Thanks for that. Yeah, I’m sure I fall in the serious learner group, and I’m adamant about getting tones perfect. Something about traumatic toilet training, methinks 
OK, unless anyone wants to dump their old books & tapes on me, I’ll contact MK to pick up a new set.
They have CDs now as well, I don’t know about the quality. It is most definitely the same master tape and I don’t know how much digital remastering they have done. None, I would think.
I agree with feiren, that if you are serious about learning Taiwanese, these books are great. And they teach you a lot about the Taiwanese way of communication.
Old-fashioned they are though.
Thanks guys! I just spoke to Father Doyle in Taipei, and he agrees the tape quality is spotty. He confirms that the CD’s are just burnt from the old master, with no remastering at all. He said they might re-record the contents at some point but don’t hold your breath.
I told him I wanted to buy the book One and tape for self-study, but he strongly recommended having my “teacher” (read local GF) come in for paid lessons to learn how to read the romanization and also to learn about the Taiwanese tonal system and tone changes, as he insists that, from experience, the locals don’t understand the structure of their own language. He said that although locals can tell you when it sounds wrong, they won’t usually be able to tell you how many tones there are, or why tone 5 changes to tone 7, etc.
He said that the fee for 1-on-1 for my teacher would be $380/hr, and that I could sit in on that for free; he recommended a minimum of 2-3 one-hour sessions, and up to 15 or so, to properly train the teacher. So I’ll discuss this with my GF to see if she’s up for it this summer. Then after investing in this training, maybe she’d be available to tutor other foreigners in Taiwanese too… we’ll see.
I am definitly taking Taiwanese there this summer. A little extra study group during the week, say an hour or so would be great. I recall there was an attempt of getting a study sometime ago, has it ever happened?
Dragonbones, are you looking at going to MK for your classes?
I want to buy the materials too and get started soon.
DB–this is definitely going to be necessary. The tonal rules for Taiwanese are very complex and native speakers are almost always completely unaware that they exist.
I have to warn you that most native speakers are also initially very resistant to the idea that Taiwanese needs top be taught in romanization. I hope your relationship is strong enough for this test (I’m only half joking).
Thanks guys! I just spoke to Father Doyle in Taipei, and he agrees the tape quality is spotty. He confirms that the CD’s are just burnt from the old master, with no remastering at all. He said they might re-record the contents at some point but don’t hold your breath.
I told him I wanted to buy the book One and tape for self-study, but he strongly recommended having my “teacher” (read local GF) come in for paid lessons to learn how to read the romanization and also to learn about the Taiwanese tonal system and tone changes, as he insists that, from experience, the locals don’t understand the structure of their own language. He said that although locals can tell you when it sounds wrong, they won’t usually be able to tell you how many tones there are, or why tone 5 changes to tone 7, etc.
He said that the fee for 1-on-1 for my teacher would be $380/hr, and that I could sit in on that for free; he recommended a minimum of 2-3 one-hour sessions, and up to 15 or so, to properly train the teacher. So I’ll discuss this with my GF to see if she’s up for it this summer. Then after investing in this training, maybe she’d be available to tutor other foreigners in Taiwanese too… we’ll see.[/quote]
Yes, the Taiwanese generally have no clue about tones. You can’t expect people being able to tell you - like in Mandarin - which tone a word is in. Especially the fact that tones are changing (tone sandhi) is completely unknown. That can drive you absolutely crazy in the beginning. So you DO need a teacher who gets that straight.
A few hours for your GF and she should be OK, though.
Have fun.
Thanks 
Feiren and rice t for the advice! Having studied three tonal languages already, I certainly appreciate the importance of getting the tones right. Due to this background and a good ear, I think I could learn through immersion and use of the book and tapes without this, but as you all agree that the awareness of tones and sandhi here is low, compared to Mandarin (and I’ll add Thai to that), and given the low cost of the training at MK ($380/hr for one on one), and the fact that this would become an added job skill for my GF, who already teaches, it sounds like the training will be well worth it.
Igorveni, for me this will be combined self-study and LE with my GF; MK is just too far and my schedule too tight to attend classes there, even though they sound quite good. Great to hear you’ll be doing it too! Jia you!! 
Numbers quickly dwindled and we lost our Taiwanese teacher/helper.
Brian
Well, Anisll will be taking formal training in how to teach Taiwanese at Maryknoll, so if folks are interested in hiring her as a teacher, especially in the summer during her college break, I imagine she’d be interested, and I’m sure she wouldn’t charge very much. If you’re on the west side, you could just attend Maryknoll at Zhongshan/Zhongxiao, but if you’re on the far east side of Taipei, it might be better to have class with her; you could PM her if interested in restarting that group.
Hey, Dragonbones.
I spoke with Father Doyle in Taipei, too. He said they are currently planning to redo their books. I recommended using a cedilla for nasals. We’ll see if that flies…
Maryknoll books are incredibly meticulous on tone rules and grammar. I thank them greatly for that.
The problem with Taiwanese text books used in public schools is that they don’t show you how the tones change; they simply write the tones in their already-changed form. Too bad for the locals.
Maryknoll, on the other hand, will show both the original tone and how it changed. That’s the advantage of Church Romanization.
[quote=“Feiren”]DB–this is definitely going to be necessary. The tonal rules for Taiwanese are very complex and native speakers are almost always completely unaware that they exist.
I have to warn you that most native speakers are also initially very resistant to the idea that Taiwanese needs top be taught in romanization. I hope your relationship is strong enough for this test (I’m only half joking).
[/quote]
I understand how some Taiwanese would think when asking to take courses like this, but I am willing to take them. I do want to learn more about my mother tongue, and would like to be trained for teaching skills, too.
Thanks Feiren; I think our(my boyfriend and me 
of course) relationship is quite strong enough for this, honestly, I don’t see any tests here? 
I went to MK a few days ago and they changed their prices, 400 an hour, it’s not excessive, just wanted to let you know.
I will start the first week of July, so it’s gonna be an all Taiwanese summer for me. 
[quote=“igorveni”]I went to MK a few days ago and they changed their prices, 400 an hour, it’s not excessive, just wanted to let you know.
I will start the first week of July, so it’s gonna be an all Taiwanese summer for me. [/quote]
Great igorveni!!! Maybe after this summer Dragonbones and you could chat in Taiwanese!!! 
I’m not sure that’s the worst thing. You will have the proper tone for any word in front of you, which might be more valuable than for any character. And for the “known” characters at least there is a direct relationship between the tones between taiwanese and mandarin.
I agree. Sure some people can remember original tones and the rules for changing them, but I certainly can’t. I just don’t learn that way.
Considering that the ‘changed’ tone is used almost every time unless the syllable is the last in a phrase, wouldn’t it be better to think of that as the ‘real’ tone. What they now call the ‘original’ tone would be beter thought of as the way it changes when it appears at the end of the phrase.
Or, for me, even better - forget changing tones altogether and just remember words and phrases.
Brian
I’ve been taking one-on-one Taiwanese classes at TLI in Taizhong for the past two months. On a scale of 1 to 10, I’d probably give my classes a 7. My two minor complaints are that the TLI book is outdated (I can’t imagine ever wanting to go to the post office to buy an aerogramme, whatever the hell an aerogramme is) and my instructor’s accent.
Perhaps other people can help me out on this. My instructor claims she’s using a ‘neutral’ accent and that everyone I talk with here has a coastal Lugang accent. For instance, she pronounces ‘I’ like ‘gua’ while everyone I’ve practiced with here in Taizhong pronounces it as ‘wa.’ Or the word for ‘what’ she pronounces as ‘shim-mi’ while everyone around me pronounces it more like ‘shiam-mi.’ Which pronounciations are more “correct”?
Yeah, but what if you want to actually speak in originally constructed sentences instead of just aping phrases?
I can assure you that the textbook Maryknoll uses is most probably even more outdated than the TLI one, however, I find that interesting if not amusing most of the time.
Don’t worry about the simmih, and gua. It just doesn’t matter. There are different accents, Taipeh, Lugang, rest of Taiwan (that is a bit simplified, I admit). You will come across a lot of other irregularities between different speakers, regarding the sound of e and i, or i and u, or j/r and l and and and.
There is no standard and therefore no “correct” pronounciation, only regional differences. She is trying to teach you Taichung-accent, which is supposed to be pretty neutral. Stick to in class and say whatever you want outside.
I know only two people who actually say simmih…
‘Wa’ for ‘Gua’’ is sometiing younger people who are prmarily Mandarin speakers use. They can’t hear that soft ‘g’.
Sim-mih and Siam-mih are just variants. There are lots more. Taiwanese has never been standardized the way Mandarin (in Taiwan) has been That is partially because Taiwanese hasn’t been on TV so much. Lugang and Yilan have especially funky accents.
Nothing wrong with picking up a regional variant – in fact, it’s inevitable. If you learn English, you’ll invariably learn the variant of a particular region, e.g., the US Midwest, or a London accent. There’s no right or wrong. My GF has a Tainan accent in Taiwanese, and I’d be perfectly happy to speak in exactly the same accent. I feel very differently about Mandarin, but that’s in part because the non-standard Taiwan variant which lacks the retroflex results in a loss of information in what is already a severely homophonic language, leading to decreased intelligibility IMO. But I have no problem adopting Taiwanese pronunciations, say, of feng1 or weng1, as long as the difference between seng and sheng is clearly preserved.
BTW, so far, I really like the teachers at Maryknoll – very professional, enthusiastic, and experienced. The romanization and tone diacriticals could use a thorough revamping, as some of them are quite counterintuitive, but otherwise all is good so far.
[quote]For instance, she pronounces ‘I’ like ‘gua’ while everyone I’ve practiced with here in Taizhong pronounces it as ‘wa.’ Or the word for ‘what’ she pronounces as ‘shim-mi’ while everyone around me pronounces it more like ‘shiam-mi.’ Which pronounciations are more “correct”?
[/quote]
Wa/gua: Ask someone about it. You’ll find that most people say “yeah, it’s actually more like ‘gua’ - your teacher’s right”. I thought the same thing at first. I always heard ‘wa’. Then I listened closer and there’s a little bit of a ‘g’ there.
Shimmih/siamih/siamih: They’re all used.
Brian