAmis people at a little over 200,000, but the number of people who speak Amis as their first language is lower than 10,000.^[16] Amis has appeared in some mainstream popular music.^[17] Other significant indigenous languages includeAtayal,Paiwan, andBunun. In addition to the recognized languages, there are around 10 to 12 groups ofTaiwanese Plains Indigenous Peoples with their respective languages.

Some indigenous people and languages are recognized bylocal governments. These includeSiraya (and itsMakatao andTaivoan varieties) to the southwest of the island. Some otherlanguage revitalization movements are going onBasay to the north,Babuza-Taokas in the most populated western plains, andPazeh bordering it in the center west of the island.

Mandarin is commonly known and officially referred to as thenational language (國語;Guóyǔ) inTaiwan. In 1945, following the end ofWorld War II, Mandarin was introduced as thede facto official language and made compulsory in schools. Before 1945,Japanese was the official language and taught in schools. Since then, Mandarin has been established as alingua franca among the various groups in Taiwan: the majorityTaiwanese-speakingHoklo (Hokkien), theHakka who have their ownspoken language, theaboriginals who speak aboriginal languages; as well asMainland Chineseimmigrated in 1949 whose native tongue may be anyChinese variant.

People who emigrated frommainland China after 1949 (12% of the population) mostly speakMandarin Chinese.^[18]Mandarin is almost universally spoken and understood.^[19] It was the only officially sanctioned medium of instruction inschools in Taiwan from late 1940s to late 1970s, following the handover ofTaiwan to thegovernment of the Republic of China in 1945, untilEnglish became a high school subject in the 1980s and local languages became a school subject in the 2000s.

Taiwanese Mandarin (as withSinglish and many other situations of acreole speech community) is spoken at different levels according to the social class and situation of the speakers. Formal occasions call for theacrolectal level of Standard Chinese of Taiwan (國語;Guóyǔ), which differs little from the Standard Chinese ofChina (普通话;Pǔtōnghuà). Less formal situations may result in thebasilect form, which has more uniquely Taiwanese features. Bilingual Taiwanese speakers maycode-switch between Mandarin and Taiwanese, sometimes in the same sentence.

Many Taiwanese, particularly the younger generations, speak Mandarin better than Hakka or Hokkien, and it has become alingua franca for the island amongst theChinese dialects.^[20]

Commonly known asTaiwanese (臺語,Pe̍h-ōe-jī:Tâi-gí) and officially referred asTaiwanese Hokkien (臺灣閩南語;Tâi-oân Bân-lâm-gú);Taiwanese Hokkien is the most-spokennative language inTaiwan, spoken by about 70% of the population.^[21][22] Linguistically, it is a subgroup ofSouthern Min languages variety originating in southernFujian province and is spoken by manyoverseas Chinese throughoutSoutheast Asia.

There are both colloquial and literaryregisters of Taiwanese. Colloquial Taiwanese has roots inOld Chinese. Literary Taiwanese, which was originally developed in the 10th century in Fujian and based onMiddle Chinese, was used at one time for formal writing but is now largely extinct. Due to the era ofTaiwan under Japanese rule, a large number ofloanwords fromJapanese also appear in Taiwanese. The loanwords may be read inKanji through Taiwanese pronunciation or simply use the Japanese pronunciation. These reasons make the modern writing Taiwanese in a mixed script oftraditional Chinese characters and Latin-based systems such aspe̍h-ōe-jī or theTaiwanese romanization system derived from pe̍h-ōe-jī in official use since 2006.

Recent work by scholars such asEkki Lu,Sakai Toru, andLí Khîn-hoāⁿ (also known as Tavokan Khîn-hoāⁿ or Chin-An Li), based on former research by scholars such asÔng Io̍k-tek, has gone so far as to associate part of the basic vocabulary of the colloquial language with theAustronesian andTai language families; however, such claims are not without controversy. Recently there has been a growing use of Taiwanese Hokkien in the broadcast media.

Accent differences among Taiwanese dialects are relatively small but still exist. The standard accent — Thong-hêng accent (通行腔) is sampled fromKaohsiung city,^[23] while other accents fall into aspectrum between

• Hái-kháu accent (海口腔): representing the accent spoken inLukang, close toQuanzhoudialect in China, and
• Lāi-po͘ accent (內埔腔): representing the accent spoken inYilan, close toZhangzhoudialect in China.

Much of Taiwanese Hokkien is mutually intelligible with other dialects of Hokkien as spoken inChina andSouth-east Asia (such asSingaporean Hokkien), but also to a degree with theTeochew variant ofSouthern Min spoken in Eastern Guangdong,China. It is, however, mutually unintelligible with Mandarin and other Chinese languages.

This sectionneeds expansion. You can help byadding missing information.(December 2009)

Hakka (客家語;Hak-kâ-ngî) is mainly spoken in Taiwan by people who haveHakka ancestry. These people are concentrated in several places throughout Taiwan. The majority of Hakka Taiwanese reside inTaoyuan,Hsinchu andMiaoli. Varieties of Taiwanese Hakka were officially recognized as national languages.^[3] Currently the Hakka language in Taiwan is maintained by theHakka Affairs Council. This governmental agency also runsHakka TV and Hakka Radio stations. The government currently recognizes and maintains five Hakka dialects (six, ifSixian and South Sixian are counted independently) in Taiwan.^[24]

Matsu dialect (馬祖話,Mā-cū-ngṳ̄) is the language spoken inMatsu islands. It is a dialect ofFuzhounese of theEastern Min branch.

Wuqiu dialect (烏坵話,Ou-chhiu-uā) is the language spoken inWuchiu islands. It is a dialect ofHinghwa of thePu-Xian Min branch. Currently, the Taiwanese government does not label the language as a national language, probably due to the low population of native speakers.

Cantonese is spoken byWaishengren immigrants fromGuangdong,Guangxi,Hong Kong, andMacau.^[26] Various Cantonese-speaking communities exist throughout Taiwan. Cantonese is the largest Sinitic language that Taiwan does not recognize as a national language, as it is not native to the island, was not brought by early Han settlers, and is not used in any official capacity.

A total of 119,129 Hong Kong and Macao residents have been granted permanent residency status, though the number currently residing in Taiwan is not reported.^[27]

Traditional Chinese characters are widely used inTaiwan to writeSinitic languages includingMandarin,Taiwanese Hokkien, andHakka. TheMinistry of Education maintains standards of writing for these languages, publications including theStandard Form of National Characters and the recommended characters for Taiwanese Hokkien and Hakka.

Written vernacular Chinese is the standard ofwritten Chinese used in official documents, general literature and most aspects of everyday life, and has grammar based onModern Standard Mandarin.Vernacular Chinese is the modern written variant of Chinese that supplanted the use ofclassical Chinese in literature following theNew Culture Movement of the early 20th Century, which is based on the grammar ofOld Chinese spoken in ancient times. Although written vernacular Chinese had replaced Classical Chinese and emerged as the mainstream written Chinese in theRepublic of China since theMay Fourth Movement, Classical Chinese continued to be widely used in theGovernment of the Republic of China. Most government documents in the Republic of China were written in Classical Chinese until reforms in the 1970s, in a reform movement spearheaded by PresidentYen Chia-kan to shift the written style to a more combinedvernacular Chinese and Classical Chinese style (文白合一行文）.^[28][29] After January 1, 2005, theExecutive Yuan also changed the long-standing official document writing habit from vertical writing style to horizontal writing style.

Today, pure Classical Chinese is occasionally used in formal or ceremonial occasions and religious or cultural rites in Taiwan. TheNational Anthem of the Republic of China (中華民國國歌), for example, is in Classical Chinese.Taoist texts are still preserved in Classical Chinese from the time they were composed.Buddhist texts, orsutras, are still preserved in Classical Chinese from the time they were composed or translated fromSanskrit sources. In practice, there is a socially accepted continuum between vernacular Chinese and Classical Chinese. Most officialgovernment documents,legal,courts rulings andjudiciary documents used a combined vernacular Chinese and Classical Chinese style (文白合一行文）.^[30] For example, most official notices and formal letters are written with a number of stock Classical Chinese expressions (e.g. salutation, closing). Personal letters, on the other hand, are mostly written in the vernacular, but with some Classical phrases, depending on the subject matter, the writer's level of education, etc.

In recent times, following theTaiwan localization movement and an increasing presence of Taiwanese literature,written Hokkien based on the vocabulary and grammar ofTaiwanese Hokkien is occasionally used in literature and informal communications.

Traditional Chinese characters are also used in Hong Kong and Macau. A small number of characters are written differently in Taiwan; theStandard Form of National Characters is the orthography standard used in Taiwan and administered by theMinistry of Education, and has minor variations compared with thestandardized character forms used in Hong Kong and Macau. Such differences relate toorthodox and vulgar variants of Chinese characters.

Latin alphabet is native toFormosan languages and partially native toTaiwanese Hokkien andHakka. With the early influences of European missionaries, writing systems such asSinckan Manuscripts,Pe̍h-ōe-jī, andPha̍k-fa-sṳ were based on in Latin alphabet. Currently, the officialwriting systems of Formosan languages are solely based on Latin and maintained by theCouncil of Indigenous Peoples. TheMinistry of Education also maintains Latin-based systemsTaiwanese Romanization System forTaiwanese Hokkien, andTaiwanese Hakka Romanization System forHakka. The textbooks of Taiwanese Hokkien andHakka are written in a mixed script oftraditional Chinese characters and the Latin alphabet.

Chinese language romanization in Taiwan tends to be highly inconsistent. Taiwan still uses theZhuyin system and does not commonly use theLatin alphabet as the language phonetic symbols. TraditionallyWade–Giles is used. The central government adoptedTongyong Pinyin as the official romanization in 2002, but local governments are permitted to override the standard as some have adoptedHanyu Pinyin and retained old romanizations that are commonly used. However, in August 2008, the central government announced that Hanyu Pinyin would be the only system of romanization of Standard Mandarin in Taiwan as of January 2009.

Zhuyin Fuhao, often abbreviated asZhuyin, or known asBopomofo after its first four letters, is thephonetic system ofTaiwan for teaching the pronunciation ofChinese characters, especially inMandarin. Mandarin uses 37 symbols to represent its sounds: 21consonants and 16rimes.Taiwanese Hokkien uses 45 symbols to represent its sounds: 21consonants and 24rimes. There is also a system created forHakka language.

These phonetic symbols sometimes appear asruby characters printed next to the Chinese characters in young children'sbooks, and in editions of classical texts (which frequently use characters that appear at very low-frequency rates in newspapers and other such daily fares). In advertisements, these phonetic symbols are sometimes used to write certain particles (e.g.,ㄉ instead of的); other than this, one seldom sees these symbols used in mass media adult publications except as a pronunciation guide (or index system) indictionary entries. Bopomofo symbols are also mapped to the ordinary Roman character keyboard (1 =bo, q =po, a =mo, and so forth) used in onemethod for inputting Chinese text when using acomputer. In more recent years, with the advent of smartphones, it has become increasingly common to see Zhuyin used in written slang terms instead of typing full characters – for exampleㄅㄅ replacing拜拜 (bye bye). It is also used to give phrases a different tone, like usingㄘ for吃 (to eat) to indicate a childlike tone in the writing.

The sole purpose of Zhuyin in elementary education is to teach standard Mandarin pronunciation to children. Grade one textbooks of all subjects (including Mandarin) are entirely in zhuyin. After that year, Chinese character texts were given in annotated form. Around grade four, the presence of Zhuyin annotation is greatly reduced, remaining only in the new character section.School children learn the symbols so that they can decode pronunciations given in a Chinese dictionary and also so that they can find how to write words for which they know only the sounds. Even among adults, it is almost universally used in Taiwan to explain the pronunciation of a certain character being referred to by others.

Taiwan has a nationalsign language, theTaiwanese Sign Language (TSL), which was developed fromJapanese Sign Language duringJapanese colonial rule. TSL has somemutual intelligibility with Japanese Sign Language (JSL) and theKorean Sign Language as a result (KSL). TSL has about a 60% lexical similarity with JSL.^[31]

• Japanese: TheJapanese language wascompulsorily taught whileTaiwan was under Japanese rule (1895 to 1945). By 1943, over 80% of the Taiwanese population at the time were speakers of Japanese.Taiwanese Americans and others in theTaiwanese diaspora may have older relatives or grandparents who learned Japanese and also spoke it as thelingua franca during their youth.^[32] Many famous Taiwanese figures, including former Taiwanese President,Lee Teng-hui, and the founder ofNissin and inventor ofinstant ramen,Momofuku Ando, were considered to be native Japanese speakers due to being born in Japanese Taiwan. Japanese is also one of the languages that is used in metro stations.
• Korean: TheKorean language, along with English and Japanese are the most popular foreign languages to learn in Taiwan. The reason of its popularity is due to theKorean Wave. The Korean language is also one of the languages used in metro stations.

A significant number of immigrants and spouses inTaiwan are fromSoutheast Asia.

• Thai: widely spoken among the approximately 80,000 Thai people in Taiwan.
• Indonesian: widely spoken among the approximately 140,000Indonesians in Taiwan.
• Vietnamese: widely spoken among the approximately 200,000Vietnamese in Taiwan. There has been some effort, particularly beginning in 2011, to teach Vietnamese as a heritage language to children of Vietnamese immigrants.^[33]
• Tagalog: widely spoken by the approximately 100,000Filipinos in Taiwan. Due to many Filipinos being able to speak English, government owned signboards which feature Thai, Vietnamese and Indonesian are less likely to be written in Tagalog.
• Malay: One of the languages of Taiwan's new immigrants, but less significant as most Malay-speaking immigrants are able to speak Mandarin Chinese and English fluently. Malay is understandable byMalaysian Chinese andBruneian Chinese as their national language. However, very few have Malay as their first language. Compared to ethnic Chinese, the population of Malay and other bumiputera in Taiwan is very low. However, descendants of Malaysian Chinese take Malay language class, while most of the Malay language teachers are Malaysian Chinese.^[34]
• Burmese: One of the languages of Taiwan's new immigrants, but less significant.
• Khmer: One of the languages of Taiwan's new immigrants, but less significant.

• Dutch: Dutch was taught to the residents of the island during theDutch colonial rule of Taiwan (1624–1662) under theDutch East India Company, as evidenced in theSinckan Manuscripts. After the withdrawal of Dutch presence in Taiwan, the use of the language disappeared.
• Spanish: Spanish was mainly spoken bySpaniards (fromSpanish Philippines), includingSpanish friar missionaries, and thenative Taiwanese they Christianized in the northern part of the island during the establishment ofSpanish Formosa (1626–1642). Many of the countries that have diplomatic relations with Taiwan are Spanish-speaking.^[which?]
• English: English is widely taught as a foreign language, with some large private schools providing English instruction. Taiwan's government under the2030 Bilingual Nation policy promulgated last 2017 to make English an official language and to provide for English to become asecond language by 2030.^[35]

• Taiwanese indigenous peoples
• Han Taiwanese –Hoklo Taiwanese,Hakka Taiwanese
• Formosan languages
• Taiwanese Hokkien
• Taiwanese Hakka
• Taiwanese Mandarin

• National Language Overall Development Plan
• Yuán zhù mínzú yǔyán xiànshàng cídiǎn 原住民族語言線上詞典(in Chinese) – "Aboriginal language online dictionary" website of the Indigenous Languages Research and Development Foundation
• Zú yǔ E lèyuán 族語E樂園(in Chinese) – Indigenous language educational site maintained by Taiwan's Council of Indigenous Peoples
  • T.A.I.W.A.N. – Taiwan-Austronesion Indigenous Words and Narrations – English counterpart of Zú yǔ E lèyuán

• Languages of Taiwan

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