Languages and Dialects in Taiwan -- General Information

As introduced by the Yearbook of the Republic of China:

The languages and dialects spoken in Taiwan have their origins in the Austronesian and Han lingual systems. The Austronesian languages are spoken by the indigenous peoples, but are slowly disappearing with cultural assimilation among the inhabitants of Taiwan. Common Han languages include Minnanese, widely known as Taiwanese, and Hakka, which are spoken mainly by those whose ancestors immigrated from China's Fujian and Guangdong Provinces in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. In 1949, after the KMT government set up its capital in Taiwan, Mandarin became the common language for communication and was promoted through the educational system. However, following the lifting of martial law in 1987, social pluralization has been accompanied by a growing emphasis on native languages. A movement was initiated to teach students their mother tongue and to preserve the languages and dialects of smaller ethnic groups. This ongoing movement is expected to have an extensive influence on the languages spoken in Taiwan.

The following figure shows the distribution of Taiwan's regional dialects: