One of things where you can guess someone's political views by what they call a place. I can remember as it being called Formosa when I was young, but then Taiwan.
I lived there. Everyone in Taiwan calls it Taiwan. I should also add that 'Liuqiu' is pronounced 'lee-oh-cho'. And I visited the island now known as Liuqiu. The name Liuqiu has the same etymological origin as the name Japanese islands known as the Ryukyu islands. The city of 'Tainan' used to be the capital and was itself previously called Taiwan before it was renamed when the whole island became known as Taiwan.
Taiwanese here. Some corrections and additions: I have never heard of the names "Xiaodong Dao" and "Dahui Guo" being used to refer to Taiwan, and a quick search doesn't provide any sources. Rather, what I know is that it was called Dongning/Tong-lîng in the 17th century. Also, it's not that "Tainan" somehow morphed into "Taiwan." The name "Taiwan" is said to have come from the names of Indigenous tribes in modern Tainan, and it was originally used only to refer to what is now Tainan. It is "Taiwan" that spread to be used for the whole island, and later "Tâi-lâm" was coined to refer to the place where "Taiwan" originally referred to, and it literally means "the south of Taiwan." "Tâi-lâm" later became "Tainan" because after the Chiang Kai-shek government came to Taiwan, they banned Taiwanese along with other local languages, and "Tâi-lâm" had to be changed to "Tainan" (which is Mandarin) as a result. China was not a nation-state, and people of different cultures and languages co-existed in the Empire, bound by a shared writing system, 漢字. Think of it as the Roman Empire in the East. People wrote in Latin, but the colloquial languages could be quite different (French, Spanish, Italian, Catalan, etc.). However, during the rule of the Chiang Kai-shek government, Taiwanese culture and languages were heavily suppressed in favor of Mandarin and Chinese culture (by Chinese culture here, I mean Mainland Chinese culture, as opposed to Taiwanese culture, which is related but different). Today, the people of Taiwan generally want nothing to do with China, although our constitution claims the entirety of China. Unfortunately, local culture and languages are already heavily Sinicized. Take Taiwanese, which was the most prevalent language before the ROC came, for example. It was spoken by 85% of the population, according to a census done in 1915. However, according to a survey in 2020, only a quarter of the population aged under 20 claim to still speak even a bit of the language, which is still probably an overestimation. And there is still not one school that teaches entirely in Taiwanese. None. Not to mention other minority languages, like Hakka and Indigenous languages, which are dying out even faster. Most people aren't aware of the situation. Most people (I would say more than 80%) see the ROC as simply Taiwan and feel emotionally connected to the country. It's kind of sad to see Mandarin and Chinese culture replacing Taiwanese ones, as opposed to, for example, Hong Kong retaining Cantonese as their dominant language under British rule.
@@itk0123 my family are Taiwanese and I would agree it’s wrong for Mandarin and mainland culture to be enforced but Taiwanese were already Chinese before then, so sinicization doesn’t make sense in this context
But one thing I would like to add is that, of course Taiwan does have its unique culture, bubble tea, Fried chicken schnitzel, but it’s all Chinese in the end. Pretty much everything known to Taiwan all came from Fujian (Minnan 閩南）, and some Shanghainese influence such as Qipao and Xiaolongbao. Taiwanese in the end is just Minnan Hokkien, and that’s a branch of the Chinese language. So I don’t really get how Chinese culture is replacing Taiwanese ones especially if the Taiwanese culture was just a branch of Chinese (Fujian/ Min/ Hokkien Chinese) culture to begin with? Just like Hong Kong, they’re a branch of the Cantonese Chinese culture, it’s still Chinese but different from say Shanghainese/ Wu Chinese culture.
Agree with most part of it but I’m not sure about the Taiwanese (language part). Though it has been restricted to use during a period and now yes young people aren’t huge on learning their native languages (whether it’s Taiwanese, Hakka or indigenous languages) but one thing I would like to point out is Taiwan has its own government which’s totally different from HK situation. I believe nowadays in elementary school they teach students their native languages in class, and still many orgs and groups are holding activities making these cultures more accessible. There’re also more indie music groups representing their native cultures. Overall, it’s not that depressing.
Very well written comment Thank you. I'm comparing and contrasting it to the nonsense I just wrote because I'm killing time and I'm like "Damn, people actually make intelligent comments here, I should erase my idiotic ones. How different is the Taiwanese language from Mandarin or Cantonese? Mutually intelligible? How about written? Same system but would the same set of characters mean the same thing from one language to another. It's a bit of a knowledge gap for me. I actually live in one of the most Chinese neighborhoods in America,Quincy MA, although I'm from Boston. Chinatown in Boston is interesting, everything around it is gentrified all same-same. glass steel buildings but Chinatown is still Chinatown. They hung the fuck in there. My favorite streets in Boston are there, Harvard St. and Johnny Ct. Look them up on the Google, you'll see what I mean. Then I look at the complete self annihilation that took place in my neighborhood South Boston and it makes me sad Sidenote the poet Khalil Gibran is from Chinatown. There was a little Syria section there, it's an offramp now. Sorry I love my town, I like pointing stuff like that out.
Taiwanese here. Appreciate you making this video. That said, Why is our island more commonly referred to Taiwan than the official name of the Republic of China (ROC)? You said it's to keep China happy. That's not entirely correct. China doesn't want the name "Taiwan" to get exposure in international settings either. The true reasons is, like you mentioned, Chiang/KMT/ROC came from China, they brought their constitution, they ruled over the island of Taiwan as the "true" China. They set up shops here, a pro-Western but still dictatorial rule. Nowadays, most Taiwanese have no interest in being the "true" China. We just want to be Taiwan. If we could write a new constitution, or least amend it, we would. Just to distance the current Taiwan away from China. But two obstacles remain: 1. we have the opposition party, the modern day KMT, who cling on to the ROC, and 2. China (PRC) threatens that if we change the constitution and remove "China" entirely, they would invade.
4:53 Almost nobody calls Chiang Kai-Shek’s party the Nationalist Party of China with the abbreviation of NPC, it’s better known by the abbreviation of KMT or the Kuomintang which means Chinese Nationalist Party.
5:26 Taiwan post-1949 wasn’t a “newly formed island nation” that was renamed to the ROC, the ROC continued existing just with its territory reduced down to Taiwan and some outlying islands
Just to add to this, Taiwan was handed back to ROC government in 1945 following the surrender of Japan Empire. So by the time Chiang and KMT moved to Taiwan in 1949, they have already held and controlled Taiwan for 4 years. There was no renaming but just continuation of Chiang's claims that he's still the legitimate ruler of "China".
Under no circumstances was Taiwan handed "back" to the ROC which never controlled it until the Allies instituted military occupation over it. The San Francisco Peace Treaty makes this clear. The ROC government was a government IN EXILE by their own admission, and the international law situation supports this. The KMT regime never considered itself Taiwanese until Taiwanese people forced democratization.
I've lived in Taiwan for the past 16 years. To echo others, offical government documents write 中華民國 (Republic of China) but in everyday life we always refer to the country as "Taiwan" (Táiwān) when speaking. The written word "Taiwan" is a bit more complicated: In China, "Taiwan" is written in simplified characters as 台湾. In Taiwan, traditional characters are used so "Taiwan" should be written as 臺灣...which it is occasionally. However, it's far more common to see a mixture of both simplified and traditional, 台灣, which I think is interesting considering the theme of this video.
Basically there are a few simplified handwritten forms of Chinese characters that were used before the communists made some of their own. Although these characters sometimes overlap such as "台" there are also simplified forms of Chinese characters that are used in casual settings in Taiwan that differ from mainland simplified characters. A couple of examples are the informal "亀" instead of standard "龜" in Taiwan, with the mainland simplification being "龟" another example is the informal simplified form "亜" with the traditional standard form being "亞" and the mainland "亚"
@@DanielS-ri1fw Good point. Perhaps it's better to call 台 an 'alternate' form instead of simplified. It kind of reminds me of banking numbers vs. regular. E.g. "one" is 一 or 壹, but I wouldn't call 一 simplified; it's just that 壹 is an alternate form.
This video seems to imply around the 5:20 mark that the ROC was somehow “reestablished” in Taiwan and “named after” the old one. What actually happened is that the ROC was pushed out of the mainland by the PRC onto the last bit of territory the ROC had which was Taiwan and a handful of small surrounding islands. The ROC is essentially, to this day, a government in exile in Taiwan. It wasn’t reestablished and there is no difference between the mainland-based ROC and the Taipei-based ROC, the latter is a direct continuation of the former. It’s also a misnomer to say that “Taiwan is still known as the Republic of China” because the two are not synonymous. Taiwan is one island (or an archipelago if using the provincial definition of the word) within the area which is administered by the ROC, and the ROC also controls some surrounding islands which aren’t part of Taiwan, such as Kinmen which is in Fujian province.
I'm pretty sure that Liuqiu is the origin behind the Ryukyu islands, in modern day Okinawa prefecture. Fun fact: The Portuguese word for a hand fan is leque and it comes from abano/abanico léquio, Léquio is the old Portuguese adjective to things related to the Ryukyu islands (pt: ilhas Léquias).
To support your assertion, the Japanese kanji for Ryuukyuu is the same as the Chinese Hanzi for Liuqui. The best way I can transcribe the Chinese pronunciation of Liuqui is something like "lyu chyuh".
Taiwan or Republic of China in formal context. The passport cover says it all. The root of the problem is the word "China" itself, which can be rather ambiguous depending on context.
I Guess the reason why the passport was redesigned is to put more emphasis on the word TAIWAN and its formal English name Republic of China less prominent, analogous to a fine print.
Yeah I was a little shocked when I got my new passport a month ago, but ai guess it will save a lot of confusions and headaches on both travellers and foreign custom officials part.
@lancerhalsey4816 It takes a bit of history lesson to understand the difference, for those from the rest of the world. BTW, Chinese Taipei is confusing too per se...but a compromise by not upsetting its neighbors.
Liuqiu is the chinese pronounciation of the words Ryukyu which was used to refer to what is now Okinawa. The small Liuqiu island that you talked about is actually not Liuqiu, we just call it that because the place resembles that of Okinawa. In fact this small island is actually called Hsiao liu qiu, which is basically small Ryukyu.
The easiest analogy of ROC and Taiwan is probably UK and GB -- UK is the official name, while GB is the geographic name of the island, but both are used colloquially.
I enjoy your videos very much. I have two thoughts on this one. I have close ties with ROC/Taiwan, and just about everyone I know from the country calls it Taiwan. They have long ago given up claims to China, and simply want to be left alone as the sovereign nation of Taiwan. They refer to themselves as both Taiwanese and Chinese. I was a bit surprised, because of your area of expertise, to hear you say "Kai-Shek" when referring to the past KMT leader. His family name is Chiang, not Kai-Shek. This would be akin to calling the President of the US "Joe", rather than "Biden" or past president FDR "Frank".
I regret not offering pronunciation tips on that community post. I understand not knowing qiu is pronounced like chiou, but what did you pronounce tainan as tanai...
Correction, Taiwanese had no problem being called Taiwan on international events as its use separates them from China. But that would be consider as advocating Taiwanese independence by CCP, while ROC would infringe on One China policy.
You mentioned when Taiwan was under Japanese rule, and there was a nickname used then: Takasago. This came up recently when talking to my sensei about clouded leopards; one name for the animal is _takasago hyou_, "Taiwan leopard". Unfortuanately the Formosan Clouded Leopard, which figured strongly in the traditions of the natives of the island, is now extinct.
Taiwanese here, really appreciate the video while eager to point out some of the mismatched information, but I see some of my fellow Taiwanese are commenting to do so, so I’m here to find excuses for the misunderstanding in the video. Dealing with the names of the island is indeed a tricky issue for the westerners, not only because of the geopolitical problem we’re facing nowadays, but also the fact that multiple languages co-exists / co-existed on this island. Dozens of Austronesian languages from the indigenous Formosans, Dutch, Spanish, Taiwanese (a language derived from 2 dialects of Southern Min / sister of Hokkien languages), Taiwanese Hakka (which was thought to be Cantonese during the Japanese rule), Japanese, and finally Mandarin brought by the KMT(ROC) …. Each language have coined or borrowed its names for the island and nearby islands, even when the whole geographical picture was still unknown to the people. And the problem of languages doesn’t stop here. If you’ve learned about the Chinese characters (Hanzi / Kanji / Hanji … whatever you call it), you’d know that some of those languages share the same writing (in some vocabulary levels) but read it in completely different ways, including Taiwanese, Hakka, Japanese, and Mandarin, which later being transcribed into Dutch, Spanish, and of course English in a variety of ways throughout history. Nevertheless, many of the ancient indigenous names were being transcribed to Chinese characters, meant to be pronounced in Taiwanese or Japanese, are now read in Mandarin, so even the natives here don’t fully understand the original meanings. And once they are spelled with Mandarin Pinyin for the westerners for the most cases, and some cases when certain Taiwanese netizens try to provide well-spelled Taiwanese POJ for the same name of places, everything is going to be an interesting mess for video creators and viewers who speak none of the languages. To sum up, linguistically speaking, Taiwan is a vibrant place with great diversity of people and thoughts though out history. Its endonyms and exonyms have changed a lot and might change again and again in the future. Thanks for all the effort of trying to understand our cultures and history.
I always remember that line in the movie The Last Emperor, where Chang Kai-Shek is called by a nickname given to him: Cash My Check! Of course, that makes sense in English, and I always wondered if it actually worked in Chinese.
5:29 though there wasn't anything newly formed. it _is_ a continuation of an existing nation while the mainland changed government. The legitimacy of the ROC might be questioned by some, but that isn't any different from questioning the legitimacy of the ROC when it did have most of the mainland. But practically it's a continuation of a, legitimate or not, nation.
For us , Kenya 🇰🇪🇰🇪, we have trade ties with the PRC, hence we call this island country, Taiwan to avoid pissing off the PRC since we trade with China (PRC)
A few things to note is that Chiang Kai Shek didn’t change the name of the island of Taiwan to the Republic of China, he just kept referring to China as a whole (including Taiwan) as the Republic of China, it was simply that he only actually controlled Taiwan and so the name became ubiquitous with it. Another thing is the “Chinese Taipei” name is actually more complicated for the PRC and ROC than the video claims, with there being two possibly translations into Chinese, one favoured by the government in Taiwan and one favoured by the government in China. 中华台北 (zhōng huá tái běi) is one translation which would be emphasising that culturally Taiwan is Chinese and is the name generally preferred by the people in Taiwan since it keeps the national status of Taiwan intentionally vague, whereas 中国台北 (zhōng guó tái běi） makes a direct claim of “the Taipei that belongs to China” which is preferred by the Chinese government as it makes the direct claim of ownership over the island. However unlike what is mentioned in the video, I have more often heard the people would prefer to simply be referred to as Taiwan in international situations like the olympics, it is simply strongly rejected by Beijing and therefore another name had to be chosen.
As someone who works with more than one person from Taiwan, I’ve only ever heard them call it Taiwan. But that might partially have something to do with the fact that most Australians call it Taiwan… i might send them this video and see what they think.
When I visited the Huaqing Hot Springs, a guide was telling me about the Xi’an Incident and they referred to the Republic of China at that time as Taiwan I thought that was an interesting bit of translation and cultural mediation
The explanation "platform bay" is just the literal translation of 臺灣 the chinese character, the origin is most likely to be between ether the mispronounce of taivoan/tevorangh by the dutch, or the siraya word "crossing place" or "foreigners".
@fvbghjfg3432 : somewhere I got the message that taiwan is a siraya word for beautiful - making formosa, hermosa, beautiful, and taiwan all expressions of the same concept.
Tainan literally means "South Taiwan", just like Taipei means "North Taiwan". There is also Tai Chung which means "Middle Taiwan"; and Taitung which means "East Taiwan". Guess where they are located on the island.
@@FrancisTheBerd: the Ex-pats in Los Angeles are Formosa this and Formosa that; also I get my news from the Formosa TV News Network - English. The old name lingers.
@SewolHoONCE many (most?) of the ex-pats probably came from the Chinese mainland and fled the communists, and Taiwan would have been a brief stop for them and not a long-term home.
My 2 cents: The name isn’t really the problem here. Like most of what the Taiwanese here say: its pretty much a matter of identity. As a communist I pretty much roll my eyes at whole “evil autocratic PRC” vs “wholesum vibrant democratic Taiwan” it doesn’t treat either place, particularly Taiwan with a real history or real politics. It becomes a mascot for the continued coping mechanism that we still live in a post 1989 world, the USSR is dead and Bill Clinton just won the election. That being said an underlying tension does exist, that being between the legacies of “high communism” and liberalization. This drama is played out within the PRC itself and Taiwan, as part of that legacy will continue to have a role.
You've just said that the ROC included both the Chinese mainland and the island of Taiwan as of 1945. Why would Taiwan be "renamed" the ROC when Chiang the rest of the government there in 1949? It is simply the only part of the country left under ROC (aka the nation founded in 1912) control post 1949. This did not and should not constitute a "renaming". The logic underlying the uploader's narration makes little sense. If in the US Civil War the only part of the US under the union's control had been Maine, then would Maine be "renamed" the USA? No, Maine would simply be the only remaining part of the USA, the same USA that declared independence from Britain in 1774. Similarly Taiwan is the only (chiefly) remaining part of the same ROC that was founded in 1912.
The island of Taiwan is called Taiwan or Formosa. The name of the country that governs the island is the Republic of China. This is really as long as this video needs to be.
Our last word: ( Upon achieving independence, the people and institutions of the islands southeast of, “ Taiwan,” chose to keep their inclusive Spanish name: The Philippines.) The Philippines are the Philippines; following the Philippines’s logic, the people and institutions of Taiwan ought to revive the name and provisional heraldry of the 1895 REPUBLIC OF FORMOSA.
I enjoy watching your videos but there are so many mistakes in your video as others have pointed out which made this video hard to watch as a Taiwanese. You butchered the pronunciation for Tainan which is pronounced how it's spelt (Tai Nan, like Thailand and Naan bread). Nan means South, Pei/Bei means North, Tung/Dong means East and Chung means Central. So the most prominent city in the south is Tai-nan, most prominent city in North is Tai-pei, the most prominent city in the east is Tai-tung and the most prominent central city is called Tai-chung. It just happens so that when the Dutch took over Taiwan by settling in Tainan, that area was called Dayuan that later became Taiwan. Then during Qing Dynasty, they decided to rename the cities of Taiwan into Taipei, Taichung, Tainan and Taitung etc. The island is called Taiwan and so even though the official name of the government situated in Taipei is called The Republic of China, the geographical island name is now synonymous with ROC. Everyday speech people refer to Taiwan as Taiwan, like how colloquially you'd say Great Britain but you can say the United Kingdom when speaking in political context, to emphasise the government or when you refer to Great Britain + Northern Ireland and other UK islands. Whenever PRC refers to Taiwan in English, they'll have it as "Taiwan, province of China". In Chinese they will say "Taiwan, China", similar to "Texas, USA". They will every refer to Taiwan as just Taiwan because that can be interpreted as supporting Taiwanese independence, lol. Also Chiang is the last name not Kai-Shek. So when you call him Kai-Shek, it's like if you referred Lincoln as Abraham.
I prefer China-Taipei (as compared to China-Beijing). Using the practics as in the Congos, or in old Germany, where the land is differentiated by its chief city. (Locals call it Taiwan, just as someone here might say Florida.)
Thanks for this video talking about our country but let me point out some minor things: 1. You just addressed CHIANG Kai Shek on a given name basis. Good job getting to be his bro, bro. 2. The OG ROC not just claims Taiwan, all the mainland, but also that south China sea mass and outer Mongolia. It's insane I know. Most people just don't care what the constitution says about our border.
To be honest, I believe, that the "one China policy". gets it perfectly right. There is only one China, because Taiwan, isn't China, it's Taiwan, a different country. De facto, that's how it is and the whole world tries not to upset China with that reality, so we all pretend, like things are different, than they really are.
L did you know I'm running a book about every language in the world it's going to be called the language Atlas, and it's going to detail how languages are similar and differently one another another
Main land China just needs to stop taking everything so seriously. Just let the island call themselves whatever they want, and admit that it is a sovereign nation.
What do you call Taiwan?
Taiwan
Republic of Taiwan
One of things where you can guess someone's political views by what they call a place.
I can remember as it being called Formosa when I was young, but then Taiwan.
The real China. 🇹🇼
I lived there. Everyone in Taiwan calls it Taiwan.
I should also add that 'Liuqiu' is pronounced 'lee-oh-cho'. And I visited the island now known as Liuqiu. The name Liuqiu has the same etymological origin as the name Japanese islands known as the Ryukyu islands. The city of 'Tainan' used to be the capital and was itself previously called Taiwan before it was renamed when the whole island became known as Taiwan.
Taiwanese here. Some corrections and additions:
I have never heard of the names "Xiaodong Dao" and "Dahui Guo" being used to refer to Taiwan, and a quick search doesn't provide any sources. Rather, what I know is that it was called Dongning/Tong-lîng in the 17th century.
Also, it's not that "Tainan" somehow morphed into "Taiwan." The name "Taiwan" is said to have come from the names of Indigenous tribes in modern Tainan, and it was originally used only to refer to what is now Tainan. It is "Taiwan" that spread to be used for the whole island, and later "Tâi-lâm" was coined to refer to the place where "Taiwan" originally referred to, and it literally means "the south of Taiwan." "Tâi-lâm" later became "Tainan" because after the Chiang Kai-shek government came to Taiwan, they banned Taiwanese along with other local languages, and "Tâi-lâm" had to be changed to "Tainan" (which is Mandarin) as a result.
China was not a nation-state, and people of different cultures and languages co-existed in the Empire, bound by a shared writing system, 漢字. Think of it as the Roman Empire in the East. People wrote in Latin, but the colloquial languages could be quite different (French, Spanish, Italian, Catalan, etc.). However, during the rule of the Chiang Kai-shek government, Taiwanese culture and languages were heavily suppressed in favor of Mandarin and Chinese culture (by Chinese culture here, I mean Mainland Chinese culture, as opposed to Taiwanese culture, which is related but different).
Today, the people of Taiwan generally want nothing to do with China, although our constitution claims the entirety of China. Unfortunately, local culture and languages are already heavily Sinicized. Take Taiwanese, which was the most prevalent language before the ROC came, for example. It was spoken by 85% of the population, according to a census done in 1915. However, according to a survey in 2020, only a quarter of the population aged under 20 claim to still speak even a bit of the language, which is still probably an overestimation. And there is still not one school that teaches entirely in Taiwanese. None. Not to mention other minority languages, like Hakka and Indigenous languages, which are dying out even faster. Most people aren't aware of the situation. Most people (I would say more than 80%) see the ROC as simply Taiwan and feel emotionally connected to the country.
It's kind of sad to see Mandarin and Chinese culture replacing Taiwanese ones, as opposed to, for example, Hong Kong retaining Cantonese as their dominant language under British rule.
@@itk0123 my family are Taiwanese and I would agree it’s wrong for Mandarin and mainland culture to be enforced but Taiwanese were already Chinese before then, so sinicization doesn’t make sense in this context
@@thematthew761 Yes, I believe Taiwanese Hokkien is from Fujian.
But one thing I would like to add is that, of course Taiwan does have its unique culture, bubble tea, Fried chicken schnitzel, but it’s all Chinese in the end. Pretty much everything known to Taiwan all came from Fujian (Minnan 閩南）, and some Shanghainese influence such as Qipao and Xiaolongbao. Taiwanese in the end is just Minnan Hokkien, and that’s a branch of the Chinese language. So I don’t really get how Chinese culture is replacing Taiwanese ones especially if the Taiwanese culture was just a branch of Chinese (Fujian/ Min/ Hokkien Chinese) culture to begin with? Just like Hong Kong, they’re a branch of the Cantonese Chinese culture, it’s still Chinese but different from say Shanghainese/ Wu Chinese culture.
Agree with most part of it but I’m not sure about the Taiwanese (language part). Though it has been restricted to use during a period and now yes young people aren’t huge on learning their native languages (whether it’s Taiwanese, Hakka or indigenous languages) but one thing I would like to point out is Taiwan has its own government which’s totally different from HK situation. I believe nowadays in elementary school they teach students their native languages in class, and still many orgs and groups are holding activities making these cultures more accessible. There’re also more indie music groups representing their native cultures.
Overall, it’s not that depressing.
Very well written comment Thank you. I'm comparing and contrasting it to the nonsense I just wrote because I'm killing time and I'm like "Damn, people actually make intelligent comments here, I should erase my idiotic ones. How different is the Taiwanese language from Mandarin or Cantonese? Mutually intelligible? How about written? Same system but would the same set of characters mean the same thing from one language to another. It's a bit of a knowledge gap for me. I actually live in one of the most Chinese neighborhoods in America,Quincy MA, although I'm from Boston. Chinatown in Boston is interesting, everything around it is gentrified all same-same. glass steel buildings but Chinatown is still Chinatown. They hung the fuck in there. My favorite streets in Boston are there, Harvard St. and Johnny Ct. Look them up on the Google, you'll see what I mean. Then I look at the complete self annihilation that took place in my neighborhood South Boston and it makes me sad
Sidenote the poet Khalil Gibran is from Chinatown. There was a little Syria section there, it's an offramp now. Sorry I love my town, I like pointing stuff like that out.
Taiwanese here. Appreciate you making this video. That said,
Why is our island more commonly referred to Taiwan than the official name of the Republic of China (ROC)? You said it's to keep China happy. That's not entirely correct. China doesn't want the name "Taiwan" to get exposure in international settings either.
The true reasons is, like you mentioned, Chiang/KMT/ROC came from China, they brought their constitution, they ruled over the island of Taiwan as the "true" China. They set up shops here, a pro-Western but still dictatorial rule.
Nowadays, most Taiwanese have no interest in being the "true" China. We just want to be Taiwan. If we could write a new constitution, or least amend it, we would. Just to distance the current Taiwan away from China. But two obstacles remain: 1. we have the opposition party, the modern day KMT, who cling on to the ROC, and 2. China (PRC) threatens that if we change the constitution and remove "China" entirely, they would invade.
4:53 Almost nobody calls Chiang Kai-Shek’s party the Nationalist Party of China with the abbreviation of NPC, it’s better known by the abbreviation of KMT or the Kuomintang which means Chinese Nationalist Party.
5:26 Taiwan post-1949 wasn’t a “newly formed island nation” that was renamed to the ROC, the ROC continued existing just with its territory reduced down to Taiwan and some outlying islands
Exactly. this video reads as CCP propaganda.
Just to add to this, Taiwan was handed back to ROC government in 1945 following the surrender of Japan Empire. So by the time Chiang and KMT moved to Taiwan in 1949, they have already held and controlled Taiwan for 4 years. There was no renaming but just continuation of Chiang's claims that he's still the legitimate ruler of "China".
Under no circumstances was Taiwan handed "back" to the ROC which never controlled it until the Allies instituted military occupation over it. The San Francisco Peace Treaty makes this clear.
The ROC government was a government IN EXILE by their own admission, and the international law situation supports this. The KMT regime never considered itself Taiwanese until Taiwanese people forced democratization.
Yeah this glaring mistake seems to have escaped everybody's radar for some reason
Brazilian here: yeah, Formosa is used sometimes here, but I would say that in recent years Taiwan is wider spread.
I only heard that word like once in history class as “ilha de Formosa”. The only reason why I remember this is cos I found the name really unique
Can confirm. (I'm old enough to remember when Formosa was more often used.)
0:55 that is some high level butchering 😭😭😭
(not complaining, but it sounds very funny when you know how 琉球 is supposed to be pronounced lol)
I’m from the US but my family came to Taiwan in 1949, everyone just calls Taiwan Taiwan, it makes the most sense
oh hey
I've lived in Taiwan for the past 16 years. To echo others, offical government documents write 中華民國 (Republic of China) but in everyday life we always refer to the country as "Taiwan" (Táiwān) when speaking. The written word "Taiwan" is a bit more complicated: In China, "Taiwan" is written in simplified characters as 台湾. In Taiwan, traditional characters are used so "Taiwan" should be written as 臺灣...which it is occasionally. However, it's far more common to see a mixture of both simplified and traditional, 台灣, which I think is interesting considering the theme of this video.
Basically there are a few simplified handwritten forms of Chinese characters that were used before the communists made some of their own. Although these characters sometimes overlap such as "台" there are also simplified forms of Chinese characters that are used in casual settings in Taiwan that differ from mainland simplified characters. A couple of examples are the informal "亀" instead of standard "龜" in Taiwan, with the mainland simplification being "龟" another example is the informal simplified form "亜" with the traditional standard form being "亞" and the mainland "亚"
@@DanielS-ri1fw Good point. Perhaps it's better to call 台 an 'alternate' form instead of simplified. It kind of reminds me of banking numbers vs. regular. E.g. "one" is 一 or 壹, but I wouldn't call 一 simplified; it's just that 壹 is an alternate form.
This video seems to imply around the 5:20 mark that the ROC was somehow “reestablished” in Taiwan and “named after” the old one. What actually happened is that the ROC was pushed out of the mainland by the PRC onto the last bit of territory the ROC had which was Taiwan and a handful of small surrounding islands. The ROC is essentially, to this day, a government in exile in Taiwan. It wasn’t reestablished and there is no difference between the mainland-based ROC and the Taipei-based ROC, the latter is a direct continuation of the former. It’s also a misnomer to say that “Taiwan is still known as the Republic of China” because the two are not synonymous. Taiwan is one island (or an archipelago if using the provincial definition of the word) within the area which is administered by the ROC, and the ROC also controls some surrounding islands which aren’t part of Taiwan, such as Kinmen which is in Fujian province.
I'm pretty sure that Liuqiu is the origin behind the Ryukyu islands, in modern day Okinawa prefecture.
Fun fact: The Portuguese word for a hand fan is leque and it comes from abano/abanico léquio, Léquio is the old Portuguese adjective to things related to the Ryukyu islands (pt: ilhas Léquias).
To support your assertion, the Japanese kanji for Ryuukyuu is the same as the Chinese Hanzi for Liuqui. The best way I can transcribe the Chinese pronunciation of Liuqui is something like "lyu chyuh".
Taiwan or Republic of China in formal context. The passport cover says it all. The root of the problem is the word "China" itself, which can be rather ambiguous depending on context.
I Guess the reason why the passport was redesigned is to put more emphasis on the word TAIWAN and its formal English name Republic of China less prominent, analogous to a fine print.
@Claro1993 100% agree. The new passport cover is a genius way to detach from any wrong associations.
Yeah I was a little shocked when I got my new passport a month ago, but ai guess it will save a lot of confusions and headaches on both travellers and foreign custom officials part.
@lancerhalsey4816 It takes a bit of history lesson to understand the difference, for those from the rest of the world. BTW, Chinese Taipei is confusing too per se...but a compromise by not upsetting its neighbors.
Liuqiu is the chinese pronounciation of the words Ryukyu which was used to refer to what is now Okinawa. The small Liuqiu island that you talked about is actually not Liuqiu, we just call it that because the place resembles that of Okinawa. In fact this small island is actually called Hsiao liu qiu, which is basically small Ryukyu.
The easiest analogy of ROC and Taiwan is probably UK and GB -- UK is the official name, while GB is the geographic name of the island, but both are used colloquially.
The United Kingdom includes Northern Ireland, while Great Britain is just the mainland island of England, Scotland and Wales.
@@SWLinPHX Similarly, ROC includes Kinmen and Matsu, both under Fujian prvovince, while Taiwan is just the main island.
I enjoy your videos very much. I have two thoughts on this one.
I have close ties with ROC/Taiwan, and just about everyone I know from the country calls it Taiwan. They have long ago given up claims to China, and simply want to be left alone as the sovereign nation of Taiwan. They refer to themselves as both Taiwanese and Chinese.
I was a bit surprised, because of your area of expertise, to hear you say "Kai-Shek" when referring to the past KMT leader. His family name is Chiang, not Kai-Shek. This would be akin to calling the President of the US "Joe", rather than "Biden" or past president FDR "Frank".
He'll just call Lincoln as Abraham, Churchill as Winston and Washington as George.
More and more of us are calling ourselves JUST Taiwanese.
@@BBarNavi I think when they call themselves Chinese, they're referring to their culture or ethnicity, rather than nationality.
I regret not offering pronunciation tips on that community post. I understand not knowing qiu is pronounced like chiou, but what did you pronounce tainan as tanai...
How many times does a European need to apologize not to upset China?
[Portuguese Guy] I really need to go to this island to see just how beautiful it really is.
Correction, Taiwanese had no problem being called Taiwan on international events as its use separates them from China. But that would be consider as advocating Taiwanese independence by CCP, while ROC would infringe on One China policy.
You mentioned when Taiwan was under Japanese rule, and there was a nickname used then: Takasago. This came up recently when talking to my sensei about clouded leopards; one name for the animal is _takasago hyou_, "Taiwan leopard". Unfortuanately the Formosan Clouded Leopard, which figured strongly in the traditions of the natives of the island, is now extinct.
Patrick, you might want to look up the history (and geography) of Hawai’i.
Taiwanese here, really appreciate the video while eager to point out some of the mismatched information, but I see some of my fellow Taiwanese are commenting to do so, so I’m here to find excuses for the misunderstanding in the video.
Dealing with the names of the island is indeed a tricky issue for the westerners, not only because of the geopolitical problem we’re facing nowadays, but also the fact that multiple languages co-exists / co-existed on this island.
Dozens of Austronesian languages from the indigenous Formosans, Dutch, Spanish, Taiwanese (a language derived from 2 dialects of Southern Min / sister of Hokkien languages), Taiwanese Hakka (which was thought to be Cantonese during the Japanese rule), Japanese, and finally Mandarin brought by the KMT(ROC) …. Each language have coined or borrowed its names for the island and nearby islands, even when the whole geographical picture was still unknown to the people.
And the problem of languages doesn’t stop here. If you’ve learned about the Chinese characters (Hanzi / Kanji / Hanji … whatever you call it), you’d know that some of those languages share the same writing (in some vocabulary levels) but read it in completely different ways, including Taiwanese, Hakka, Japanese, and Mandarin, which later being transcribed into Dutch, Spanish, and of course English in a variety of ways throughout history.
Nevertheless, many of the ancient indigenous names were being transcribed to Chinese characters, meant to be pronounced in Taiwanese or Japanese, are now read in Mandarin, so even the natives here don’t fully understand the original meanings. And once they are spelled with Mandarin Pinyin for the westerners for the most cases, and some cases when certain Taiwanese netizens try to provide well-spelled Taiwanese POJ for the same name of places, everything is going to be an interesting mess for video creators and viewers who speak none of the languages.
To sum up, linguistically speaking, Taiwan is a vibrant place with great diversity of people and thoughts though out history. Its endonyms and exonyms have changed a lot and might change again and again in the future. Thanks for all the effort of trying to understand our cultures and history.
I always remember that line in the movie The Last Emperor, where Chang Kai-Shek is called by a nickname given to him: Cash My Check! Of course, that makes sense in English, and I always wondered if it actually worked in Chinese.
I have a few Taiwanese friends. They call their island homeland ‘Taiwan’.
5:29 though there wasn't anything newly formed. it _is_ a continuation of an existing nation while the mainland changed government. The legitimacy of the ROC might be questioned by some, but that isn't any different from questioning the legitimacy of the ROC when it did have most of the mainland. But practically it's a continuation of a, legitimate or not, nation.
It’s either 🇹🇼Taiwan and 🇨🇳Refucking of Shina
Or 🇹🇼Republic of (real) China and 🇨🇳West Taiwan
For us , Kenya 🇰🇪🇰🇪, we have trade ties with the PRC, hence we call this island country, Taiwan to avoid pissing off the PRC since we trade with China (PRC)
A few things to note is that Chiang Kai Shek didn’t change the name of the island of Taiwan to the Republic of China, he just kept referring to China as a whole (including Taiwan) as the Republic of China, it was simply that he only actually controlled Taiwan and so the name became ubiquitous with it.
Another thing is the “Chinese Taipei” name is actually more complicated for the PRC and ROC than the video claims, with there being two possibly translations into Chinese, one favoured by the government in Taiwan and one favoured by the government in China. 中华台北 (zhōng huá tái běi) is one translation which would be emphasising that culturally Taiwan is Chinese and is the name generally preferred by the people in Taiwan since it keeps the national status of Taiwan intentionally vague, whereas 中国台北 (zhōng guó tái běi） makes a direct claim of “the Taipei that belongs to China” which is preferred by the Chinese government as it makes the direct claim of ownership over the island.
However unlike what is mentioned in the video, I have more often heard the people would prefer to simply be referred to as Taiwan in international situations like the olympics, it is simply strongly rejected by Beijing and therefore another name had to be chosen.
As someone who works with more than one person from Taiwan, I’ve only ever heard them call it Taiwan. But that might partially have something to do with the fact that most Australians call it Taiwan… i might send them this video and see what they think.
When I visited the Huaqing Hot Springs, a guide was telling me about the Xi’an Incident and they referred to the Republic of China at that time as Taiwan
I thought that was an interesting bit of translation and cultural mediation
The explanation "platform bay" is just the literal translation of 臺灣 the chinese character, the origin is most likely to be between ether the mispronounce of taivoan/tevorangh by the dutch, or the siraya word "crossing place" or "foreigners".
@fvbghjfg3432 : somewhere I got the message that taiwan is a siraya word for beautiful - making formosa, hermosa, beautiful, and taiwan all expressions of the same concept.
@@SewolHoONCENot true; their word is Mamutirag
@@BBarNavi “Formosa, Hermosa, Beautiful, Taiwan “ Thank you; I will change my usage.
I think China also has a name problem. I don't know it's China or West Taiwan.
-9000+ credit score 😂😂😂
You're a damn fool
Oh, definitely WEST TAIWAN!
¿Middle Kingdom?
Reddit
Tainan literally means "South Taiwan", just like Taipei means "North Taiwan". There is also Tai Chung which means "Middle Taiwan"; and Taitung which means "East Taiwan". Guess where they are located on the island.
Beijing, Nanjing, Tokyo....
We do NOT call it formosa man!
That is a shame, because it means very beautifull. Why not that meaning in chinese?
@@rogeriomonteiro760 I know what it means and that's not a modern name (just to avoid any sort of misconception, in portugal we call it Taiwan aswell)
@@FrancisTheBerd: the Ex-pats in Los Angeles are Formosa this and Formosa that; also I get my news from the Formosa TV News Network - English. The old name lingers.
@SewolHoONCE many (most?) of the ex-pats probably came from the Chinese mainland and fled the communists, and Taiwan would have been a brief stop for them and not a long-term home.
Most Taiwanese don't care about the true China thing, we are comfortable calling them Taiwan
Conversation:
"Where are you from?"
"China"
"Which one?"
"I don't know what you're talking about. There's only one China, according to policy."
9:07 it seems like lately it is...
My 2 cents:
The name isn’t really the problem here. Like most of what the Taiwanese here say: its pretty much a matter of identity. As a communist I pretty much roll my eyes at whole “evil autocratic PRC” vs “wholesum vibrant democratic Taiwan” it doesn’t treat either place, particularly Taiwan with a real history or real politics. It becomes a mascot for the continued coping mechanism that we still live in a post 1989 world, the USSR is dead and Bill Clinton just won the election.
That being said an underlying tension does exist, that being between the legacies of “high communism” and liberalization. This drama is played out within the PRC itself and Taiwan, as part of that legacy will continue to have a role.
You've just said that the ROC included both the Chinese mainland and the island of Taiwan as of 1945. Why would Taiwan be "renamed" the ROC when Chiang the rest of the government there in 1949? It is simply the only part of the country left under ROC (aka the nation founded in 1912) control post 1949. This did not and should not constitute a "renaming". The logic underlying the uploader's narration makes little sense.
If in the US Civil War the only part of the US under the union's control had been Maine, then would Maine be "renamed" the USA? No, Maine would simply be the only remaining part of the USA, the same USA that declared independence from Britain in 1774. Similarly Taiwan is the only (chiefly) remaining part of the same ROC that was founded in 1912.
The island of Taiwan is called Taiwan or Formosa. The name of the country that governs the island is the Republic of China. This is really as long as this video needs to be.
the country of Fomosa feels like a country from Gulliver's Travels
Our last word: ( Upon achieving independence, the people and institutions of the islands southeast of, “ Taiwan,” chose to keep their inclusive Spanish name: The Philippines.) The Philippines are the Philippines; following the Philippines’s logic, the people and institutions of Taiwan ought to revive the name and provisional heraldry of the 1895 REPUBLIC OF FORMOSA.
It took me a while to get what the "NPC" was. It's Kuomintang or Guomindang.
As an portuguese I would sugest the chinese meaning of formosa (very beautiful).
It's amazing that I was allowed to watch this video by the way in in Hong Kong
Correct me if im wrong but i’ve seen and heard of some sources that the country of Morocco the name came from the old city of Marrakesh.
what did the natives call it
At times to avoid confusion
Are those islands northeast of Taiwan the infamous Quemoy and Matsu of the early Cold War era?
@@allanrichardson1468 no, they’re NW
@@thematthew761 Thanks.
I enjoy watching your videos but there are so many mistakes in your video as others have pointed out which made this video hard to watch as a Taiwanese.
You butchered the pronunciation for Tainan which is pronounced how it's spelt (Tai Nan, like Thailand and Naan bread).
Nan means South, Pei/Bei means North, Tung/Dong means East and Chung means Central. So the most prominent city in the south is Tai-nan, most prominent city in North is Tai-pei, the most prominent city in the east is Tai-tung and the most prominent central city is called Tai-chung.
It just happens so that when the Dutch took over Taiwan by settling in Tainan, that area was called Dayuan that later became Taiwan. Then during Qing Dynasty, they decided to rename the cities of Taiwan into Taipei, Taichung, Tainan and Taitung etc.
The island is called Taiwan and so even though the official name of the government situated in Taipei is called The Republic of China, the geographical island name is now synonymous with ROC. Everyday speech people refer to Taiwan as Taiwan, like how colloquially you'd say Great Britain but you can say the United Kingdom when speaking in political context, to emphasise the government or when you refer to Great Britain + Northern Ireland and other UK islands.
Whenever PRC refers to Taiwan in English, they'll have it as "Taiwan, province of China". In Chinese they will say "Taiwan, China", similar to "Texas, USA". They will every refer to Taiwan as just Taiwan because that can be interpreted as supporting Taiwanese independence, lol.
Also Chiang is the last name not Kai-Shek. So when you call him Kai-Shek, it's like if you referred Lincoln as Abraham.
In before the endless river of partisan bots
You mean west taiwan?
@@bazinga-tt9pjwest Taiwan is nice
I prefer China-Taipei (as compared to China-Beijing). Using the practics as in the Congos, or in old Germany, where the land is differentiated by its chief city.
(Locals call it Taiwan, just as someone here might say Florida.)
Cool!
1:19 Formosa is not little
Stop apologizing, i understand that this is a world constantly filled with eggshells but it doesn't need to be.
In Kenya 🇰🇪, it is just called Taiwan
Thanks for this video talking about our country but let me point out some minor things:
1. You just addressed CHIANG Kai Shek on a given name basis. Good job getting to be his bro, bro.
2. The OG ROC not just claims Taiwan, all the mainland, but also that south China sea mass and outer Mongolia. It's insane I know. Most people just don't care what the constitution says about our border.
That's why they have to resort to their de facto claims as the Taiwan Area or Free Area.
In a formal sense- Republic of China,as it is ruled by a Nationalistic government dating its period from the Kuomintang led by Chiang Kai-Shek
"People don't lie on the internet, right?"
The most naïve thing I've ever heard.
me who just found out Mexico is named after the city not the other way around....
😅
The name “Taiwan” is from the indigenous
Taiwan
Chiang Kai-Shek's family name is Chiang. Chinese name order is from general to specific.
Edit: fixed autocorrect typo
Mostly Mao Zedong's name is just Mao, but Chiang Kai-Shek is adressed fully and not just Chiang. Maybe it's because Chiang is much more common.
Just watch this same topic on Phil Edwards channel a couple days ago.
Simon Whisler’s channel “Places” also did a video about Taiwan on August 1st. It’s over an hour long, but it’s VERY interesting!
🇹🇼 ❤
To be honest, I believe, that the "one China policy". gets it perfectly right. There is only one China, because Taiwan, isn't China, it's Taiwan, a different country. De facto, that's how it is and the whole world tries not to upset China with that reality, so we all pretend, like things are different, than they really are.
Guy from America here, we just call it Taiwan so you should too.
Bhutan recognizes neither.
Taiwan🇨🇳
Taiwan 🇨🇳
0:55 “Lee-Kwoh”?? Please search how to pronounce words from languages you clearly don’t know
Liuqui is pronounced as roughly Loo-Chew not Leek-coo 😂 Still love your videos even though you almost always butcher non-English words
I just call it The Real China.
We're not China.
Poor Taiwan, the country without a proper name.
Oh and China is shaped like a motorcycle,driving east (or to the West,depending on how you look at) That is a visual metaphor that is a little scary.
it’s not tainan
it’s tâi-oân
Beijing is the capital of West Tiawan
Don't you mean West Taiwan? Taiwan IS to the East.
@@TheLobsterCopter5000 Whoops. Fixed it. Thanks
😅😅😅😅😅
😅
@@mingfanzhang8927 #KFC
@@mingfanzhang4600 #FreeTaiwan #KFC #Islam
@@mingfanzhang8927 #Islam #KFC
You also could’ve mentioned 🇹🇼 controls islands not technically part of Taiwan but under Taipei control
L did you know I'm running a book about every language in the world it's going to be called the language Atlas, and it's going to detail how languages are similar and differently one another another
Books can't run, they're inanimate objects
@@thedinobros1218 very interesting
Mao and Chiang are the family names. You should not refer to them by their given names, unless you are friendly with them.
Why are you afraid of hurting Mao's feelings?
I can it Japan 🤭
2:54 Tanai??
Its Tainan. Mispronouncing a word while you can clearly read it.
One reason Taiwan has such a powerful economy is because of its many workers with Taipei (Type A) personalities!
Regardless of whether it comes from China or Taiwan,
the main thing is that the price is right.
I can't say anything about the local difficulties.
189th
Main land China just needs to stop taking everything so seriously. Just let the island call themselves whatever they want, and admit that it is a sovereign nation.
The real China. Period.
Not China at all. Period.
"China" altogether seems like just a weird name. I don't think there's ever a "real China".
Please try harder to pronounce the name correctly. I believe the internet have many resources for you to learn it
I see
😅😅😅😅😅
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@@mingfanzhang4600 #KFC #Islam
@@mingfanzhang8927 #Ramadan