Daī-ghî tōng-iōng pīng-im

Transliteration of Chinese
Mandarin
Modern Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Gwoyeu Romatzyh Spelling conventions Latinxua Sin Wenz Mandarin Phonetic Symbols II Tongyong Pinyin Wade–Giles Yale romanization Lessing-Othmer Simplified Wade Comparison chart
Late imperial Mandarin Morrison romanization Legge romanization Postal romanization EFEO
Sichuanese Sichuanese Pinyin Scuanxua Ladinxua Xin Wenz
Wu
General Wu Romanization of Wu Chinese
Wenzhounese Wenzhounese romanization
Yue
Cantonese Jyutping Yale romanization Guangdong Romanization Hong Kong Government Macau Government Meyer–Wempe Sidney Lau S. L. Wong (phonetic symbols) S. L. Wong (romanization) ILE romanization Standard Romanization Barnett–Chao Comparison chart
Min
Hokkien Pe̍h-ōe-jī Modern Literal Taiwanese Phofsit Daibuun Habhunwe Latinxua Sin Bhundzi Bbánlám pìngyīm Daighi tongiong pingim TLPA Tâi-lô Comparison chart
Teochew Peng'im Pe̍h-ūe-jī
Fuzhounese Foochow Romanized Fuzhou Transliteration Scheme
Northern Min Kienning Colloquial Romanized
Pu-Xian Min Hinghwa Romanized
Hainanese Hainan Romanized (Haikou dialect) Hainanese Transliteration Scheme (Wenchang dialect)
Shao–Jiang Min Romanized Shaowu (Shaowu dialect)
Gan
Chang-Du Pinfa
Hakka
Meixian Pinfa Hagfa Pinyim
Sixian Pha̍k-fa-sṳ TLPA
Xiang
Chang–Yi Pinfa
Polylectal
General Chinese Romanized General Chinese
See also
Other transliterations Character-based General Chinese Cyrillization Xiao'erjing ʼPhags-pa script Bopomofo Taiwanese kana Taiwanese Phonetic Symbols Transcription into Chinese
By place Romanization in Hong Kong Romanization in Singapore Romanization in Taiwan
v t e

Daī-ghî tōng-iōng pīng-im (abbr: DT; Chinese: 臺語通用拼音; lit. 'Taiwanese phonetic transcription system') is an orthography in the Latin alphabet for Taiwanese Hokkien based upon Tongyong Pinyin. It is able to use the Latin alphabet to indicate the proper variation of pitch with nine diacritic symbols.^[1]

Consonants^[2]

			Dental	Alveolo-palatal	Bilabial	Alveolar	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	voiceless	unaspiration			b	d	g	-h/ ' ([ʔ])
		aspiration			p	t	k
	voiced	unaspiration			bh		gh
Affricate	voiceless	unaspiration	z	zi
		aspiration	c	ci
	voiced	unaspiration		r
Fricative	voiceless	unaspiration	s	si
		aspiration						h
Nasal	voiced	unaspiration			m	n	ng
Lateral	voiced	unaspiration				l

Vowels^[3]

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Close-mid	e		or(2)
Mid		or(1)
Open-mid			o
Open	a

DT in its present form has 17 initials, 18 finals and 8 tones.

Taiwanese is a tonal language, so the pitch (tone) of a spoken word affects its meaning, same as the written words. However, in non-tonal languages, a word's pitch constantly conveys emotion but often does not influence its meaning.^[4] In Taiwanese, which has nine tones and two extra tones, neutral tone and nasal vowel.

DT tone number

1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th	9th	Neutral	Nasal
a	à	a̱	ā(p/t/k/h)	ă	à	ā	a(p/t/k/h)	á	å	aⁿ/ann

Tones are expressed by diacritics; checked syllables (i.e. those ending with glottal stops) are followed by the letter h. Where diacritics are not technically available, e.g. on some parts of the internet, tone alphabet may be used instead.

1. a (1st tone; yinping)
2. à (2nd tone; yingshang)
3. a̠ (3rd tone; yinqu)
4. ā (ptkh) (4th tone; yinru)
5. ă (5th tone; yangping)
6. ä (6th tone; yangshang)
7. ā (7th tone; yangqu)
8. a (ptkh) (8th tone; yangru)
9. á (9th tone; high rising)
10. å (neutral tone)
11. aⁿ (ann) (nasal vowel)

Examples for these tones: ciūⁿ (elephant), bâ (leopard), bhè (horse), di (pig), zŭa (snake), āh (duck), lok (deer). And, a neutral tone, sometimes indicated by å(aj) in DT, has no specific contour; its pitch always depends on the tones of the preceding syllables. Taiwanese speakers refer to this tone as the "neutral tone" (Chinese: 輕聲).

Tone sandhi or chain shift by circulation, as the tones are encoded by appending and modifying spellings with attention to the rules of the DT system. The basic tone has no modification and tone mark. Generally speaking, the basic tone means the 7th tone (mid even tone; yangqu).^[5][6]

A DT word, like an English word, can be formed by only one syllable or several syllables, with the two syllables being the general typicality. Each syllable in DT follows one of the six underlying patterns:^[6]

The DT alphabet adopts the Latin alphabet of 19 letters, 4 digraphs, and 6 diacritics to express the basic sounds of Taiwanese:

dt capital letter	A	B	Bh	C	D	E	G	Gh	H	I	K	L	M	N	Ng	O	Or	P	R	S	T	U	Z
dt lower case	a	b	bh	c	d	e	g	gh	h	i	k	l	m	n	ng	o	or	p	r	s	t	u	z

bh, z, c, gh, h, r, g, k, l, m, n, ng, b, p, s, d, t

Note that unlike their typical interpretation in modern English language, bh and gh are voiced and unaspirated, whereas b, g, and d are plain unvoiced as in Hanyu Pinyin. p, k, and t are unvoiced and aspirated, corresponding closer to p, t, and k in English. It is inconsistent with the use of h's in the Legge romanization and the use of the diacritic in the International Phonetic Alphabet to signal consonantal aspiration.

• Vowels: a, i, u, e, or, o
• Diphthongs: ai, au, ia, iu, io, ui, ua, ue
• Triphthongs: iau, uai
• Nasals: m, n, ng

The nasals m, n, and ng can be appended to any of the vowels and some of the diphthongs. In addition, m and ng can function as independent syllables by themselves.

The stops h, g, b and d can appear as the last letter in a syllable, in which case they are pronounced with no audible release. (The final h in DT stands for a glottal stop.)

All syllables in each word are normally separated by the dash (-) mark. Generally, syllables before the dash which must undergo tone sandhi.

DT	English
Lēn-hâ-gōk sê-gāi rīn-kūan sūan-ghĕn Dê 1 diău Lāng-lăng seⁿ-låi zû-iŭ, zāi zūn-ghiăm gāh kuăn-lī siòng it-lip bīng-dìng. In hù-iù li-sîng gāh liōng-sim, lî-ciaⁿ ìng-gai i hiānn-dī gūan-hē ē zīng-sĭn hō-siōng dùi-dāi.	Universal Declaration of Human Rights Article 1 All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

DT	English	Audio file: Voyager Golden Record
Tài-kong bīng-iù, lin hòr! Lin ziâ-bà bhē! Û-ĭng, dôr-lăi ghun-zia zē òr.	Friends of space, how are you all! Have you eaten yet? Drop in on us if you have time.	Taiwanese(Amoy; Min nan; Formosan) sound record of voyager 1