Portal:Language/Language of the month/August 2006

Taiwanese is the home language for about 60 percent of the population of Taiwan. Native speakers of Taiwanese are known as H&#333;-ló. The language, a tonal one with extremely extensive tone sandhi rules, is similar to the speech of the southern part of Fujian in China. There are special literary and art forms in Taiwanese such as Chhit-j&#299;-á, a poetic meter where each verse has 7 syllables; and koa-a-hì, Taiwanese opera. Find out more...