Finalist, College Category - 2024 Betty L. Yu and Jin C. Yu Creative Writing Prizes “蘋果” “りんご” “Apple.” A baby gurgles apple sauce. A mother splits her tongue in three. The learned language I was around the age of four when I first experienced a paralyzing sensation in my mouth. From the moment my teeth broke through the thick skin of a granny smith, I began to feel red swelter: first around my lips, and soon after, sprawling recklessly…
[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] FEATURE PHOTO PROVIDED BY AUTHOR[/caption] When the Covid-19 pandemic hit the East Coast last spring, I unexpectedly found myself at home for an extended stretch of time. For me, quarantining with family meant that daily walks with my dad and weekly drives to a local Taiwanese bakery became a natural time for me to learn more Taiwanese — something I had been trying to do on-and-off for quite some time. As weeks turned into months, my vocabulary…
Judie Yang is a polyglot: she can speak English, Mandarin, Taiwanese, Japanese, and Spanish. Although she doesn’t always introduce herself as a polyglot, language has always been a huge part of her identity and is a common theme that runs through all her films, including Taiwanese Cha Cha Cha, a narrative short-film now playing at the Austin Asian American Film Festival. Taiwanese Cha Cha Cha explores the connections between language, culture, and family in Taiwan as it follows a young woman…
I was born in the US and, like many second generation Taiwanese-Americans, I grew up speaking first Taiwanese (台語), and then English at home. I recall visiting Taiwan as a child and people finding it quite odd that my brother and I understood only Taiwanese—not Mandarin Chinese. Although my level of Taiwanese never reached beyond that of a kindergartner's, if I hear Taiwanese being spoken around me, I will always turn my head, unable to refrain from eavesdropping on the conversation. With…
We’ve fallen into a pattern, my new friends. And some of my old friends, in this new context. It’s a new thing, for them, but feels familiar, comfortable, for me. You see, it’s natural for me, because it’s how I grew up. I grew up in the US, in the heart of the Midwest, a daughter of Taiwanese immigrants. Mandarin was my first language, but ceded her position as mother tongue to English early on, in a country where assimilation was survival. My parents, though, my beautifully centered…
Set in Taiwan and Hawaii, the film "Tongues of Heaven" focuses on the questions, desires and challenges of young indigenous peoples to learn the languages of their forebears-languages that are endangered or facing extinction. Using digital video as the primary medium of expression, four young indigenous women from divergent backgrounds collaborate and exchange ideas to consider the impact of language on identity and culture. With 96% of the world’s population speaking only 4% of the world’s languages,…
As we celebrate Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, TaiwaneseAmerican.org is pleased to continue with our series of interviews highlighting some accomplished community members who have pursued interesting paths in their professional careers or personal projects. We launched these interviews during Taiwanese American Heritage Week, and we’ve selected these individuals particularly because their stories include how a Taiwanese American community organization or experience has shaped their experience…
MediaRites presents a 25th Anniversary Celebration of the Peabody-winning film Mei Mei, A Daughter’s Song Doors open 7:30pm with live music by the Orchid and Bamboo Ensemble and a beautiful art installation by artist Willow Zheng who created Chinese watercolors for the film! The screening starts at 8pm. “A cross-cultural tale of a mother and daughter separated by language and culture, yet bound together for life.” With the 1989 Peabody-winning audio documentary as the soundtrack, Dmae…
Looking for more opportunities to learn and practice some Taiwanese phrases? Make your parents proud and come practice dai-wan-way with us! TAP’s new Taiwanese Dinner Series brings people together to learn and practice Taiwanese over a delicious dinner. Come learn some new words or practice old ones, speak or listen in on conversations in Taiwanese, socialize and meet new people, or discuss Taiwanese culture, foods, or stories. Everybody is welcome, from beginner levels to fluent, so come out and…
Taiwanese American filmmaker Anita Chang's most recent documentary film, Tongues of Heaven, revolves around the issue of language loss and asks the essential question: “what do you lose when you lose your native language?” Her film explores the challenges of young indigenous peoples of Taiwan and Hawaii in learning the heritage languages of their ancestors — languages that are endangered or facing extinction. TaiwaneseAmerican.org is proud to support this limited theatrical engagement of…
