台灣閩南語 (Taiwanese)

hitokiri6993

October 26, 2008, 05:57 AM posted in General Discussion

Hey guys! I've recently started learning Taiwanese. Could anybody recommend any sites which teaches 台灣閩南語?

I use the Peh-oe-ji (白話字） romanization system to help me study.

Thanks!

My own site, Tailingua, has a few links to learning materials for Taiwanese. Feel free to check it out! Personally I use the Maryknoll books, which are written using Peh-oe-ji, but there are other options available. If you want to go from English to Taiwanese, there are very few good options out there for websites. I really should put up some lessons myself, but time, as always, is the problem. http://tailingua.com

hitokiri6993

October 28, 2008, 08:48 AM

Thanks! I'll check it out.

mickeytoon

October 29, 2008, 10:53 PM

I used this site some time ago. http://www.glossika.com/en/dict/taiwanese/lessons/l1.php It was a struggle, but ok for the basics. Learning from helpful native speakers was much easier for me personally.

The Tailingua site is very useful - I look forward to seeing some lessons in the future!!

garfaldo

November 01, 2008, 06:03 PM

I love how the Taiwanese use well.. Taiwanese language to show strong emotion or feelings in their conversations. It's true that Taiwanese sounds so much more livelier than mandarin! Unfortunately, all I know are bad words from playing basketball.

alanchan

November 02, 2008, 02:58 AM

Hey Hitokiri,

Since you live in the Philippines, my recommendation is to just find a local Chinese friend (or you probably have lots already) who speaks the language, and practice with him or her.

Coming from either Cantonese or Mandarin, it will be more challenging to learn because of the nasal sounds and the fact that there are so many ways to say one thing. For example, I can think of at least 3 ways off the top of my head how to say the sentence "The apple dropped to the floor"... so the best way is to get lots of practice by talking to your Chinese friends in this language. If I were there, I would gladly volunteer to help you :) Then you can teach me Cantonese! :)

Also, I will assume that the reason you want to learn this language is so that you can use it to converse with the Filipino-Chinese community where you live in, right? So by talking to them, you'll get their accent too and in no time no one would even notice that you learned this language as an adult! :)

duncan

December 15, 2008, 05:24 PM

Lately I've been interested in Taiwan. And what has really caught my attention is the minnanyu. To tell you the truth I don't know a thing about it, and only hearing somebody once saying two sentences in it on tv, isn't really a good way to judge it.

Does everyone talk minnanyu in Taiwan? Would it be the same situation as in Guangzhou where most of the people you bump into know both Cantonese and Mandarin, but usually just converse in Cantonese unless the other party isn't capable of sufficient Cantonese skills?

hitokiri6993

December 17, 2008, 11:56 AM

hey duncan!

In HK an Macau, most people are both fluent in Cantonese and Mandarin, but the preferred lingua franca is Cantonese.

My friend from Guangzhou said that they speak Mandarin most of the time, but they do speak Cantonese whenever they feel like it.

In urban cities in Taiwan, you can expect people who can speak Mandarin and Taiwanese...so communication won't be a problem. Actually, some people can comprehend Taiwanese even if they are not even able to speak it.