Taiwanese kana



Taiwanese kana (タイ𚿳ヲァヌ𚿳ギイ𚿰カア𚿰ビェン𚿳, tâi oân gí ká biêng, ) is a katakana-based writing system that was used to write Taiwanese Hokkien (commonly called "Taiwanese") when the island of Taiwan was under Japanese rule. It functioned as a phonetic guide to hanzi, much like furigana in Japanese or Zhuyin fuhao in Chinese. There were similar systems for other languages in Taiwan as well, including Hakka and Formosan languages.

The system was imposed by Japan at the time and used in a few dictionaries, as well as textbooks. The Taiwanese–Japanese Dictionary, published in 1931–32, is an example. It uses various signs and diacritics to identify sounds that do not exist in Japanese. The system is chiefly built for the Amoy dialect of Hokkien spoken in Taiwan, with some consideration for the Quanzhou and Zhangzhou dialects of Hokkien also spoken in Taiwan as well, which descendant speakers of all three of the historical major dialects of Hokkien thrived, developed, and intermixed in Taiwan for centuries producing modern Taiwanese Hokkien and its own specific regional dialects throughout the island (Formosa) and nearby smaller islands (e.g. Pescadores).

Through the system, the Office of the Governor-General of Taiwan aimed to help Taiwanese people learn the Japanese language, as well as help Japanese people learn the Taiwanese language. Linguistically speaking, however, the syllabary system was cumbersome for a language that has phonology far more complicated than Japanese. After Japanese administration ended, the system soon became obsolete. Now, only a few scholars, such as those who study the aforementioned dictionary, learn Taiwanese kana.

The system underwent modification over time. This article is mainly about the last edition, used from roughly 1931.

Basic rules
Mapped sounds are mostly similar to katakana in Japanese, with the kana ヤ, ユ, ヨ, ワ, ヰ, and ヱ not used. Each syllable is written with two or three kana (with a few exceptions). Notable differences include:

Vowels

 * There are six vowels in Taiwanese: ア, イ , ウ , エ , オ , ヲ . The pronunciations of ウ, オ, and ヲ are different from Japanese (which are respectively.)
 * The vowel ヲ is pronounced in the diphthongs ヲア  and ヲエ, also their extensions such as ヲァイ , ヲァッ . In some dialects ヲ may be pronounced  or.
 * In syllables with a single vowel, the kana for the vowel is repeated, like the long vowels in Japanese. For example, カア, キイ , オオ , ヲヲ.
 * The small kana ァ, ィ, ゥ, ェ, ォ, 𛅦 are defined as short vowels. They are used to represent the second vowel in the middle of a syllable, or a final glottal stop. For example, キァウ, キェㇰ for , キァゥ.
 * There are two optional vowel kana for the Choân-chiu accent (Quanzhou dialect): ウ and オ . For example, ク ウ, オ , ク ゥ ヌ.

Consonants

 * フ is pronounced, not as in Japanese.
 * There are six overlined kana to distinguish and /. サ, チ , ツ  or , セ , ソ  or  or , ト.
 * {|class=wikitable

! !! colspan="6" width="225" |Taiwanese kana !!colspan=5 width=225|Modern Japanese kana !IPA ! !! !! !! !! !!! !!  !! !!  !! ! !/
 * -align=center
 * タ|| チ
 * ツ ||テ||ト
 * ト
 * タ||ティ||トゥ||テ||ト
 * -align=center
 * サ ||チ||ツ
 * セ
 * ソ
 * ソ
 * ツァ||チ||ツ||ツェ||ツォ
 * }
 * The aspirated consonants, , , / are represented by adding an underdot to the kana. For example, ク̣ for.
 * Final nasal consonants are written as ム, ヌ , ン . Note that ム, ヌ are pronounced , when they are used as initials. For example, カヌ , ヌヌ for.
 * The syllabic consonant is spelt (u+)ン, for example クン [kŋ̍]. Note that  without a preceding vowel is written as a single ン, not ウン or ンン.
 * The syllabic consonant is spelt (u+)ム, for example フム . Note that  without a preceding vowel is written as a single ム, not ウム or ムム.
 * Initial is spelt as  with a nasal tone sign. For example, ガア𚿰, ガア𚿸.
 * Final plosives (which have no audible release) are ㇷ゚, ッ , ㇰ , similar to the kana used in Ainu.
 * Final glottal stops are represented by the short-vowel small kana (ァ, ィ, ゥ, ェ, ォ, 𛅦) at the end. For example, カァ, カゥ.

Tone signs
There are different tone signs for normal vowels and nasal vowels.
 * {| class=wikitable

!Tone number !!width=50| 1 !!width=50| 2(6) !!width=50| 3 !!width=50| 4 !!width=50| 5 !!width=50| 7 !!width=50| 8
 * -align=center
 * Pitch||||||||||||||
 * -align=center
 * Normal vowels || None || 𚿰 || 𚿱 || 𚿲 || 𚿳 || 𚿵 || 𚿶
 * -align=center
 * Nasal vowels || 𚿷 || 𚿸 || 𚿹 || 𚿺 || 𚿻 || 𚿽 || 𚿾
 * -align=center
 * Pe̍h-ōe-jī || a || á || à || ah || â || ā || a̍h
 * }
 * When a text is written vertically, these signs are written on the right side of letters. Taiwanese kana is only attested in vertical orientation, so it is unknown where the signs would be placed if it were written horizontally.
 * Initial consonants, , are always written with nasal vowel tone signs, whereas , ,  are always with normal vowels. Note that  and  share the same initial kana.

Syllable chart

 * 1) Tone signs are always needed for a syllable.
 * 2)  always takes normal vowel tone signs;, ,  always take nasal vowel tone signs.
 * 3) Some spellings are not clear. 仔(á) was sometimes written as ア rather than アア. 的(ê) was sometimes written as エ rather than エエ.
 * 4)  is spelt with オ, such as in オオ, ポオ, イオ, ピオ, and so on.

Unicode support
Amongst software/encodings, Mojikyo fully supports the system.

Unicode has been able to represent small ku (ㇰ) and small pu (ㇷ゚) since Unicode 3.2, small katakana wo (𛅦) since Unicode 12.0, and tone signs since Unicode 14.0 (2021).

It also requires the use of the combining overline and combining dot below with kana to represent overlined and underdotted kana (like so: チ̅, ツ̣). Font support for these small kana and for sensible rendering of these uncommon combining sequences is in practice limited; overlines are simulated in the tables above using markup.