Hi,
I’m looking for good podcasts or radio/television broadcasts in Taiwanese Mandarin. If there was a learning Chinese podcast that used Taiwanese pronunciation and usage that would be great, but my search for that has come up empty. Does anyone know a good place to download good Taiwanese mandarin audio material? It doesn’t have to be basic. All recommendations are appreciated.
Thanks
it’s like youtube. i’ve only used it for watching spongebob, but there seems to be a lot of video on it.
[quote=“Anbende”]Hi,
I’m looking for good podcasts or radio/television broadcasts in Taiwanese Mandarin. If there was a learning Chinese podcast that used Taiwanese pronunciation and usage that would be great, but my search for that has come up empty. Does anyone know a good place to download good Taiwanese Mandarin audio material? It doesn’t have to be basic. All recommendations are appreciated.
Thanks[/quote]
What do you mean by Taiwanese Mandarin?
The Taipei Standard Mandarin spoken by most TV newscasters in Taiwan (in which, among other things, the Beijing /-er/ is mostly dropped, the word for garbage is “lese” rather than “laji”, and the word for wind is pronounced “fong” instead of “feng”)?
Or the more heavily accented “Taiwan Guoyu” spoken by the working class (in which, among other things, [f] is confused with [h], [s] is confused with [sh], medial i-glides are dropped and “wen” (ask) is pronounced “wun” or “un”)?
Check out Survival Phrases (survivalphrases.com/chinese/guest.php). You can download 10 free lessons from their site and load it on your ipod (begginer). It is Chinese, not specifically Taiwanese, but it is free.
If you mean the Taiwanese accented Mandarin…
I’ve been listening to a podcast put out by a Taiwanese woman living in Europe. In a few days she’ll hit 550 casts. Each one is about 15 minutes long and she just talks about whatever she wants…movies, art, traveling, her life. Her accent is calming – not that heavy Beijing accented stuff most of the Taiwanese publishers use in their recordings.
Princess Remy: http://princessremy.net/blog/
Speaking of audios and accents:
A friend gave me a Chinese-for-travelers book by Far East. She got it because it was small, had traditional characters, and an audio CD. When I stuck in the CD, the speakers had an obnoxious Beijing accent. I was a little miffed…so I wrote a letter to the company. The marketing people wrote back saying they’d keep my comment – to have a softer, Taiwanese-like accent – in mind. (Those of you who dislike the Beijing accent – write to the publishers and tell them what you think! They’re listening. )
Then, I picked up a book at the small bookshop just across from Shi-Da night market (is it a remainders bookshop??). It’s called TAKE THE LANGUAGE LEAP by David Germain and Joanna Tseng. The concept seemed interesting, with lists of intelligent vocab like psychological disorders, STDs, and blood vessels in both English and Chinese and activities also in English and Chinese, although the Chinese activities are way too hard for someone at my level. The guy’s English is a tad annoying (very game show host-like), but the woman’s voice is clear and pleasant.
Any other books that have the local accent?
I know its been mentioned in the threads before but ChinesePod is great and there are tons of episodes out there at all different levels though. Its chinese though, not specifically Taiwanese.
Chinesepod is great but you do need to go over stuff on it with a local to make sure you aren’t learning China specific vocab, phrases and grammar (such a modal partical “bei”). That said they do have specific lessons in the Qing Wen section on the differences between vocab in China and Taiwan.
worldlearnerchinese is recorded in Taipei with Taiwanese speakers of Mandarin though I hate the squeaky voice of the female speakers.
There’s also NTU’s “My Chinese Tutor” which is not exactly what you’re looking for, but has the best audio (pitch, speed) recognition I’ve ever seen. Unfortunately the software is very Taiwanese, too, not just the Chinese they use (cute, flashing, useless tickers).
There’s a thread on it over here.
If you choose to register, I recommend not uploading a photo to your profile page or you’ll receive billions of “can I be your friend”-request within a few hours (profiles are shared with the “My English Tutor” service). 
Can anybody recommend an FM radio (Taipei) with standard Mandarin and lots of talking (i.e. not music?)
Hit the seek button until you find what you’re looking for…? Would take you all of 15 minutes to find a few stations that match that criteria.
Personally, I love listening to the Taiwanese fortune tellers. I don’t understand a damn thing they say and it drives my better half nuts, but I think it’s funny. Someday, my 台語 will be good enough to understand and then I probably won’t want to listen to it, either.
I just now found a website for learning Chinese. Yes, it’s Taiwanese mandarin. Haha!!!
Although it is a new site. But there are many stories and definitions and mp3. You can download and print freely.
I think it is great.
You can try it. chinesestoriesplatform.com
There seems to be three narrators – a man’s voice, a woman’s voice, and a computer generated woman’s voice. The computer generated voice is definitely not Taiwanese Mandarin for obvious reasons. The woman’s voice isn’t either. The closest is the man’s voice. He has affectated accent where a retroflex is pronounced when none is warranted. It happens a lot. He also uses some mainland pronunciations and some Taiwanese pronunciations and is very conscious of the neutral tone. This points to someone with a southeast Asian background, most likely Singaporean (but perhaps Malaysian), trying hard to speak ‘properly’. Still, if by ‘Taiwanese Mandarin’ you mean the way people speak on Taiwanese TV, the guy’s accent isn’t it, but neither is it Beijing.