Free web resources to learn Taiwanese / Minnan / Hokkien?

Language Taiwanese and Hakka Corner
1

hi,

Does anyone know of any free online resources for learning some basic Taiwanese? Most of what i’ve googled isn’t very good, or has broken links.

Thanks

Mod note: title altered to include synonyms for Taiwanese, as the latter is excluded by the search function due to being too common a word on 'mosa. – DB

2

You should check Tailingua (esp. the resources page), by Forumosa’s own Taffy.

The Ministry of Education also has some Taiwanese-learning material on its site.

3

You can try these links.

edu.ocac.gov.tw/lang/taiwanese/
mina.ks.edu.tw/mina1/index1.htm
ws2.chkops.kh.edu.tw/newholo/index1.htm
wnes.tnc.edu.tw/taiwanese.htm

4

Hi OKao,

I run a website called Tailingua which is designed as an introduction to the language, but I don’t have any lessons on there. If I can find the time (unlikely in the future) then I will put some together, but in the meantime resources are very thin on the ground if you don’t already read Chinese characters (which you will need for wisher’s links). Matthew O’Connor’s Tâi-ôan Chè-chō (Taiwanese Vocabulary - a new phrase every day) is great, but it’s generally at the intermediate to advanced level.

If you’re in Taiwan then you might want to take a look at my Bookshelf page which contains some textbooks you can pick up reasonably cheaply from a number of bookshops.

EDIT: I somehow managed to miss Cranky’s post above - thanks for the referral!

5

Thanks guys, i’ll have a look.

6

Does anyone know of any (free) learning resources online for learning Taiyu?

7

Just found this cool Mandarin-Taiwanese online dictionary. (or go to tglmj.lib.nttu.edu.tw/index.htm and follow the 台華辭典 link).

Click 華文 , then type 早安, for instance. You get
台語羅馬字 …漢羅… 華文
gâu-chá…gâu早… 早安

which to me implies that the editors were unable to identify a corresponding 本字 for gâu (I had thought it might be 巧 , but this dictionary gives pronunciations of khiáu and khá for that).

8

For “good morning”, try this link:
早

From MOE’s Taiwanese dictionary: 教育部臺灣閩南語常用詞辭典

Note that this dictionary differs from the Mandarin-Taiwanese online dictionary given by DB. For example, the MOE gives “kitchen” as 灶跤 rather than 灶腳. The MOE does, however, give alternate writings and 灶腳 is listed as one of them.

9

[quote=“sjcma”]

Note that this dictionary differs from the Mandarin-Taiwanese online dictionary given by DB. For example, the MOE gives “kitchen” as 灶跤 rather than 灶腳. The MOE does, however, give alternate writings and 灶腳 is listed as one of them.[/quote]

跤 is a better fit for khah “foot”, 腳 does not fit tonally. It’s often used those who care about such things. But of course 腳 is far more commonly used.

It speaks well for the MOE dictionary! Have to check them out more later.

10

Well, they aren’t really web-based but there are lot a bipedal long-haired resources to learn Taiwanese from… though, come to think of it, they are not free :laughing: