Taiwanese (TW)

Taiwanese refers to the cluster of Taiwanese Hokkien (Minnan) accents found on the island of Taiwan, which, while descended from dialects of Xiamen, Quanzhou, and Zhangzhou, have undergone a significant degree of convergence towards each other, even though a couple of locations still lean towards either Quanzhou or Zhangzhou in certain isoglosses. As a result of this convergence, which includes all dialects in Taiwan undergoing the same sociolinguistic experience under Japanese occupation and the subsequent Republic of China regime, Taiwanese across the island is readily mutually intelligible, though some of those differences from the inherited southern Fujian dialectal rime isoglosses still exist.

The mainstream prestige accent of Taiwanese is that of Tainan, the old capital of Taiwan, and that is the reference accent for Taiwanese (TW) on Lexxify Hub. The Tainan accent is tilted towards Zhangzhou in rime isoglosses, and compared to the Tainan accent, the Taipei accent is tilted more towards Xiamen, though neither is exactly Zhangzhou nor Xiamen. In terms of intelligibility with Hokkien, itelligibility between Taiwanese and Xiamen Hokkien is quite good, but as one goes more towards the extremes ends of the Zhangzhou-Quanzhou spectrum, intelligibility will tend to decrease, and intelligibility is also lower with the inland lects of Longyan and Datian as well as with Chaoshanese. Taiwanese in general has a higher preference for utilizing literary readings of characters in compound words where many Hokkien dialects and also Chaoshanese will use the plain readings of characters.

Initials

Initials

As in Standard Mandarin, the initials /tɕ/, /tɕʰ/, /dʑ/, /ɕ/ only occur before the high front vowel (in Taiwanese, only /i/ due to the lack of /y/), so they can be considered allophones of /ts/, /tsʰ/, /dz/, /s/ respectively when in front of /i/. This is reflected in the Peh-oe-ji and Tai-lo romanization systems, which use the same symbols for both sets of initials. The Zhuyin system as well as Hanyu Pinyin overtly indicate this difference, so as Lexx Rom for Sinitic languages is an expanded Hanyu Pinyin system, it will also reflect this difference. This palatalization is obligatory in Taiwanese, whereas in Hokkien dialects of southern Fujian it can vary.

The voiced /dz/, /dʑ/ initials are inherited from Zhangzhou Hokkien, but in Xiamen and Quanzhou, it merged into /l/. This merger is also quite strong in Taiwan, being increasingly dominant, even in the south, so if learners are having difficulty with this sound, it is very much so acceptable to replace it with the /l/ sound.

The initials /b/ and /ɡ/ may carry some optional pre-nasalization becoming realized as [ᵐb] and [ᵑɡ].

In Taiwanese as well as many dialects of Hokkien, the nasal phonemes /m/, /n/, and /ŋ/ can actually be considered allophones of /b/, /l/, and /ɡ/ respectively, when in front of a nasalized vowel rime (not nasal coda rimes). This is different from the phonological situation in Chaoshanese. For ease of romanization and for the sake of simplicity for learners, they are indicated overtly in the vast majority of transcription systems, including the Zhuyin, Peh-oe-ji, Tai-lo, and Lexx Rom used on Lexxify Hub. The nasalization of the vowel is subsequently not indicated, as it is not contrasted against a non-nasalized vowel in this environment. Therefore, the plain reading of 滿 /muã˥˧/ is, for example, transcribed as moá in Peh-oe-ji instead of boáⁿ (which works phonologically, but due to being more opaque would require more time for learners to internalize the phonological process).

Rimes

Plain Rimes

Mainstream Taiwanese has six basic vowel phonemes, /i/, /u/, /a/, /e/, /ə ~ ɤ/, and /ɔ/. Of these, the /ə/ phoneme is historically realized as a /o/ reflected in Peh-oe-ji and Tai-lo, and it is still realized as such in parts of northern Taiwan (sometimes with weaker rounding), but from around Taichung southwards the /ə/ pronunciation is dominant, and this is reflected explicitly in the contemporary Zhuyin with the character <ㄜ>, as well as in Lexx Rom with <eu>. If a learner is having difficulty producing a less-rounded /o̜/, it is preferable to aim for producing an /ə/ rather than going for a diphthongized /ou/. Some speakers, particularly younger generations, will also merge this relatively unstable /o/ into the rime /ɔ/. To further complicate matters, /ə/ can also appear as a separate vowel from both /o/ and /ɔ/ in Lukang Quanzhou-style accent (as in Quanzhou Hokkien), though this is seldomly encountered day-to-day in Taiwan and not applicable to mainstream Taiwanese.

Nasalized Rimes

In the mainstream Taiwanese accent, /iɔ̃/ is marginal/unnecessary, at most occurring only in onomatopoeia. However, speakers of Zhangzhou-style accents such as in Yilan systematically use either /iɔ̃ ~ iõ/ instead of the rime /iũ/.

Nasal Coda Rimes

For some accents, there is some variation between which words use /iɔŋ/ and which use /iaŋ/, with Zhangzhou-style accents having more /iaŋ/.

In Peh-oe-ji and Tai-lo, note that the <o> before codas -m and -ng indicates the open /ɔ/ vowel, rather than /o/ or /ə/.

Peh-oe-ji spells the /iŋ/ rime as <eng>, though this rime triggers palatalization of sibilant initials as with other rimes starting with /i/.

Checked Rimes

For Peh-oe-ji and Tai-lo, as with before the -m and -ng, the <o> before the -p and -ng indicates the open /ɔ/ vowel, rather than /o/ or /ə/. However, there is technically a distinction between /ɔ/ and /o ~ ə/ before the glottal stop coda /ʔ/, though the /ɔʔ/ sequence is limited to a small number of onomatopoeia/sentence-final particles or other colloquialisms.

Peh-oe-ji spells the /ik/ rime as <ek>, though this rime triggers palatalization of sibilant initials as with other rimes starting with /i/.

Nasalized Checked Rimes

As with in Chaoshanese, this category of nasalized checked rimes is characteristic of the vernacular register, and liked all checked rimes, they can only be pronounced in the Ru tones (Yinru and Yangru, tones 4 and 8). As with normal nasalized rimes, when coming after nasal initials m-, n-, ng-, the nasalized part of the rime is omitted from the spelling, so minnh > mih.

Tones

Citation Tones

Taiwanese contrasts five tones in unchecked syllables and two tones for checked syllables, for a total of seven tones. The Ru tones (Yinru and Yangru) are for checked syllables (syllables with ending -p, -t, -k, -h), the other six tones (Ping, Shang, Qu tones) are for non-checked syllables.

The neutral tone can occur as an indistinct, neutralized low tone in non-initial position.

Tone Sandhi

Whenever in non-final position of an utterance, the tone of a syllable is subject to changing into another tone contour. In Taiwanese, the changes are as follows:

Yinping (Tone 1) changes to Yangqu (Tone 7).

Yinshang (Tone 2) changes to Yinping (Tone 1).

Yinqu (Tone 3) changes to Yinshang (Tone 2).

Yangping (Tone 5) changes to either Yangqu (Tone 7) or to Yinqu (Tone 3). Change to Tone 7 is more typical of the south, and change to Tone 3 is more typical of the north.

Yangqu (Tone 7) changes to Yinqu (Tone 3).

Yinru (Tone 4) and Yangru (Tone 8) swap tone values with each other (Yinru turns into Yangru and Yangru turns into Yinru) if the checked coda is -p, -t, or -k.

Yinru with coda -h changes to Yinshang (Tone 2), and Yangru with coda -h changes to Yinqu (Tone 3).

If a syllable is followed by all neutral tone syllables, then it is counted as the final syllable of its utterance, and therefore will be in the original citation tone.