Why I Support Taiwanese Politician Yeh Yi Jin's Proposal for Taiwan to Drop Zhuyin Entirely (in Favor of Pinyin)

Taiwan News

It may be news from 2018 (meaning, five years ago) but as a person who sees the importance of Mandarin in the international market, I still want to react. Not surprisingly, Yeh Yi Jin lost the Tainan mayoral bid because of her controversial statement to abolish Zhuyin from Taiwan altogether. She may have lost the race but I'm still supporting her for this. It's not because I kept failing hard in Zhuyin back in my days. It's because I feel that as time goes on, some things need to be dropped like asking students to submit their reports written via typewriter or asking documents to be faxed when email (and modern standard mail) are more reliable. Like I argued with an investment before, I said, "You can't fax a book. Can I just mail it?" The bank kept arguing it had to be faxed. Unfortunately stubborn boomers, stubborn boomers, everywhere, right?

From The Free China Post, this is what's said about Yeh's argument:

Yeh argues that using zhuyin serves almost no purpose other than to learn zhuyin itself.  She purports that if students were to learn pinyin however, they would not only gain the benefit of learning how to pronounce Mandarin, but also how to use the Latin alphabet for later study of secondary languages.  Yeh thinks that if she could first introduce this system in Tainan, that other cities and counties would soon follow suit.

The politician also argues that with the world’s ever-increasing use of technology, using pinyin is easier.  This being due to the fact that most keyboards use the Latin system. She thinks that this will create faster and easier input.

She also argues that this will attract more foreigners to study Mandarin in Taiwan.  This is my main point of contention with Yeh.

I believe she's right. A historical fact was that Zhou Yougang (who died at 111 years old in 2017), the father of Hanyu Pinyin, was actually a critic of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). I really find it stupid how the drift between Zhuyin and Pinyin has been more political as if Zhou himself was a member of the CCP when he wasn't. The guy was a political prisoner. I even wonder did Mao Zedong himself lie to Joseph Stalin that the CCP invented Pinyin, therefore causing Taiwan to reject it? Bizarre speculation but it could be true. 

It's true some people did master the Zhuyin table. However, not everyone has the ability to be that good with multiple languages. Some languages in the world write in an entirely different alphabet such as Arabic and Indian languages. From the same article on The Free China Post--this can also be read which makes me think most of the instructors must be stubborn boomers:

A fair amount of Mandarin instructors argue that zhuyin is a more accurate way to learn pronunciation, and it is certainly the most classical way to learn. Pinyin came into fashion in the 1950s with simplified characters from the mainland  While I am no expert, the pronunciation of the letters used in Chinese pinyin, differ a lot from how we pronounce the sounds in English.  This should be expected as both languages have sounds that are unique to their respective languages.

I am certainly not enough of an expert to weigh in totally on this issue.  Though some Taiwanese netizens did.  They said they were happy that the mayoral hopeful had no real sway over the educational standards on the island.  They also questioned why they don’t just give up on Mandarin all together and learn English as their first language, almost certainly a tongue in cheek remark. 

Whether we want to admit it or not, language must evolve. Chinese education back in my day got rid of the subject we called Tzong Hap in Amoy. We were to focus on 華語 (Huáyǔ) though we were still stuck with Zhuyin. Yes, I remembered passing without really learning anything! I do have my regrets but I'm still going to criticize the Chinese education system, in hopes of making Chinese more accessible as a second language. Language evolves over time and the need to transliterate is there. True, we do still have countries that write in a very different alphabet like the Arabs and the Indians. However, Chinese uses calligraphy and the use of Zhuyin can complicate things in the long run. It's one thing that I have to learn to write Arabic and Hindi with the Arabic alphabet and the Hindi alphabet. It's another thing if I have to learn another alphabet just to learn how to read Chinese characters. 

Yeh's remarks are pretty much to get Taiwan ready for the Asian Century. With over one billion speakers of Mandarin worldwide, Taiwan can't miss this grand opportunity by being too traditional. If pinyin were focused on instead of Zhuyin, Taiwanese could also have an easier time getting into English, which is the universal language. How can Mandarin speakers teach Mandarin as a second language if they don't know anything else but Mandarin? English is still widely spoken. Can you even use Zhuyin to register your business in a non-Chinese country (read here)? That's what I believe she's trying to drive at!