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Tsou

The Tsou people are one of 26 recorded indigenous groups (原住民族) of Taiwan, and the Tsou language is spoken by about 4,000 people in the area of Mount Ali in Chia-Yi county.
Tsou Interview
Tsou phrases I
Tsou phrases II
Tposx to Nanghia (A Love Letter) - Tsou
Yiyohe - Tsou
‘Ananasi ‘Anane (It's Like So) - Tsou
Oeoe - Tsou
Moatʉ'nʉ (Goat) - Tsou
Amo ho yino (Father and Mother) - Tsou
Pasu Mimo - Tsou
Eyayongo (Crab) - Tsou

The Tsou people are one of 26 recorded indigenous groups (原住民族) of Taiwan. Nine of these indigenous languages are no longer actively spoken, although some, like Siraya, are being revitalized by their communities. The government recognizes 14 distinct tribes but recognition of tribal status in Taiwan, as in other countries, can be difficult and controversial.

The indigenous languages of Taiwan belong to the Austronesian family and constituted the only languages of the island before the large scale arrival of the Chinese in the 17th century. Archaeology suggests that Taiwan had already been inhabited by an Austronesian population from about 6,200 years before present. Due to large scale immigration from China over the last 400 years, the entire aboriginal population of Taiwan now only makes up a little over 2% of the entire Taiwanese population. In Tawian, the four dialects of Tsou are spoken in multiple villages, Tapangu, Tfuya, Luhtu, and Limucu, which is now extinct. Tapangu and Tfuya are spoken in villages scattered in Chia-yi county, while Luhtu is only spoken in one village in Central Taiwan and is on the verge of extinction. (Zeitoun 2005).

Like the indigenous people of the Americas, the aboriginal population of Taiwan has also suffered loss of their land and resources at the hands of newcomers, as well as discrimination that continues today. Taiwan’s current president, Tsai Ing-wen, who is herself of aboriginal (Paiwan) descent, has pledged to improve the condition of aboriginal languages. While steps have been taken over the last few decades to improve the official standing of the languages, this has brought the languages into the school system in a limited way but has not yet created a new generation of speakers. Ongoing efforts to promote Tsou and other Formosan languages can be seen on the website of the Indigenous Language Research and Development Center (Chinese version: https://ilrdc.tw/, English version: https://eng.ilrdc.tw/).

Affiliation

Tsou is spoken by about 4,000 people in the area of Mount Ali in Chia-Yi county. Tsou is not to be confused with what has sometimes been referred to as “Southern Tsou”, that is, Kanakanavu and Saaroa. These are clearly separate languages whose relation to Tsou is the focus of current research. According to one recent proposal for the Austronesian family tree (Ross 2009), Tsou is considered to be one of four primary branches, along with Rukai, Puyuma and a fourth proto-language that gave rise to all other Austronesian languages. As Taiwan is understood to be the historical homeland of the Austronesian people, who began a southwards migration some 4,000 years ago, each Formosan language plays a crucial role in our understanding of how the top of the family tree is reconstructed.

Source

Zeitoun, Elizabeth.2005. “Tsou” in The Austronesian Languages of Asia and Madagascar, Alexander Adelaar and Nikolaus Himmelmann (eds.), p. 259-290. London & New York: Routledge.

 

Endangerment

Tsou’s threatened status is the result of several centuries of discrimination and the active suppression of aboriginal languages at the hands of the state. While there were no residential schools tasked with erasing indigenous identity in Taiwan, as there were in the United States and Canada until recently, aboriginal languages were banned in the schools and generally looked down upon by Chinese speaking society.

There are now no monolingual Tsou speakers, nor do there seem to be any children who can speak Tsou fluently. This is not uncharacteristic of other aboriginal groups. According to a telephone survey conducted by a prominent Taiwanese newspaper, only 9% percent of indigenous respondents said that their children spoke their heritage language (Ciwas 2004:27).

Source

Ciwas, Pawan. 2009. Indigenous language education in Taiwan. In Language is Life: Proceedings of the 11th Annual Stabilizing Indigenous Language Conference, Wesley Y. Leonard, Stelómethet Ethel B. Gardner (eds.). Survey of California and other Indian Languages, Report 14, pp.26-33.