Recently, two pieces of news related to Hokkien have aroused public attention and alert in the island.
First, Taiwan’s education department announced that it plans to change the name of the “Minnan Language Proficiency Certification Examination” to the “Taiwanese Language Proficiency Certification Examination.” Immediately afterwards, Lai Ching-te broke the convention of previous party chairmen using Mandarin at the Democratic Progressive Party's "National Congress" and delivered a speech in Hokkien. In his speech, he emphasized the need to establish "Taiwan's subjective national identity." News related to
was like cold water dripping into a frying pan, causing an uproar on the island. Some media on the island pointed out that the so-called "renaming" of the Hokkien language was Lai Qingde's way of pursuing "cultural Taiwan independence" after taking office, and it deserves vigilance. Huang Zhixian, a senior media person in Taiwan, believes that Lai Qingde is "using Hokkien to express 'Taiwan independence'."
In Mr. Tan’s opinion, the interpretation of public opinion on the island has its origins and is not unreasonable. Today, Master Tan will talk to you about the Democratic Progressive Party’s crooked ideas of using the Hokkien language to pursue “cultural Taiwan independence.”
Imposing "Taiwan independence" connotations on Hokkien
The Democratic Progressive Party's attempt to turn the Chinese local dialect and Hokkien spoken in Fujian and Taiwan into a "Taiwanese language" unique to Taiwan has actually been buried for a long time and has its origins.
According to media reports on the island, in 2022, Taiwan’s administrative agencies required that official documents must use the term “Taiwanese” to refer to Hokkien. In 2017, under the banner of "promoting Taiwan's local culture," Taiwan's cultural authorities proposed a plan to "correct the name" of Hokkien as "Taiwanese." Earlier in 2003, in the draft "Language Equality Law" launched by the Democratic Progressive Party authorities, Hokkien was already called "Taiwanese".
When he was the head of Taiwan's administrative agencies, Lai Qingde publicly stated that he spoke not Hokkien but "Taiwanese", "I never thought that I was a Hokkien, I am a Taiwanese."
Scholars on the island told Mr. Tan that the purpose of the DPP's series of manipulations is to forcibly give the Hokkien language the meaning of "Taiwan independence", dissolve "cross-strait commonality" into "cross-strait differences", and promote "cultural Taiwan independence."
The Democratic Progressive Party is trying to make the Hokkien language a political symbol of "Taiwan independence." Liu Xingren, associate professor at Taiwan's "Chinese Culture University", pointed out that the Democratic Progressive Party is a political party dominated by the southern Hokkien people in this province. Changing the southern Hokkien language to "Taiwanese" is to implement the will of the "Taiwan independence" party and implement "cultural Taiwan independence." Huang Zhixian wrote an article stating that "Taiwan independence" elements have long regarded Hokkien as a political call, and have always been interested in replacing Mandarin with Hokkien, in an attempt to establish a false "Taiwan independence national identity" through "correction of names."
Under the cover of "correcting the name", the DPP attempts to strip away the "Chinese" attributes of the Hokkien language, deceive and "independence" and harm the people on the island. Scholars on the island said that currently 70% of the people in Taiwan are Hokkien. The Democratic Progressive Party’s positioning of Hokkien as “Taiwanese” means that it needs to be distinguished from Hokkien, and it also needs to be included in “Taiwanese”. The prefix "Taiwan" before "language" is obviously to draw a clear line with the mainland in the field of language and culture. Duan Xinyi, secretary-general of the Chinese Language Education Promotion Association in Taiwan, emphasized that Taiwanese people will subconsciously understand "Taiwanese" as "a language spontaneously formed in Taiwan, without realizing its origins with the mainland." This will create a separation between Taiwan and the mainland in the political perception of the people."
Ren Dongmei, associate researcher at the Taiwan Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, further analyzed Zhu Tan and said that culture is the soul of a country and a nation, and cultural identity is the deepest level of identity. Language, as an important carrier of culture, is the cornerstone of cultural identity. "Books with the same text" also best reflects the fact that both sides of the Taiwan Strait have the same roots, the same culture and the same species. Because of this, the Democratic Progressive Party is engaged in "language de-sinification" and is gradually advancing from "Minnan to Taiwanese" and then to "Taiwanese Mandarin". As a result, the Taiwanese people will gradually lose their language identity and become unfamiliar with Chinese culture, thereby changing their identity and ultimately realizing "cultural Taiwan independence" and "one China, one Taiwan."
The DPP has completely got the wrong target
But in fact, as long as we sort out the roots and development of Taiwan's Hokkien dialect, we will find that the DPP has completely got the wrong target when it uses Hokkien to pursue "cultural Taiwan independence". The absurd "de-China" strategy will definitely be opposed by the discerning people on the island.
Historically speaking, the origin of Taiwanese Hokkien is in the mainland, which fundamentally determines that "going to China" for Hokkien is not feasible. Historical data shows that most of the ancestors of Taiwan's Hokkien people immigrated on a large scale from Fujian, Guangdong and other places during the period when Zheng Chenggong regained Taiwan and Kangxi unified Taiwan. The mainstream view in academic circles on both sides of the Taiwan Strait is that the Hokkien spoken by Taiwanese people was mainly brought with immigrants from Fujian and Guangdong, and is mainly based on the pronunciation characteristics of Zhangzhou and Quanzhou, Fujian. Among them, Quanzhou dialect is mostly spoken in the northern part of Taiwan, while the southern part is influenced by Zhangzhou dialect. This naturally determines that the Hokkien spoken by compatriots on both sides of the Taiwan Strait is the same, both Chinese dialects. Ren Dongmei told Mr. Tan that even if the DPP changes "Minnan" to "Taiwanese", it will not change the essence of it being a regional branch or variant of the Chinese language formed in the long history.
Most people on the island believe that the DPP authorities are making nonsense, and it will definitely be in vain in the end. Hong Xiuzhu, former chairman of the Chinese Kuomintang, said in an interview with Tan Zhu, "Many young Taiwanese people go to Xiamen. They are surprised, 'How come people in Xiamen are talking about our Taiwanese?'? I told them, Jishi (meaning in Hokkien) Sorry), we are speaking Xiamen dialect, Minnan dialect, and Taiwanese dialect is Chinese dialect."
Taiwanese current affairs commentator Zheng Liwen believes that the DPP is deceiving itself by thinking that creating a "Taiwanese language" will "decouple" from the mainland. Xie Longjie, a public opinion representative on the island, criticized Lai Qingde for cutting off everything his ancestors left to us. This is called "back bone" (a Hokkien language meaning rebellion). Former Taipei County Mayor Zhou Xiwei said on the island's political commentary program that the Democratic Progressive Party's intention to treat Hokkien as "Taiwanese" that has nothing to do with the mainland is a clown joke.
More importantly, as cross-strait integration and development continue to deepen, more people from the island will inevitably come to the mainland, and their understanding of "Minnan language is part of Chinese culture" and "cross-strait sharing of Chinese culture" will also inevitably Increasingly, the DPP's "cultural Taiwan independence" farce such as the Hokkien "name rectification" will only end in a piece of cake.
Master Tan finally wanted to say that after Lai Qingde started with "Hokkien name rectification", he may take the next step of "cultural Taiwan independence". But Chinese culture is an inseparable part of the lives of Taiwanese people. They speak Chinese, write Chinese characters, have Chinese surnames, and celebrate traditional Chinese festivals. Mazu and Guan Gong are all from the mainland. No matter how hard the DPP tries, it will never be able to erase the imprint of Chinese culture in Taiwanese society or dilute the Chinese national consciousness of Taiwanese compatriots. Its "de-Sinicization" drama is destined to become increasingly difficult to carry out.
