30-Second Overview: Chiung Wi-vun, the most radical advocate of the Taiwanese language movement, sparked island-wide controversy in 2011 when he held up a protest banner at the Taiwan Literature Museum declaring "Taiwanese writers who don't use Taiwanese language but create in Chinese are shameful!" This Tamkang mechanical engineering graduate later became one of Taiwan's few Vietnamese language experts and now serves as chair of NCKU's Department of Taiwanese Literature. He has spent 30 years proving that language is not just a tool, but the core battlefield of national identity.
A mechanical engineering student at Tamkang University established a "Taiwanese Language Society" in the early 1990s, launching a movement that would potentially reshape Taiwan's linguistic landscape. Chiung Wi-vun's English name "Taiffalo" is short for "Taiwan Buffalo"—a choice that hints at how he sees himself: a Taiwan water buffalo laboring tirelessly in the fields of language and culture, undaunted by hardship.
From Machinery to Language: An Unexpected Turn
Born in Gangshan, Kaohsiung in 1971, Chiung Wi-vun initially followed a typical engineering path. But during his studies at Tamkang University's Department of Mechanical Engineering, he made a life-changing decision: founding the Taiwanese Language Society and obtaining a Pe̍h-ōe-jī (Romanized Taiwanese) textbook from the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan.
This was Taiwan in the early 1990s, when indigenous consciousness was just beginning to emerge, and written Taiwanese remained an extremely marginal cultural movement. Chiung began studying the seemingly simple yet complex question of "how to write Taiwanese." In 1996, he made his literary debut with the Taiwanese-language collection Hai-ông (Sea Whale), when he was just 25 years old.
📝 Curator's Note
Chiung's shift from mechanical engineering to linguistics wasn't accidental. The 1990s marked Taiwan's post-martial law indigenous cultural revival, when many young people began reconsidering the question "Who am I?" Chiung's choice to approach this through language and writing suggests he understood that controlling language means controlling discourse power.
2011: The Banner That Changed Taiwan's Literary World
May 24, 2011, at the Taiwan Literature Museum. Writer Huang Chun-ming was delivering a lecture on "Deliberations on Taiwanese Language Writing and Education" when Chiung Wi-vun in the audience suddenly raised a large banner: "Taiwanese writers who don't use Taiwanese language but create in Chinese are shameful!" (台湾作家不用台湾语文，却用中国语創作，可恥！) Below it, in Taiwanese Pe̍h-ōe-jī: "Tâi-oân chok-ka ài iōng Tâi-oân-gí chhòng-chok" (Taiwanese writers should create in Taiwanese language).
Huang Chun-ming flew into a rage, removing his shirt and charging down from the podium to verbally assault Chiung, even using profanity to call him a "howling beast." This confrontation became known as the "524 Taiwan Literature Incident," one of the most controversial public debates in Taiwan's literary history.
The legal aftermath was equally dramatic: Chiung sued Huang for public insult, and in 2012 Tainan District Court found Huang guilty, imposing a fine of NT$10,000 with a two-year suspended sentence. Though Tainan High Court later changed the verdict to exemption from punishment, one phrase in the judgment was telling: "Huang is an important literary author who was provoked, and the insult was minor."
⚠️ Controversial Perspectives
Chiung's protest method triggered polarized reactions. Supporters saw him as courageously challenging the hegemonic position of Chinese-language literature; critics considered his approach too radical, undermining civilized academic discourse. The Taiwan Literature Pen Association even published a book The Truth About Chiung Wi-vun's Protest Against Huang Chun-ming in his defense.
Theoretical Architect of the De-Sinicization Movement
Chiung's radical stance wasn't an emotional reaction but built on solid academic foundations. He went abroad to study in 1996, earning a Ph.D. in Linguistics from the University of Texas at Arlington in 2003, focusing on "theoretical discourse of de-Sinicization movements within the Chinese character cultural sphere."
His core argument: Within the Chinese character cultural sphere, using Chinese characters to write indigenous languages is essentially still cultural colonialism. True linguistic independence must be based on a Romanization writing system. This theoretical framework made him the most radical wing of the Taiwanese language movement—not just speaking Taiwanese, but writing it in Roman letters.
Currently serving as president of the Taiwan Romanization Association, he advocates for the Pe̍h-ōe-jī writing system. In his view, Pe̍h-ōe-jī isn't just a phonetic tool, but the legitimate writing form for Taiwanese literature.
Unexpected Expertise in Taiwan-Vietnam Studies
Even more surprising is Chiung's later emergence as one of Taiwan's few scholars fluent in Vietnamese. Beginning Taiwan-Vietnam comparative studies in 1997, he discovered that Vietnam's language policy experience offers important insights for Taiwan: Vietnam began using Romanization during the French colonial period, successfully breaking free from the Chinese character system.
In 2011, Chiung received the "Outstanding Medal for Vietnam Studies" from the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences—an extremely rare honor for Taiwanese scholars. He now serves as director of NCKU's Vietnam Research Center and is the chief developer of the "International Vietnamese Proficiency Test" (iVPT).
💡 Did You Know?
Chiung's Vietnam studies isn't purely academic interest, but serves to construct theoretical foundations for comparative linguistics. In his theory, Vietnam successfully escaped Chinese characters, Korea partially escaped, Japan uses them mixed, while Taiwan remains deeply trapped—this represents a progressive "de-Sinicization spectrum."
Academic Achievements and Social Impact
Chiung's academic output is remarkable, from 1996's Hai-ông to 2024's Tang Mountain Crossing Vietnam: Identity Transformation and Localization Studies of Vietnamese Minh Hương People, he has published over 30 monographs covering Taiwanese literature, Vietnam studies, and language certification.
He's also chief developer of the "National Taiwanese Language Proficiency Test," a system attempting to establish standardized assessment mechanisms for Taiwanese language ability. Under his leadership, NCKU's Taiwan Language Testing Center has become one of Taiwan's most important Taiwanese language research institutions.
Currently serving as chair of NCKU's Department of Taiwanese Literature, he continues training new generations of Taiwanese literature researchers. In the classroom, he insists on teaching in Taiwanese, practicing his belief in "speak Taiwanese, write Taiwanese."
Controversy and Reflection
Chiung's radical stance remains controversial. Even within the Taiwanese language movement, many consider his "full Romanization" position too extreme. Some faculty and students in NCKU's Department of Taiwanese Literature disagree with his approach, believing his methods might hinder mainstreaming of the Taiwanese language movement.
From another perspective, precisely because "extremists" like Chiung exist, the movement's moderates have bargaining space. His presence makes the "Chinese-Roman mixed script" compromise appear rational and feasible.
✦ "Language is identity, identity is politics. Those unwilling to face the political nature of language issues are making the biggest political statement of all." —Chiung Wi-vun
Reflections After 30 Years
From establishing the Taiwanese Language Society in the early 1990s to now, Chiung has dedicated 30 years to the Taiwanese language movement. In these three decades, Taiwanese's social status has indeed improved—the National Languages Development Act was passed, indigenous languages were incorporated into national education curricula—but this remains far from his ideal of "linguistic equality."
Recent surveys show Taiwanese-speaking populations continue declining, with younger generations generally lacking Taiwanese language ability. Facing this reality, does Chiung's persistence still matter? Or perhaps, precisely because trends are so dire, someone must play the role of "language guardian"?
Chiung has answered this question with his academic career: even when labeled a "radical," even when bearing various controversies and criticisms, he still believes linguistic rights are basic human rights, still believes Taiwanese literature has irreplaceable value.
This scholar who calls himself "Taiwan Buffalo" has labored quietly in language's fields for 30 years, perhaps embodying exactly the kind of persistence Taiwan needs—asking not about harvest, only about cultivation.