Taiwanese Hokkien Vocabulary
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for learning Taiwanese Hokkien here: Learning Taiwanese Resources
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Current featured Taiwanese vocabulary
Category: colors
total 18 words
color
色緻
sik-tī
釋義：色彩、色澤。
red
紅色
âng-sik
釋義：像鮮血的顏色。
blue
紺
khóng
釋義：藍色。源自日語。
green
綠色
li̍k-sik
釋義：像草和樹葉一般的顏色。 做為前綴。指具有環保概念的產物，如綠色電腦。
yellow
黃色
n̂g-sik
釋義：一種像金子的顏色。 與色情或低俗趣味有關的事。
purple
茄仔色
kiô-á-sik
釋義：紫色。
brown
咖啡色
ka-pi-sik
釋義：一種褐色系列的顏色，與咖啡的顏色相近。
orange
柑仔色
kam-á-sik
釋義：橙色、橘黃色。指像柑橘外皮一樣的顏色。
white
白色
pe̍h-sik
釋義：像雪或乳汁般素淨的顏色。
black
烏色
oo-sik
釋義：黑色。像煤或墨一樣深暗的顏色。
dark
深色
tshim-sik
釋義：（臺華共同詞 ，無義項）
light
淺色
tshián-sik
釋義：顏色較淺。在色彩的彩度較低，明度較高的顏色。
grey
鳥鼠仔色
niáu-tshí-á-sik/niáu-tshú-á-sik
釋義：灰色。介於黑與白之間的顏色。
silver
銀色
gîn-sik/gûn-sik
釋義：銀白色。
gold
金色
kim-sik
釋義：黃金的顏色。
blue
藍色
nâ-sik
釋義：藍色、青色。像晴天天空的顏色。
dyeing
染色
ní-sik
釋義：用染料在物品上加顏色。
skin color
肉色
bah-sik
釋義：膚色。似人皮膚的顏色。
What is Taiwanese Hokkien?
Taiwanese or Taiwanese Hokkien is a language commonly spoken in Taiwan and other Chinese/Taiwanese communities around the world. Hokkien is often referred to by a number of different names which can be confusing for those not familiar with Chinese languages. Some of these include Hoklo, Southern Min, Fujianese, Minnan, Minnanhua and of course Taigi, the commonly used name for the language in Hokkien itself.
Written Taiwanese
How Taiwanese should be written is often a debate amongst Taiwanese speakers and learners. While Taiwan's Ministry of Education has more recently released a list of recommended Chinese characters for use with Taiwanese, most people are still unsure which characters to use. This means the same word is often written with different characters depending on who is writing. This confusion has always been a challenge with promoting and teaching Taiwanese and is one reason some people prefer to write Taiwanese with the Latin alphabet.
Taiwanese romanization
The most popular ways of written Taiwanese with letters (known as romanization or Lomaji) are POJ (Pe̍h-ōe-jī) and Tâi-lô. The former was created by missionaries in the 19th century and Tâi-lô was created by the Taiwanese government, based off POJ. There are other ways of writing Taiwanese, but these are the two most common. Since this site uses data from the MOE, Tâi-lô and the recommended characters from the government are used here.
Taiwanese Hokkien vs Taiwanese Mandarin
Although Taiwanese Hokkien is often referred to as simply a dialect, it is not mutually intelligible with Mandarin Chinese and Taiwanese Mandarin. A Taiwanese person who has not grown up speaking Taiwanese or not learnt Taiwanese will not be able to understand Taiwanese Hokkien just from Mandarin. Therefore it is often seen as more correct to refer to them as separate languages. While we have also included the Taiwanese Mandarin characters on this website, the focus here is for learning Taiwanese Hokkien. Luckily there are plenty of other resources for learning Mandarin online, whereas Taiwanese has much fewer resources.
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