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Home > JOURNAL > Vol. 12 (2023) > Number 2

 

Pao-Chien Wang

Abstract

Taiwan boasts a rich cultural, heritage and linguistic diversity as a multiethnic and multicultural state. Although most of its population speak Mandarin, it is not designated as the official language. In 2000, Taiwan passed the Broadcasting Language Equality Protection in Public Transport Act to ensure minority languages such as Hakka, Matsu and the indigenous languages are broadcasted in all public transportation. In the government’s effort to promote Taiwan's linguistic diversity, three legislations, namely, the Indigenous Languages Development Act, the Hakka Basic Act, and the Development of National Languages Act, were introduced in 2017, 2018, and 2019, respectively. Aligned with the National Language Policy, these legislations helped shape Taiwan’s language development strategy so that everyone in Taiwan can express themselves in their respective languages. This paper discusses Taiwan’s minority language policy by reviewing the Hakka language, the Indigenous languages, and the Matsu language with the use of qualitative research methods and the theory of human rights and substantive equality to understand the State’s institutional arrangements aimed at promoting equality for minority languages. The main findings of this paper are as follows: (1) The National Language Policy not only protects the rights of the linguistic minority but helps to enhance communication of ethnic minorities and construct ethnic minority identity, (2) that a Language Ombudsman be established in Taiwan to protect the language rights of minority languages according to Article 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights that fulfills the Paris Principles.

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