Satellite Event of the 13th International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics

Published in Aboriginal Education World 67 (February, 2016): 82-85.

Sequoyah and the Invention of the Cherokee Alphabet （2012）

Writing Systems for Taiwan Indigenous Languages （原住民族語言書寫系統） are announced officially in 2005 by Council of Indigenous Peoples and Ministry of Education. These symbols are developed by linguists, indigenous language experts/teachers and authorities based on Roman letters, though it must not be ignored that both Mandarin phonetic symbols and Japanese scripts were once candidates promoted by different forces at different times.

Sometime during the early decades of 1800 (circa 1809), a man remembered by Washington Post in 1899 as 'Cadmus of Cherokees' (Note: In Greek mythology, Cadmus was the founder of Thebes and the creator of Phoenician alphabets) single-handedly created a writing system  for his native language.

With the help of his six- to ten- year old daughter Ahyokeh, who was his best pupil and assistant, he completed the syllabary in 1821 and convinced the Cherokee Council as well as his people by demonstration of the truth of his invention.

This man was Sequoyah or George Guess (Gist). According to a Cherokee writer and a self-claimed descendant of Sequoyah in 1971, Traveller Bird, the name Sequoyah was Sogwili in Taliwa and it meant 'horse' (Sequoyah and the Invention, p. 78).

Return to be Paiwanized-A Work in Progress

Passed. 

"The Little Prince" in Fifteen Taiwan Indigenous Languages

Among ILRDC's annual research projects, "Edit and Translate Indigenous Texts"（編譯族語讀本）is one that inspires creativity and broadens the scope of as well as deepens the depth of written indigenous languages in Taiwan.

As commonly known, most indigenous languages in the world do not subscribe to a writing tradition, and those that do now have less than a century for a continuous and steady development.

Briefly in Taiwan, Formosan languages from the western plains were put into written form as early as in the 17th century by Dutch missionaries who sought to evangelize the people through translating the Bible, tenets and creeds. This trend was stopped in the 18th and 19th century as native communities were largely ignored by the ruling Qing Government. It was after the Japanese Occupation that educated Formosans started the movement of writing in their own languages with a mixed script of Japanese, Mandarin and Roman letters. Intellects wrote journals; missionaries translated Bibles; teachers compiled teaching materials; and song writers produced beautiful yet sentimental music about the disappearing peoples.

After WWII, Taiwan was reconstructed under the Nationalist Government of ROC. As opportunities arose in the 1980s to improve indigenous rights, activists seized them and initiated changes for the island's indigenous society. One change was the standardization of writing script for indigenous languages in 2005. Now, every publication in indigenous language in whatever form has a criterion to resort to.

Background to Discovery: Pacific Exploration from Dampier to Cook (1990)

This collection on European exploration in the Pacific from the late 17th century throughout the 18th century was edited by Derek Howse (1919-1998) in dedication to Harvard Professor of Oceanic History and Affairs, John Horace Parry (1914-1982).

As Howse explained in the "Preface", Horace, then invited as the Clark Library Professor for the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) for the academic year 1983-1984, orchestrated the original series of seminar about the exploration in the Pacific during the 18th century. However, his sudden decease in 1982 brought the plan to a halt.

Howse accepted the invitation from UCLA and succeeded as the next Clark Library Professor. To remember Horace's lifelong work on maritime history, Howse decided to continue with the original plan and published six of the original eight seminar lectures in this collection via University of California (1990).

Though the book is already out of print, a digital version from cover to cover is made available by UC Press E-Book Collection 1982-2004, starting here with the "Preface".

Sauljaljui Pinevar (Paiwan)

Sauljaljui Pinevar, otherwise known in Chinese as Chou Shu-chin（周淑琴）, was my classmate at Shimen Elementary School. She was the leader of the class; the captain of our school handball team; and a constant winner in exams or competitions of sorts.

Now, she works as a teacher at a primary school near our hometown, a mother of three children, and a writer whose writing is motivated by none other than a desire to pass down the knowledge about the past to younger generations and in one word, Love.

Watch her interview: Motivated by Love.

"The Story about the World Under the Water" (Taipei: TIPI, 2013)《水世界下的故事》and "cunuq's Summer" (Taipei: TIPI, 2014)《佐諾的夏天》are the results of her love-driven hard-work.

Honey, who were there at your birthdays? (Gregorian Calendar)

Indian intellectual Amartya Sen talks about many different calendars followed by different cultures in the second to the last chapter of his The Argumentative Indian (《好思辨的印度人》Allen Lane, 2005).

It seems as if the Gregorian Calendar prevails nowadays; however, from what I read from Sen, it is more of a lack of knowledge of other calendars or even of how one's own culture used to register the passing of years. For example, the mixed effect of the Gregorian Calendar and the Chinese Lunar Calendar is rather obvious upon the indigenous peoples of Taiwan. So, we become rather busy.

As a result of the influence of Christianity, we celebrate the crossing of New Year and Christmas; in fact, some villages are so famous in their celebration that they've become a seasonal tourist destination.

Also, as a result of the influence from Chinese culture, we celebrate lunar new year worrying where to come up with the red-envelop money for younger kids, sweep tombs of bygone family members and eat Zhongzi (sticky rice) on Dragon Boat Festival and moon cakes on Moon Festival. What is missing are the many types of rituals and ceremonies that used to direct people's way of life because the environment has changed dramatically.

Ljuljima / A Prayer（思念感恩歌）

(This is a very beautiful, yet  very difficult song. I am singing it for those who are attending the 2015 Graded Indigenous Language Proficiency Test tomorrow [19th December 2015], like I myself. Though whether or how the Test helps language revitalization remains debatable, I pray the act will mean for each participant a true commitment to live with their mother's - or in cases now, grandmother's - language for life.)

Ljuljima i ya na na ya u 

Ini maluljai e a izuwa i 

Masalutsalut ya a ti Cemas

Idu a tevelji itjen a mapuljat

Ljuljima i ya na na ya u 

Ini maluljai e a izuwa i

Kalevalevai idu a tja sevalitan 

Kinizazanga e a nitjen a palalaut

Ljuljima i ya na na ya u 

Ini maluljai e a izuwa i 

Tisun a nia sevalitan, papupiculi amen

Ina tjen a manguaq a patjemamilin. 

Untitled（情歌）

Untitled

kadjamadjaman vai a en na sema gadu

namasi cengel aen ta su ngadan a u kaka

mayanga u qadavan, mayanga u zeliyan

i a u si aluljaluljay.

u pacucunan sun

u pacucunan sun

dangidagida maciurciur itjen

ay saqetju a varung na ni aen

mayanga u qadavan, mayanga u zeliyan 

i a u si aluljaluljay. 

Some of My Translation Publication

（自2009年以來，我一直有機會做中英文筆譯出版品，有小說、研究報告、短篇故事及政府文案。）

Since 2009, I've been involved in large translation projects; novels, research, short stories and official pamphlets were the genre I dealt with.

In 2009, it was Gaile Parkin's Baking Cakes in Kigali: A Novel .

Parkin was a journalist in Africa. She turned her observations into a novel about a woman named Angel, who had the ability to create happiness and hope for people around her  with wonderful and tasteful cakes.

I worked on the Chinese translation of this novel in 2009 before I flew to the Netherlands for study.  The final product was 幸福推手, published by Big Tree (Taipei) in 2009.

When I left Taiwan, I brought another translation contract with me. It was Sandra Dallas's Prayers for Sale.

This is a very different story. Set against the Depression during 1930s in a mountainous town called Middle Swan, Colorado, it tells about the unlikely friendship between two women set apart from each other by sixty years and also by very different life experiences. What binds them, however, is a shared woe over lost loved ones, which they try to tackle with by stitching blankets.

Working on this Chinese translation and my Dutch studies at the same time from 2009 until 2010 was really a tough time for me. After all, it was here: 我願為妳祈禱, published by Big Tree (Taipei) in 2010. And my Dutch grades were good enough to get me into an honor's college.