Revitalization and Development of Taiwanese Literarure: On the Key to the Development of Taiwanese Literarure

Abstract

Like all national literatures in the world, Taiwanese (also known as Tâi-gi) literature was naturally initiated using Tâi-gi native speakers'mother tongue, and developed from oral to written form. Tâi-gi literature started with folk literature (oral literature), and, after a period of creation and learning of writing system, achieved the sequential form of written literature. Accordingly, a research on the development of Tâi-gi literature should begin with its oral form probing and estimating the works, then extend to the exploration of Tâi-gi literature written in Chinese (Han) characters and Romanized spelling system (Pėh-ōe-ji), analyzing their respective developments. It’s relatively appropriate to pay attention to the period when Taiwan was under Japanese colonial rule. Taiwanese literature transited then from classical litery Chinese form to the modern written vernacular form. It was a spectacular era when polyphonic linguistic landscapes arose and multilingual writing blossomed. After the World War II, Tâi-gi literature, oppressed by KMT who took measures to promote Chinese Mandarin as National Language, could merely exist in the publication and religious practices in the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan (PCT) or believers’ personal use, as well as in the texts for performing arts, such as Tâi-gi pop songs, folk theaters and operas, modern theaters, narrative ballads and ballad text books, etc. Tâi-gi literature in the other spheres almost vanished completely. Not until the 1980s' and along with the rise of the Language Revitalization Movements did Tâi-gi literature restore its vitality and regain the way to development. In the development of Tâi-gi literature along with the awakening of the cultural awareness of mother tongue, many problems were encountered and had to be solved, such as the argument about writing systems, difficulties in informatization of Tâi-gi literature data and writing systems, establishment of the subjectivity of Taiwanese literature, and academic institutionalization of its subject areas, etc.