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The contemporary classification of the Polynesian languages began with certain observations by Andrew Pawley in 1966 based on shared innovations in phonology, vocabulary and grammar showing that the East Polynesian languages were more closely related to Samoan than they were to Tongan, calling Tongan and its nearby relative Niuean "Tongic" and ...
Pe̍h-ōe-jī (白話字) is a Latin alphabet developed by Western missionaries working in Southeast Asia in the 19th century to write Hokkien. Pe̍h-ōe-jī allows Hokkien to be written phonetically in Latin script, meaning that phrases specific to Hokkien can be written without having to deal with the issue of non-existent Chinese characters.
The first grammar and dictionary of the Samoan language, A Grammar and Dictionary of the Samoan Language, with English and Samoan Vocabulary, was written by Reverend George Pratt in 1862. [17] Pratt's valuable Samoan dictionary records many old words of special interest, specialist terminology, archaic words and names in Samoan tradition.
Loanwords have entered written and spoken Chinese from many sources, including ancient peoples whose descendants now speak Chinese. In addition to phonetic differences, varieties of Chinese such as Cantonese and Shanghainese often have distinct words and phrases left from their original languages which they continue to use in daily life and sometimes even in Mandarin.
Most Austronesian languages use Latin script today. Some non-Latin-based writing systems are listed below. Jawi alphabet (for Malay and a number of other languages) [4] Cham script (for Cham language) [5] Eskayan script (for Eskayan language) [6] Kawi script (used across Maritime Southeast Asia) [7] Balinese script [8] Batak script [9] Baybayin ...
Chinese words borrowed into Japanese could be written with the Chinese character, while Japanese words could be written using the character for a Chinese word of similar meaning. Because there have been multiple layers of borrowing into Japanese, a single kanji may have several readings in Japanese.
Written Chinese is a writing system that uses Chinese characters and other symbols to represent the Chinese languages. Chinese characters do not directly represent pronunciation, unlike letters in an alphabet or syllabograms in a syllabary .
Currently, all 16 Formosan languages are written with similar systems. The Pe̍h-ōe-jī of Taiwanese Hokkien [3] and Pha̍k-fa-sṳ of Taiwanese Hakka were also created with by the western missionaries. In 2005, standardized writing systems for the languages of Taiwan's 16 recognized indigenous peoples were established by the government. [1]