Editing Taiwanese Hokkien (section)

== Classification ==
Taiwanese Hokkien is a variety of [[Hokkien]], a [[Southern Min]] language. Like many varieties of [[Min Chinese]], it has distinct [[literary and colloquial readings of Chinese characters|literary and colloquial layers]] of vocabulary, often associated with formal and informal [[register (sociolinguistics)|register]]s respectively. The literary layer can be traced to the late [[Tang dynasty]], and as such is related to [[Middle Chinese]]. In contrast, the colloquial layers of Min varieties are believed to have branched from the mainstream of Chinese around the time of the [[Han dynasty]].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Mei |first=Tsu-lin |title=Tones and Prosody in Middle Chinese and The Origin of The Rising Tone |journal=Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies |volume=30 |pages=86–110 |year=1970 |jstor=2718766 |doi=10.2307/2718766}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |surname=Norman |given=Jerry |chapter=The Mǐn dialects in historical perspective |editor-surname=Wang |editor-given=William S.-Y. |title=Languages and Dialects of China |pages=325–360 |series=''Journal of Chinese Linguistics'' Monograph Series |publisher=Chinese University Press |volume=3 |issue=3 |year=1991b |jstor=23827042 |oclc=600555701}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |surname=Ting |given=Pang-Hsin |title=Derivation time of colloquial Min from Archaic Chinese |journal=Bulletin of the Institute of History and Philology |volume=54 |issue=4 |pages=1–14 |year=1983}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |surname1=Baxter |given1=William H. |author1-link=William H. Baxter |surname2=Sagart |given2=Laurent |author2-link=Laurent Sagart |title=Old Chinese: A New Reconstruction |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2014 |pages=33, 79 |isbn=978-0-19-994537-5}}</ref>

Regional variations within the Taiwanese variant may be traced back to Hokkien variants spoken in Southern Fujian, specifically those from [[Quanzhou]] and [[Zhangzhou]], and later from [[Amoy]]. Taiwanese also contains loanwords from Japanese and native [[Formosan languages]]. Recent work by scholars such as Ekki Lu,<ref>{{cite web |last=Ekki H. J. Lu |date=27 March 1997 |title=ON AUSTRO-TAIC TERMS IN HOKLO |url=http://ws.twl.ncku.edu.tw/hak-chia/l/lou-ek-ki/kongpah-oat.htm |access-date=2023-04-03 |website=|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20041022000504/http://ws.twl.ncku.edu.tw/hak-chia/l/lou-ek-ki/kongpah-oat.htm|archive-date= 22 October 2004}}</ref> Toru Sakai,<ref>{{cite web |last=Sakai |first=Toru (酒井亨) |date=2002 |title=探求 HÖ -LÓ 台語中間 Ê 非漢語語詞--羅馬字寫書寫法 Ê 正當性 |url=http://203.64.42.21/iug/ungian/poj/siausit/2002/2002pojgth/lunbun/a1-sakai.pdf |archive-url=https://wayback.archive-it.org/all/20081002014759/http://203.64.42.21/iug/ungian/poj/siausit/2002/2002pojgth/lunbun/a1-sakai.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-date=2008-10-02 }}</ref> and Li Khin-hoann,<ref>{{cite web |last=Lí Khîn-hoāⁿ |date=15 September 2004 |title=李勤岸博士論文．LEXICAL CHANGE AND VARIATION IN TAIWANESELITERARY TEXTS．ACKNOWLEDGMENT |url=http://ws.twl.ncku.edu.tw/hak-chia/l/li-khin-hoann/phok-su/phok-su.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040915015640/http://ws.twl.ncku.edu.tw/hak-chia/l/li-khin-hoann/phok-su/phok-su.htm |archive-date=15 September 2004}}</ref> based on former research by scholars such as [[Ong Iok-tek]], has gone so far as to associate part of the basic vocabulary of the colloquial Taiwanese with the [[Austronesian languages|Austronesian]] and [[Tai languages|Tai]] language families; however, such claims are controversial.

The literary form of Hokkien once flourished in [[Fujian]] and was brought to Taiwan by early emigrants. ''[[Tale of the Lychee Mirror]]'', a manuscript of a series of plays published during the [[Ming dynasty]] in 1566, is one of the earliest known works. This form of language is now largely extinct. However, literary readings of the numbers are used in certain contexts, such as reciting telephone numbers (see [[Literary and colloquial readings of Chinese characters]]).{{citation needed|date=February 2016}}