A trilingual YouTuber
As a student, Lua worked hard to improve his English proficiency. During his year in Australia, he gained the confidence to put his language skills into practice. Many netizens have asked him for English learning tips. “Taiwanese people are obsessed with learning English. I have capitalized on this phenomenon, using English as a way to catch people’s attention and get them to listen to what I really want to say.”
Having something to say about the threatened demise of the Taiwanese language, but unwilling to say it in Mandarin, Lua makes full use of his other languages: each additional language, he hopes, will help him reach a new audience. His trilingual fluency in Taiwanese, English, and Hakka has thus become his trademark. Lua’s YouTube channel—“Tsiok Ing Tâi”—has attracted more than 48,000 followers. Tsiok Ing Tâi features “Eng-Tâi Express,” a series of videos created by Lua and his collaborator A’iong, a New Yorker living in Taiwan. They select two news articles every week, one in English and the other in Taiwanese, and translate each into the other language. The topics they have discussed so far include weather, semiconductors, kangaroos, and the classroom discipline monitor, a student role peculiar to Taiwan’s education system. They hope to show their audience that the Taiwanese language lends itself to every imaginable topic in daily life.
Realizing how important it is to safeguard their native languages, many countries have been making efforts to preserve their vanishing vernaculars. Lua mentions Welsh in the United Kingdom, Ainu in Japan’s Hokkaido, and Maori in New Zealand, all of which are threatened by the incursions of dominant cultures and languages. However, public awareness has led those governments to promote and reward the study and preservation of vernaculars. The most crucial task for them is to help people take pride in speaking their native languages.” For the Taiwanese people, this is something worth pondering and emulating.
Why has Lua decided to avoid speaking Mandarin from now on? In response to this question, he refers to Hong Kong’s Anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill Movement. “You may ask Hongkongers why they have stood up for their rights, and whether they really think they will succeed.” Lua continues: “I also know that the survival of the Taiwanese language is not very likely, but this isn’t a matter of success or failure. For me, it’s a matter of having no choice but to do it.”
Do you remember those words and phrases your mother taught you when you were a babbling toddler? Next time you go back home, learn some more from her, and say more! Let us work together to preserve our vernaculars and to give Taiwan’s cultural diversity a chance to survive.
Bang! The rice pops in the heat when Lua releases the pressure from his vessel.
Mixing the puffed rice with maltose syrup.
Lua Ing-hua has teamed up with A’iong, a New Yorker based in Taiwan, to produce “Eng-Tâi Express,” a series of videos in which they discuss news in Taiwanese and English. They demonstrate that the vernacular can still be used in everyday life.
Lua is often invited to give talks. Language embodies culture. Should our vernaculars become extinct, our culture will suffer irreparable loss.