Tsou - Chinese bilingual New Testament / Buacou seiso no faeva esvutu / patotiska buacou / seiso no puutu maitan'e / Hardcover / Bible Society in Taiwan 2014 - TCV263DI / 鄒語新約聖經: 鄒語/現代中文譯本對照版 

COUNT / TCV263DI

Hardcover 2014

ISBN-10: 9866674436

ISBN: 9789866674433 / 978-9866674433 

PAGES: 1114

PUBLISHER: Bible Society in Taiwan

LANGUAGE: Tsou (Cou) - Chinese (mandarin) parallel

Bible Dimensions:  16x22.5cm

Weight: 775g

English Description:

Tsou is a divergent Austronesian language spoken by the Tsou people of Taiwan. Tsou is a threatened language; however, this status is uncertain. The speakers are located in the west-central mountains southeast of the Chiayi/Alishan area in Taiwan. The language is written in the Latin script. 

Tsou has traditionally been considered part of a Tsouic branch of Austronesian. However, several recent classifications, such as Chang (2006) and Ross (2009) dispute the Tsouic branch, with Tsou more divergent than the other two languages, Kanakanabu and Saaroa.

These people live in the mountainous areas because dominating colonizers were in Taiwan for over 380 years. Outsiders have killed the indigenous people, burned villages, and forced them to move as the colonizers claimed more and more spaces. Some such colonizers were the Dutch, Spanish, Japanese, and Chinese. The outside rulers imposed their own education systems on the indigenous people, but the most notable influence came from the Kuomintang era, where Taiwanese people were forced to use Mandarin and where children were punished at school if they used their own indigenous language. This forced the original Taiwanese people to give up their language in order to survive in the new, imposed environment.

One survey from 1999 found that only 9% of the indigenous children could speak their native language, and most children preferred to use Mandarin, which is the official Taiwan language. Tsou is mostly used by community elders in ceremonies and certain gatherings. Unfortunately, since the parents are not fluent and do not view the language as practical for children, the language is rarely spoken at home. The language is found more in school settings where children attend cultural learning programs.

The Tsou language is recognized by the government. The government has allocated money dedicated to bring language programs to elementary and junior high schools, but the funds are sometimes inconsistent, which negatively affects the programs. It helped that the Martial law was lifted in 1987 and that people could freely speak their native languages again, however, so many other dominant languages were used that several native indigenous languages disappeared.

鄒語(COU)／現代中文譯本對照／新約聖經

Chinese Description:

鄒語（鄒文：Cou），前稱「曹語」，為臺灣鄒族人所使用的語言，屬於南島語系的鄒語群，以拉丁文字書寫。

1997年因鄒族教會本身宣教需要，鄒語聖經的翻譯從教會內部萌芽，1997年台灣基督長老教會鄒族區會成立了「鄒族聖經翻譯委員會」並派員參加聖經翻譯相關之各項研習。1999年以翻譯新約聖經為目標正式執行工作。

2000年鄒語文字符號系統經政府承認頒布，這對鄒語聖經翻譯書寫有極大的幫助。2003年鄒族區會推派人選專責翻譯，鄒族的三個教派（長老教會、天主教、真耶穌教會）各派代表協助翻譯工作，同時籌組9人小組進行譯文審查；天主教代表：鄭政宗傳教師、浦寶蘭女士。長老教會：汪正義、石明雄、安淑美、溫初光4位牧師和汪朝麗女士。真耶穌教會：石國享傳道、汪健昌長老等人。《鄒語聖經》成為名副其實的「鄒族人的聖經」。此外，聖經公會亦先後派彭國瑋博士、梁望惠博士擔任鄒語聖經翻譯顧問前去協助翻譯事工；長老教會總會關心《鄒語聖經》的發展和進度，亦提供隨時的援助。由於各教派都參與此項翻譯事工，鄒語聖經變成了名副其實的「鄒族人的聖經」。

2007年7月鄒語新約全書翻譯初稿完成。經審查小組的審查結論，認為應用詞彙過於艱深，建議循著«現代中文譯本修訂版»的文體盡量以口語化、簡潔易懂重新修正。至2010年9月才完成修正工作。同年11月開始，跨教派的閱讀小組成立並逐字閱讀。鄒語新約聖經翻譯工作終於在2013年8月8日正式宣布完成。

2014年4月20日由台灣聖經公會出版發行《鄒語新約聖經》，同日台灣基督長老教會鄒族族群區會並舉行聯合慶祝復活節暨鄒語聖經出版感恩禮拜。《鄒語新約聖經》的出版不只是鄒族各基督教派各教會宣揚福音必讀的經書，另外最大的功能是提供鄒語教學、教材資料、母語傳承的重大任務。