Bungieen kab peqoe
Buun-peh-i-thak 🔊 (文白異讀; Literary and colloquial readings of Chinese characters)
Literary vs colloquial
Literary readings (bunthak) of Harnji are usually used in formal loan words or names, when reading aloud and in formal settings, while colloquial readings (peqthak) are usually used in vernacular speech. For example, 白 can be read either "pek 🔊" (literary) or "peh 🔊" (colloquial). The existence of literary and colloquial readings is a prominent feature of some Hokkien dialects and indeed in many Sinitic varieties in the south.
Unlike other spoken Chinese varieties, characters used to write Zoanciw Hokkien have three different kinds of readings: literary (文 buun), colloquial (白 pek), and vulgar (俗 siok 🔊). For example, the readings for 肉 (meat) are: literary liak 🔊, colloquial hiak 🔊 and vulgar baq; baq 🔊 is the most commonly used reading.
Examples
The following examples<ref>Victor H. Mair, How to Forget Your Mother Tongue and Remember Your National Language, University of Pennsylvania</ref> show differences in literary and colloquial readings in Taiwanese Hokkien.
Harnji Readings
Template:HokkienLiteraryColloquial
Sorji (數字; Numbers)
This feature extends to Chinese numerals, which have both literary and colloquial readings. Literary readings are typically used when the numerals are read out loud (e.g. phone numbers), while colloquial readings are used for counting items.
| 1 | 2 | 3 / 三 | 4 / 四 | 5 / 五 | 6 / 六 | 7 / 七 | 8 / 八 | 9 / 九 | 10 / 十 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Peh | cit (蜀) | nng (兩) | svaf | six | go | lak | chid | pøeq | kao | zap |
| Buun | id (一) | ji (二) | safm | sux | gvor | liok | pad | kiuo | sip |
More details
In Hokkien, reading pronunciations (thag'ym 🔊 讀音) differ from spoken pronunciations/explications (gwym 🔊 語音/kayseq 🔊 解說). Hokkien dictionaries in Taiwan often differentiate between such character readings with the prefixes 文 (buun 🔊) for literary readings, and 白 (pek/peh) for colloquial readings.
The bulk of literary readings (bunthak 🔊 文讀) are based on pronunciations of the vernacular during the Tang (Toong) dynasty and mainly used in formal phrases and written language (e.g. philosophical concepts, surnames, and some place names). For example, see Most Common Surnames in Taiwan and Laixgoaxkhøf Kharnhoxhak. Literary readings tend to be more similar to the pronunciations of the Tang standard of Middle Chinese than their colloquial equivalents. The colloquial (or vernacular) readings (peqthak 🔊 白讀) are basically used in spoken language and vulgar (ordinary/common) phrases.
The divergence between literary and colloquial is due to several strata in the Min lexicon. The earliest, colloquial stratum is traced to the Han Dynasty (206 BCE - 220 CE, Haxn); the second colloquial one comes from the period of the Southern and Northern Dynasties (420 - 589 CE); the third stratum of pronunciations (typically literary ones) comes from the Tang Dynasty (618 – 907 AD, Toong). (Note: this could be why literary readings sound closer to Mandarin than colloquial.)