Well-respected Hakka leader and physician Tseng Kuei-hai (曾貴海), born in a Hakka village in Pingtung County’s Jiadong Township (佳冬), passed away from illness on Aug. 6. He held many posts throughout his career, including operations director of the Literary Taiwan Foundation, director of the Chung Li-ho Literary Foundation, president of the Taiwanese Pen Tai-bun Pit-hoe, convener of the Weiwuying Metropolitan Park promotional committee, founder of the Southern Taiwan Society and many more.
Tseng also composed countless celebrated pieces of poetry in Mandarin, Hakka and Taiwan Taiwanese (“Taiwan Taiyu”). Hometown, Magnolia Tree (原鄉夜合) and Scene (畫面) are the respective translations of the titles of his Hakka and Taiwanese-language poetry anthologies.
One small secret unknown to most about Tseng is that using the term “Taiwan Taiwanese” was actually his idea. On Dec. 1, 2018, Tiunn Hok-chu (張復聚), former president of the Southern Taiwan Society, a group for Hakka young people, and I visited Tseng. We sought advice on how to ensure Taiwan’s subjectivity and handle the official name of the Taiwanese language without harming other ethnic groups.
He suggested using the terms Taiwan Taiwanese, Taiwan Hakka and Taiwan indigenous language, namely the addition of “Taiwan” to emphasize that they are all Taiwanese languages. Adding “Taiwan” to Taiwanese to form the phrase Taiwan Taiwanese, while verbose, could avert doubts and negative responses from the older and more traditional generation of Hakka, he said.
Colloquially, Taiwan Taiwanese can still be shortened to Taiwanese, thus coinciding with the name most people are already accustomed to using. After years of effort, the Hakka Affairs Council was finally persuaded.
In August 2022, the Executive Yuan formally ruled that it would change the official term from Minnanyu (閩南語, Southern Min) to Taiwan Taiwanese.
Taiffalo Chiung is vice president of the Southern Taiwan Society and a professor in the Department of Taiwanese Literature at National Cheng Kung University.
Translated by Kyra Gustavsen
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