Pe̍h-ōe-jī Church Romanization
A sample of pe̍h-ōe-jī text
Type	Latin alphabet (modified)
Languages	Southern Min Amoy Taiwanese
Creator	Walter Henry Medhurst Elihu Doty John Van Nest Talmage
Time period	1830s–present
Child systems	TLPA Tâi-lô
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols.

Pe̍h-ōe-jī (pronounced [peʔ˩ ue˩ dzi˨] ( listen), abbreviated POJ, literally vernacular writing, also known as Church Romanization) is an orthography used to write variants of Southern Min, a Chinese language or dialect, particularly Taiwanese and Amoy Hokkien. Developed by Western missionaries working among the Chinese diaspora in Southeast Asia in the 19th century and refined by missionaries working in Xiamen and Tainan, it uses a modified Latin alphabet and some diacritics to represent the spoken language. After initial success in Fujian, POJ became most widespread in Taiwan, and in the mid-20th century there were over 100,000 people literate in POJ. A large amount of printed material, religious and secular, has been produced in the script, including Taiwan's first newspaper, the Taiwan Church News.

The orthography was suppressed during the Japanese era in Taiwan (1895–1945), and faced further countermeasures during the Kuomintang martial law period (1947–1987). In Fujian, use declined after the establishment of the People's Republic of China (1949) and in the early 21st century the system was not in general use there. Use of pe̍h-ōe-jī is now restricted to some Taiwanese Christians, non-native learners of the language, and native-speaker enthusiasts in Taiwan. Full native computer support was developed in 2004, and users can now call on fonts, input methods, and extensive online dictionaries. Rival writing systems have been developed over time, and there is ongoing debate within the Taiwanese mother tongue movement as to which system should be used. Versions of pe̍h-ōe-jī have been devised for other languages, including Hakka and Teochew.

Name[link]

The name pe̍h-ōe-jī (simplified Chinese: 白话字; traditional Chinese: 白話字) means "vernacular writing", that is, written characters representing everyday spoken language.^[1] Though the name vernacular writing could be applied to many kinds of writing, romanized and character-based, the term pe̍h-ōe-jī is commonly restricted to the Southern Min romanization system developed by Presbyterian missionaries in the 19th century.^[2]

The missionaries who invented and refined the system didn't use the name pe̍h-ōe-jī, however, instead using various terms such as "Romanized Amoy Vernacular" and "Romanized Amoy Colloquial".^[1] The origins of the system and its extensive use in the Christian community has led to it being known by some modern-day writers as "Church Romanization" (simplified Chinese: 教会罗马字; traditional Chinese: 教會羅馬字; pinyin: Jiàohuì Luōmǎzì; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Kàu-hōe Lô-má-jī); often abbreviated in POJ itself to "Kàu-lô" (simplified Chinese: 教罗; traditional Chinese: 教羅; pinyin: Jiàoluō).^[3] There is some debate as to whether "pe̍h-ōe-jī" or "Church Romanization" is the more appropriate name.

Objections raised to "pe̍h-ōe-jī" include that the surface meaning of the word itself is more generic than one specific system, and that both literary and colloquial register Southern Min appear in the system (meaning that describing it as "vernacular" writing might be inaccurate).^[1] Opposition to the name "Church Romanization" is based on the identification with the church, as the writing is used by a wider community than just Christians, and for secular as well as sacred writing.^[4] One commentator observes that POJ "today is largely disassociated from its former religious purposes".^[5] The term "romanization" is also disliked by some, who see it as belittling the status of pe̍h-ōe-jī by identifying it as a supplementary phonetic system, rather than a fully-fledged orthography.^[4] Sources disagree on which represents the more commonly used name of the two.^[3][4]

History[link]

Pe̍h-ōe-jī inscription at a church in Tâi-lâm commemorating Thomas Barclay

The history of Peh-oe-ji has been heavily influenced by official attitudes towards the Southern Min vernaculars and the Christian organizations that propagated it. Early documents point to the purpose of the creation of POJ as being pedagogical in nature, closely allied to educating Christian converts.^[6]

Early development[link]

The first people to use a romanized script to write Southern Min were Spanish missionaries in Manila in the 16th century.^[2] However, it was used mainly as a teaching aid for Spanish learners of the language, and seems not to have had any influence on the development of pe̍h-ōe-jī.^[7] In the early 19th century, China was closed to Christian missionaries, who instead proselytized to overseas Chinese communities in South East Asia.^[8] The earliest origins of the system are found in a small vocabulary first printed in 1820 by Walter Henry Medhurst,^[9][10] who went on to publish the Dictionary of the Hok-këèn Dialect of the Chinese Language, According to the Reading and Colloquial Idioms in 1832.^[9]

This dictionary represents the first major reference work in POJ, although the romanization within was quite different from the modern system, and has been dubbed Early Church Romanization by one scholar of the subject.^[3] Medhurst, who was stationed in Malacca, was influenced by Robert Morrison's romanization of Mandarin Chinese, but had to innovate in several areas to reflect major differences between Mandarin and Southern Min.^[11] Several important developments occurred in Medhurst's work, especially the application of consistent tone markings (influenced by contemporary linguistic studies of Sanskrit, which was becoming of more mainstream interest to Western scholars).^[12] Medhurst was convinced that accurate representation and reproduction of the tonal structure of Southern Min was vital to comprehension:

Respecting these tones of the Chinese language, some difference of opinion has been obtained, and while some have considered them of first importance, others have paid them little or no intention. The author inclines decidedly to the former opinion; having found, from uniform experience, that without strict attention to tones, it is impossible for a person to make himself understood in Hok-këèn.

—W.H. Medhurst^[13]

Frontispiece of Doty's Anglo Chinese Manual of the Amoy Dialect (1853)

The system expounded by Medhurst influenced later dictionary compilers with regard to tonal notation and initials, but both his complicated vowel system and his emphasis on the literary register of Southern Min were dropped by later writers.^[14][15] Following on from Medhurst's work, Samuel Wells Williams became the chief proponent of major changes in the orthography devised by Morrison and adapted by Medhurst. Through personal communication and letters and articles printed in The Chinese Repository a consensus was arrived at for the new version of POJ, although Williams' suggestions were largely not followed.^[16]

The first major work to represent this new orthography was Elihu Doty's Anglo-Chinese Manual with Romanized Colloquial in the Amoy Dialect,^[16] published in 1853. The manual can therefore be regarded as the first presentation of a pre-modern POJ, a significant step onwards from Medhurst's orthography and different from today's system in only a few details.^[17] From this point on various authors adjusted some of the consonants and vowels, but the system of tone marks from Doty's Manual survives intact in modern POJ.^[18] John Van Nest Talmage has traditionally been regarded as the founder of POJ among the community which uses the orthography, although it now seems that he was an early promoter of the system, rather than its inventor.^[10][16]

In 1842 the Treaty of Nanking was concluded, which included among its provisions the creation of treaty ports in which Christian missionaries would be free to preach.^[6] Xiamen (then known as Amoy) was one of these treaty ports, and British, Canadian and American missionaries moved in to start preaching to the local inhabitants. These missionaries, housed in the cantonment of Gulangyu, created reference works and religious tracts, including a bible translation.^[6] Naturally, they based the pronunciation of their romanization on the speech of Xiamen, which became the de facto standard when they eventually moved into other areas of the Hokkien Sprachraum, most notably Taiwan.^[19] The 1858 Treaty of Tianjin officially opened Taiwan to western missionaries, and missionary societies were quick to send men to work in the field, usually after a sojourn in Xiamen to acquire the rudiments of the language.^[19]

Maturity[link]

Quanzhou and Zhangzhou are two major varieties of Southern Min, and in Xiamen they combined to form something "not Quan, not Zhang" – i.e. not one or the other, but rather a fusion, which became known as Amoy Dialect or Amoy Chinese.^[20] In Taiwan, with its mixture of migrants from both Quanzhou and Zhangzhou, the linguistic situation was similar; although the resulting blend in the southern city of Tainan differed from the Xiamen blend, it was close enough that the missionaries could ignore the differences and import their system wholesale.^[19]

The fact that religious tracts, dictionaries, and teaching guides already existed in the Xiamen tongue meant that the missionaries in Taiwan could begin proselytizing immediately, without the intervening time needed to write those materials.^[21] Missionary opinion was divided on whether POJ was desirable as an end in itself as a full-fledged orthography, or as a means to literacy in Chinese characters. William Campbell described POJ as a step on the road to reading and writing Hanzi, claiming that to promote it as an independent writing system would inflame nationalist passions in China, where Hanzi were considered a sacred part of Chinese culture.^[22] Taking the other side, Thomas Barclay believed that literacy in POJ should be a goal rather than a waypoint:

Soon after my arrival in Formosa I became firmly convinced of three things, and more than fifty years experience has strengthened my conviction. The first was that if you are to have a healthy, living Church it is necessary that all the members, men and women, read the Scriptures for themselves; second, that this end can never be attained by the use of the Chinese character; third, that it can be attained by the use of the alphabetic script, this Romanised Vernacular.

—Thomas Barclay^[23]

A great boon to the promotion of POJ in Taiwan came in 1880 when James Laidlaw Maxwell, a medical missionary based in Tainan, donated a small printing press to the local church,^[24] which Thomas Barclay learned how to operate in 1881 before founding the Presbyterian Church Press in 1884. Subsequently the Taiwan Prefectural City Church News, which first appeared in 1885 and was produced by Barclay's Presbyterian Church of Taiwan Press,^[24] became the first printed newspaper in Taiwan.^[25]

As other authors made their own alterations to the conventions laid down by Medhurst and Doty, pe̍h-ōe-jī evolved and eventually settled into its current form. Ernest Tipson's 1934 pocket dictionary was the first reference work to reflect this modern spelling.^[26] Between Medhurst's dictionary of 1832 and the standardization of POJ in Tipson's time, there were a number of works published, which can be used to chart the change over time of pe̍h-ōe-jī:^[27]

Taiwanese kana used as ruby characters

Competition for POJ was introduced during the colonial era in Taiwan (1895–1945) in the form of Taiwanese kana, a system designed as a teaching aid and pronunciation guide, rather than an independent orthography like POJ.^[37] From the 1930s onwards, with the increasing militarization of Japan and the Kōminka movement encouraging Taiwanese people to "Japanize", there were a raft of measures taken against native languages, including Taiwanese.^[38] While these moves resulted in a suppression of POJ, they were "a logical consequence of increasing the amount of education in Japanese, rather than an explicit attempt to ban a particular Taiwanese orthography in favor of Taiwanese kana".^[39]

The Second Sino-Japanese War beginning in 1937 brought stricter measures into force, and along with the outlawing of romanized Taiwanese, various publications were prohibited and Confucian-style shobō (Chinese: 書房; pinyin: shūfáng; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: su-pâng) – private schools which taught Classical Chinese with literary Southern Min pronunciation – were closed down in 1939.^[40] The Japanese authorities came to perceive POJ as an obstacle to Japanization and also suspected that POJ was being used to hide "concealed codes and secret revolutionary messages".^[41] In the climate of the ongoing war the government banned the Taiwan Church News in 1942 as it was written in POJ.^[42]

After World War II[link]

A decree (1955) banning Pe̍h-ōe-jī.

Initially the Kuomintang government in Taiwan had a liberal attitude towards "local dialects" (i.e. non-Mandarin varieties of Chinese). The Mandarin Promotion Council produced booklets outlining versions of Mandarin Phonetic Symbols ("Bopomofo") for writing the Taiwanese tongue, these being intended for newly arrived government officials from outside Taiwan as well as local Taiwanese.^[43] The first government action against native languages came in 1953, when the use of Taiwanese or Japanese for instruction was forbidden.^[44] The next move to suppress the movement came in 1955, when the use of POJ for proselytizing was outlawed.^[42] At that point in time there were 115,000 people literate in POJ in Taiwan, Fujian, and southeast Asia.^[45]

Two years later, missionaries were banned from using romanized bibles, and the use of "native languages" (i.e. Taiwanese, Hakka, and the Aboriginal languages) in church work became illegal.^[42] The ban on POJ bibles was overturned in 1959, but churches were "encouraged" to use character bibles instead.^[42] Government activities against POJ intensified in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when several publications were banned or seized in an effort to prevent the spread of the romanization. In 1964 use of Taiwanese in schools or official settings was forbidden,^[44] and transgression in schools punished with beatings, fines and humiliation.^[46] The Taiwan Church News (printed in POJ) was banned in 1969, and only allowed to return a year later when the publishers agreed to print it in Chinese characters.^[42][47]

In 1974 Bernard L.M. Embree's A Dictionary of Southern Min was banned by the Government Information Office, with a government official saying: "We have no objection to the dictionary being used by foreigners. They could use it in mimeographed form. But we don't want it published as a book and sold publicly because of the Romanization it contains. Chinese should not be learning Chinese through Romanization."^[48] Also in the 1970s, a POJ New Testament translation known as the "Red Cover Bible" was confiscated and banned by the Nationalist regime.^[49] Official moves against native languages continued into the 1980s, the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of the Interior decided in 1984 to forbid missionaries to use "local dialects" and romanizations in their work.^[42]

With the ending of martial law in 1987, the restrictions on "local languages" were quietly lifted,^[50] resulting in growing interest in Taiwanese writing during the 1990s.^[51] For the first time since the 1950s, Taiwanese language and literature was discussed and debated openly in newspapers and journals.^[52] There was also support from the then opposition party, the Democratic Progressive Party, for writing in the language.^[44] From a total of 26 documented orthographies for Taiwanese in 1987 (including defunct systems), there were a further 38 invented from 1987 to 1999, including 30 different romanizations, six adaptations of Zhuyin fuhao and two Hangul-like systems.^[53] Some commentators believe that the Kuomintang, while steering clear of outright banning of the native language movements after the end of martial law, took a "divide and conquer" approach by promoting Taiwanese Language Phonetic Alphabet (TLPA), an alternative to POJ,^[54] which was at the time the choice of the majority inside the nativization movement.^[55] Native language education has remained a fiercely debated topic in Taiwan into the 21st century, and is the subject of much political wrangling.^[56][57]

Current system[link]

The current system of pe̍h-ōe-jī has been stable since the 1930s, with a few minor exceptions (detailed below).^[58] There is a fair degree of similarity with the Vietnamese orthography Quốc Ngữ, including the b/p/ph distinction and the use of ⟨ơ⟩ in Quốc Ngữ compared with ⟨o͘⟩ in POJ.^[59] POJ uses the following letters and combinations:^[60]

Chinese phonology traditionally divides syllables in Chinese languages into three parts; firstly the initial, a consonant or consonant blend which appears at the beginning of the syllable, secondly the final, consisting of a medial vowel (optional), a nucleus vowel, and an optional ending; and finally the tone, which is applied to the whole syllable.^[63] In terms of the non-tonal (i.e. phonemic) features, the nucleus vowel is the only required part of a licit consonant in Chinese languages.^[63] Unlike Mandarin but like other southern varieties of Chinese, Taiwanese has final plosives, which have no audible release, a feature that has been preserved from Middle Chinese.^[64] There is some debate as to whether these stops are a tonal feature or a phonemic one, with some authorities distinguishing between ⟨-h⟩ as a tonal feature, and ⟨-p⟩, ⟨-t⟩, and ⟨-k⟩ as phonemic features.^[65] Southern Min dialects also have an optional nasal property, which is written with a superscript ⟨ⁿ⟩ and usually identified as being part of the vowel.^[66]

A legitimate syllable in Hokkien takes the form (initial) + (medial vowel) + nucleus + (stop) + tone, where items in parenthesis indicate optional components.^[67]

The initials are:

b ch chh g h j k kh l m n ng

Medial vowels:

i o

Nuclei:

a e i o o͘ u m ng

Stops:

m n ng h p t k

POJ has a limited amount of legitimate syllables, although sources disagree on some particular instances of these syllables. The following table contains all the licit spellings of POJ syllables, based on a number of sources:

Tone markings[link]

Number	Diacritic	Chinese tone name	Example  listen (help·info)
1	none	yinping dark level	kha foot; leg
2	acute	shangsheng rising	chúi water
3	grave	yinqu dark departing	kàu arrive
4	none	yinru dark entering	bah meat
5	circumflex	yangping light level	ông king
7	macron	yangqu light departing	tiōng middle
8	vertical line above	yangru light entering	jo̍ah hot

The five tone markings used in pe̍h-ōe-jī, representing tones 2, 3, 5, 7, and 8

In standard Amoy or Taiwanese Hokkien there are seven distinct tones, which by convention are numbered 1–8, with number 6 omitted (tone 6 used to be a distinct tone, but has long since merged with tone 2).^[71] Tones 1 and 4 are both represented without a diacritic, and can be distinguished from each other by the syllable ending, which is a vowel, ⟨-n⟩, ⟨-m⟩, or ⟨-ng⟩ for tone 1, and ⟨-h⟩, ⟨-k⟩, ⟨-p⟩, and ⟨-t⟩ for tone 4.

Southern Min languages undergo considerable tone sandhi, i.e. changes to the tone depending on the position of the syllable in any given sentence or utterance.^[67] However, like Hanyu Pinyin for Mandarin Chinese, POJ always marks the citation tone (i.e. the original, pre-sandhi tone) rather than the tone which is actually spoken.^[72] This means that when reading aloud the reader must adjust the tone markings on the page to account for sandhi. Some textbooks for learners of the language mark both the citation tone and the sandhi tone to assist the learner.^[73]

There is some debate as to the correct placement of tone marks in the case of diphthongs and triphthongs, particularly those which include ⟨oa⟩ and ⟨oe⟩.^[74] Most modern writers follow six rules:^[75]

1. If the syllable has one vowel, that vowel should be tone-marked; viz. ⟨tī⟩, ⟨láng⟩, ⟨chhu̍t⟩
2. If a diphthong contains ⟨i⟩ or ⟨u⟩, the tone mark goes above the other vowel; viz. ⟨ia̍h⟩, ⟨kiò⟩, ⟨táu⟩
3. If a diphthong includes both ⟨i⟩ and ⟨u⟩, mark the ⟨u⟩; viz. ⟨iû⟩, ⟨ùi⟩
4. If the final is made up of three or more letters, mark the second vowel (except when rules 2 and 3 apply); viz. ⟨goán⟩, ⟨oāi⟩, ⟨khiáu⟩
5. If ⟨o⟩ occurs with ⟨a⟩ or ⟨e⟩, mark the ⟨o⟩; viz. ⟨òa⟩, ⟨thóe⟩
6. If the syllable has no vowel, mark the nasal consonant; viz. ⟨m̄⟩, ⟨ǹg⟩, ⟨mn̂g⟩

Hyphens[link]

A single hyphen is used to indicate a compound. What constitutes a compound is controversial, with some authors equating it to a "word" in English, and others not willing to limit it to the English concept of a word.^[74] Examples from POJ include ⟨sì-cha̍p⟩ "forty", ⟨bé-hì-thôan⟩ "circus", and ⟨hôe-ho̍k⟩ "recover (from illness)". The rule-based sandhi behaviour of tones in compounds has not yet been clearly defined by linguists.^[76] A double hyphen is used when POJ is deployed as a full orthography (rather than as a transciption system) to indicate that the following syllable should be pronounced in the neutral tone.^[77] It also marks to the reader that the preceding syllable does not undergo tone sandhi, as it would were the following syllable non-neutral. Morphemes following a double hyphen are often (but not always) grammatical function words.^[78]

Audio examples[link]

POJ	Translation	Audio File
Sian-siⁿ kóng, ha̍k-seng tiām-tiām thiaⁿ.	A teacher/master speaks, students quietly listen.	listen (help·info)
Kin-á-jit hit-ê cha-bó͘ gín-á lâi góan tau khòaⁿ góa.	Today that girl came to my house to see me.	listen (help·info)
Thài-khong pêng-iú, lín-hó. Lín chia̍h-pá—bē? Ū-êng, to̍h lâi gún chia chē—ô͘!	Everyone, what's up? Have you eaten yet? When you have the time, come on over to eat.	Listen (from NASA Voyager Golden Record)

Regional differences[link]

In addition to the standard syllables detailed above, there are several regional variations of Hokkien speech which can be represented with non-standard or semi-standard spellings. In Zhangzhou and parts of Taiwan which are closely related to the Zhangzhou dialect (particularly the northeastern coast around Yilan), the final ng is replaced with uiⁿ, for example in "egg" (nuiⁿ) and "cooked rice" (puiⁿ).^[79]

Texts[link]

Due to POJ's origins in the church, much of the material in the script is religious in nature, including several Bible translations, books of hymns, and guides to morality. The Tainan Church Press, established in 1884, has been printing POJ materials ever since, with periods of quiet when POJ was suppressed in the early 1940s and from around 1955 to 1987. In the period to 1955, over 2.3 million volumes of POJ books were printed,^[81] and one study in 2002 catalogued 840 different POJ texts in existence.^[82] Besides a Southern Min version of Wikipedia in the orthography,^[83] there are teaching materials, religious texts, and books about linguistics, medicine and geography.

• Lán ê Kiù-chú Iâ-so͘ Ki-tok ê Sin-iok (1873 translation of the New Testament)
• Lāi-goā-kho Khàn-hō͘-ha̍k
• Amoy–English Dictionary
• Lear Ông (translation of King Lear)

Computing[link]

POJ was initially not well supported by word-processing applications due to the special diacritics needed to write it. Support has now improved and there are now sufficient resources to both enter and display POJ correctly. Several input methods exist to enter Unicode-compliant POJ, including OpenVanilla (Mac OS X and Windows), the cross-platform Tai-lo Input Method released by the Taiwanese Ministry of Education, and the Firefox add-on Transliterator, which allows in-browser POJ input.^[84] When POJ was first used in word-processing applications it was not fully supported by the Unicode standard, thus necessitating work-arounds. One employed was encoding the necessary characters in the "Private Use" section of Unicode, but this required both the writer and the reader to have the correct custom font installed.^[49] Another solution was to replace troublesome characters with near equivalents, for example substituting ⟨ä⟩ for ⟨ā⟩ or using a standard ⟨o⟩ followed by an interpunct to represent ⟨o͘⟩.^[49] In 2004 with the introduction into Unicode 4.1.0 of the combining diacritic COMBINING DOT ABOVE RIGHT (U+0358) all the necessary characters were present to write regular POJ without the need for workarounds.^[85][86] However, even after the addition of these characters, there are still relatively few fonts which are able to properly render the script, including the combining diacritics. Some of those which can are Charis SIL, DejaVu, Doulos SIL, Linux Libertine, and Taigi Unicode.^[49]

Han-Romanization mixed script[link]

One of the most popular modern ways of writing Taiwanese is by using a mixed orthography^[88] called Hàn-lô^[89] (simplified Chinese: 汉罗; traditional Chinese: 漢羅; pinyin: Hàn-Luó; literally Chinese-Roman), and sometimes Han-Romanization mixed script.^[90] In fact, the term Hàn-lô does not describe one specific system, but covers any kind of writing in Southern Min which features both Chinese characters and romanization.^[88] That romanization is usually POJ, although recently some texts have begun appearing with Tâi-lô spellings too. The problem with using only Chinese characters to write Southern Min is that there are many morphemes (estimated to be around 15 percent of running text)^[91] which are not definitively associated with a particular character. Various strategies have been developed to deal with the issue, including creating new characters, allocating Mandarin characters with similar meanings (but dissimilar etymology) to represent the missing characters, or using romanization for the "missing 15%".^[92] There are two rationales for using mixed orthography writing, with two different aims. The first is to allow native speakers (almost all of whom can already write Chinese characters) to make use of their knowledge of characters, while replacing the missing 15% with romanization.^[88] The second is to wean character literates off using them gradually, to be replaced eventually by fully romanized text.^[93] Examples of modern texts in Hàn-lô include religious, pedagogical, scholarly, and literary works, such as:

• Chang Yu-hong. Principles of POJ. 
• Babuja A. Sidaia. A-Chhûn. 

Adaptations for other languages or dialects[link]

POJ has been adapted for several other languages and dialects, with varying degrees of success. For Hakka, missionaries and others have produced a Bible translation, hymn book, textbooks, and dictionaries.^[94] Materials produced in the orthography, called Pha̍k-fa-sṳ, include:

• Hak-ngi Sṳn-kin, Sin-yuk lau Sṳ-phien: Hien-thoi Thoi-van Hak-ngi Yit-pun (Hakka Bible, New Testament and Psalms: Today's Taiwan Hakka Version). Bible Society. 1993. 
• Phang Tet-siu (1994). Thai-ka Loi Hok Hak-fa (Everybody Learn Hakka). Taipei: Southern Materials Center. ISBN 957-638-017-0. 
• Phang Tet-siu (1996). Hak-ka-fa Fat-yim Sṳ-tien (Hakka Pronunciation Dictionary). Taipei: Southern Materials Center. ISBN 957-638-359-5. 
• Hak-ka Sṳn-sṳ (Hakka Hymns). Tainan: PCT Press. 1999. ISBN 957-8349-75-0. 

A modified version of POJ has also been created for Teochew.^[95]

Current status[link]

Some books which use pe̍h-ōe-jī, including textbooks, dictionaries, a bible, poetry, and academic works

Most native Southern Min speakers in Taiwan are unfamiliar with POJ or any other writing system for the language,^[96] commonly asserting that "Taiwanese has no writing",^[97] or, if they are made aware of POJ, considering romanization as the "low" form of writing, in contrast with the "high" form (Chinese characters).^[98] For those who are introduced to POJ alongside Han-lo and completely Chinese character-based systems, a clear preference has been shown for all-character systems, with all-romanization systems at the bottom of the preference list, likely because of the preexisting familiarity of readers with Chinese characters.^[99]

POJ remains the Taiwanese orthography "with the richest inventory of written work, including dictionaries, textbooks, literature [...] and other publications in many areas".^[100] A 1999 estimate put the number of literate POJ users at around 100,000,^[101] and secular organizations have been formed to promote the use of romanization among Taiwanese speakers.^[102]

Outside Taiwan, POJ is rarely used. For example, in Fujian, Xiamen University uses a romanization known as Bbánlám pìngyīm, based on Pinyin. In other areas where Hokkien is spoken, such as Singapore, the Speak Mandarin Campaign is underway to actively discourage people from speaking Hokkien or other Chinese dialects in favour of switching to Mandarin instead.^[103]

In 2006, Taiwan's Ministry of Education chose an official romanization for use in teaching the language in the state school system.^[104] POJ was one of the candidate systems, along with Daighi tongiong pingim, but a compromise system, the Taiwanese Romanization System or Tâi-Lô, was chosen in the end.^[105] Tâi-Lô retains most of the orthographic standards of POJ, including the tone marks, while changing the troublesome o͘ character for oo, swapping ts for ch, and replacing o in diphthongs with u.^[106] Supporters of Taiwanese writing are in general deeply suspicious of government involvement, given the history of official suppression of native languages,^[5] making it unclear whether Tâi-Lô or POJ will become the dominant system in the future.

References[link]

Notes

Bibliography

External links[link]

	China portal
	Languages portal

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Pe̍h-ōe-jī

General

Input methods

POJ-compliant fonts

Texts and dictionaries

Jay Chou
Chou on the red carpet at the MTV Asia Aid, Bangkok, Thailand, 2005
Chinese name	周杰倫 (Traditional)
Chinese name	周杰伦 (Simplified)
Pinyin	Zhōu Jiélún (Mandarin)
Origin	Taiwan
Born	(1979-01-18) 18 January 1979 (age 33) Linkou, Taipei County, Taiwan
Other name(s)	Director Chou (周董)
Occupation	Singer-songwriter, composer, record producer, rapper, DJ, music video director, film director, music arranger, model, screenwriter, actor
Genre(s)	Pop, rock, R&B, hip pop
Instrument(s)	Vocals, guitar, bass, piano, violin, cello, drums, guzheng, keyboards, pipa, erhu, harmonica
Voice type(s)	tenor
Label(s)	Sony Music Taiwan (2008–present) JVR Music (2007–present) Alfa Music (1999–2007)
Years active	2000–present
Parents	Father: Zhou Yaozhong (周耀中) Mother: Ye Huimei (葉惠美)
Influenced	Nan Quan Mama
Official Website	Jay Chou@JVR Music
Awards Hong Kong Film Awards Best New Performer 2006 Initial D Best Original Film Song 2007 "Chrysanthemum Terrace" (Curse of the Golden Flower) Golden Horse Awards Best Newcomer 2005 Initial D Outstanding Taiwanese Film of the Year 2007 Secret Best Original Song 2007 "The Secret That Cannot Be Told" (Secret) Golden Melody Awards Best Mandarin Album 2001 Jay 2002 Fantasy 2004 Ye Hui Mei 2011 The Era Best Music Video 2009 "Mr. Magic" (Capricorn) Best Song of the Year 2008 "Blue and White Porcelain" (On the Run) 2009 "Fragrant Rice" (Capricorn) Best Composer 2002 "Love Before A.D." (Fantasy)[1] 2008 "Blue and White Porcelain" (On the Run) Best Producer 2002 Fantasy Best Single Producer 2007 Fearless EP Best Male Mandarin Artist 2009 Capricorn 2011 The Era Best Composer (Instrumental Category) 2008 "Piano Room" (Secret) Best Producer (Instrumental Category) 2008 Secret Original Movie Soundtrack (Secret) MTV Asia Awards Favorite Artist, Taiwan 2002, 2005 Other awards World Music Awards Best-Selling Chinese-Speaking Artist 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008 Shanghai Film Critics Awards 2007 Best Actor (Curse of the Golden Flower)

This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters.

Jay Chou; (born 18 January 1979)^[2] is a Taiwanese musician, singer-songwriter, music and film producer, actor and director. In 1998 he was discovered in a talent contest where he displayed his piano and song-writing skills. Over the next two years, he was hired to compose for popular Mandarin singers. Although he was trained in classical music, Chou combines Chinese and Western music styles to produce songs that fuse R&B, rock and pop genres. He composes all his own songs, as well as songs for other singers.

In 2000, Chou released his first album, titled Jay, under the record company Alfa Music. Since then he has released one album per year except in 2009, selling several million copies each. His music has gained recognition throughout Asia, most notably in regions such as Taiwan, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and in overseas Asian communities. He has sold more than 28 million albums worldwide up to 2010.^[3] He debuted his acting career in Initial D (2005), for which he won Best Newcomer Actor in both the Hong Kong Film Awards and the Golden Horse Awards, and was nominated for Best Supporting Actor by Hong Kong Film Awards for his role in Curse of the Golden Flower (2006). He produced the theme song for the film Ocean Heaven starring Jet Li. His career now extends into directing and running his own record company JVR Music.

Career[link]

Jay Chou at the premiere of Secret in Seoul, South Korea, on 10 January 2008.

Jay Chou grew up in Linkou, Taipei County, Taiwan.^[4] Both his parents were secondary school teachers: his mother, Ye Hui Mei (Chinese: 葉惠美; pinyin: Yè Huìměi), taught fine arts, while his father, Zhou Yao Zhong (Chinese: 周耀中; pinyin: Zhōu Yàozhōng), was a biomedical researcher. His mother noticed his sensitivity to music and took him to piano lessons at the age of three.^[4] During his childhood, he was fascinated with capturing sounds and songs with his tape recorder, which he carried everywhere with him. In the third grade, he became interested in music theory and also started cello lessons. He is an only child and loved to play piano, imitate TV actors, and perform magic tricks. His favorite composer was, and still is to this day, Chopin. His parents divorced when he was 13, which caused him to become reclusive and introverted. Although he had friends, he often preferred to be alone, listening to music, contemplating and daydreaming. At Tamkang Senior High School, he majored in piano and minored in cello. He showed talent for improvisation, became fond of pop music and began to write songs.^[5][6]

Chou graduated from high school with inadequate grades for university, so he prepared for mandatory military service. However, a sports injury triggered by an unexplainable and severe back pain eventually led to the diagnosis of ankylosing spondylitis, a hereditary spine inflammation disease; as a result, he was exempted from conscription.^[7][8] Meanwhile, he found himself a job as a waiter. Without his knowing, his friend had entered both their names in a talent show called Super New Talent King. Chou played the piano accompaniment for his friend, whose singing was described as "lousy". Although they did not win, the show's host Jacky Wu—an influential character in Taiwan's entertainment business—happened to glance at Chou's music score and was impressed with its complexity. Wu hired him as a contract composer and paired him with the novice lyricist Vincent Fang.^[6]

Over the next two years he wrote songs for Mandarin pop artists, and also learned recording and sound mixing; his dedication was apparent as he even slept in the music studio. Wu's music studio was later sold to Alfa Music, and the new manager Yang Jun Rong asked him to release his own album. Chou already had an arsenal of songs he wrote for others but had been rejected, so among those he chose 10 for his debut CD Jay that was released in 2000. The album established his reputation as a musically gifted singer-songwriter whose style is a fusion of R&B, rap, classical music, and yet distinctly Chinese. His fame spread quickly in Chinese-speaking regions including countries throughout Southeast Asia.^[9][10][11] Since 2000, Chou has released one album per year, except the year 2009, each selling several million copies, and has been recognized with hundreds of awards.^[12] In 2003, he was the cover story of Time magazine (Asia version),^[6] acknowledging his influence on popular culture. He has held four world tours, "The One" (2002), "Incomparable" (2004), "Jay Chou The World Tours" (2007–2008) and "The Era" (2010–2011) performing in cities such as Taipei, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Beijing, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Las Vegas, Toronto and Vancouver. Unlike most singers, Chou has an enormous amount of creative control over his music.^[6] He is not only the songwriter but also the producer on all of his albums; since 2005 he is also the music director and also directs his own music videos.

Music[link]

Musical style[link]

	"Chrysanthemum Terrace" (菊花台) noicon An example of Chou using Chinese style music. "Nunchucks" (雙截棍) noicon A combination of Chinese style music and rap.
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Chou's compositions are loosely categorized as pop music. While many of his works fall into contemporary R&B, rap, and rock genres, the term "Chou Style" (Chinese: 周氏風格; pinyin: zhōu shì fēnggé)^[13][14] has been popularized to describe his trademark cross-cultural music and his insistence on singing with slurred enunciation. Taipei Times once described the meaning of "Chou Style": "In what has become the archetypal Chou style, Taiwan's favorite son blends pop, rap, blues and a smorgasbord of esthetic elements of world music to create his dream-like never-never land ..."^[15]

He regularly fuses traditional Chinese instruments and styles with R&B or rock to form a new genre called "Zhongguo feng" (simplified Chinese: 中国风; traditional Chinese: 中國風; pinyin: Zhōngguó fēng), which literally means "Chinese Style Music",^[a] some of which are written in the Pentatonic Scale as opposed to the more common seven-note scale (Diatonic Scale) to accentuate an oriental style. Besides his own culture, he also incorporated Spanish guitar in "Red Imitation" (Chinese: 紅模仿; pinyin: hóng mófǎng), American techno/electronica in "Herbalist's Manual" (Chinese: 本草綱目; pinyin: Běncǎo Gāngmù), rap with subtle classical music undertones in "Reverse Scales" (Chinese: 逆鱗; pinyin: nìlín), Blues style in "Free Tutorial Video" (Chinese: 免費教學錄影帶; pinyin: Mian Fei Jiao Xue Lu Ying Dai) and Bossanova style in "Rosemary" (Chinese: 迷迭香; pinyin: mídiéxiāng), to name a few. Sound effects from everyday life are frequently woven into his music, such as bouncing ping pong balls, touch tone phone dialing, helicopter blades, dripping rain, and radio static noise (concrete music).^[b]

His formal musical training is evident by the use of classical textures in his compositions. For example, counterpoint was used in "Perfection" (Chinese: 完美主義; pinyin: wánměizhǔyì) and "Sorry" (Chinese: 對不起; pinyin: duìbuqǐ), while polyphony can be found in "The Wound That Ends War" (Chinese: 止戰之殤; pinyin: zhǐ zhàn zhī shāng) and "Twilight's Chapter Seven" (Chinese: 夜的第七章; pinyin: yè de dì-qī zhāng).

Chou's albums have been noted for the lack of change compared to his earlier works, yet he firmly stated that he will not alter his style: "They say I've been standing still ... but this is the music I want, and I don't see what I want by moving ahead."^[16] To demonstrate his point, he named his 2006 album Still Fantasy after his 2001 album Fantasy. His use of relaxed enunciation has been criticized as "mumbling"^[17] which he also insisted will not change;^[18] however, recently he has adopted clearer pronunciation for certain songs, particularly more traditional Chinese style songs, such as "Faraway" (Chinese: 千里之外; pinyin: qiānlǐ zhīwài) which features Fei Yu-ching and "Chrysanthemum Terrace" (Chinese: 菊花台; pinyin: júhuā tái).^[19]

Lyrics[link]

Chou is more often a singer-composer than a lyricist. Several "regulars" write the lyrics for most of his music, but the content and style is unified with his own personality and image, covering a diverse range of topics and ideas. Vincent Fang accounts for more than half of the lyrics in his albums, helping to establish an important element in Chou's music: the use of meaningful, imagery- and emotionally rich lyrics, sometimes written in the form of ancient Chinese poetry with reference to Chinese history or folklore.^[c] In addition to writing romantic hits,^[d] he also touches on war, the Bible, sports, and martial arts.^[e] Vivian Hsu is a singer herself and has helped with Chou's earlier hits,^[f] while Huang Jun Lang (Chinese: 黃俊郎; pinyin: Huáng Jùnláng) is noted for his work surrounding unusual themes (such as a detective story and chess game).^[g]

Chou himself has written lyrics for many ballads,^[h] but has also discussed societal ills such as drug addiction in "Coward" (Chinese: 懦夫; pinyin: nuòfū) and loss of the rural countryside to urbanization in "Terrace fields" (Chinese: 梯田; pinyin: tītián). Domestic violence discussed in "Dad, I am back" (Chinese: 爸,我回來了; pinyin: bà, wǒ huílai le) received a great deal of commotion since he was the first to bring up this taboo subject in Sanscript music,^[20] which helped solidify his status as a pioneer and a unique pop singer capable of approaching serious issues. In the songs "Maternal grandmother" (Chinese: 外婆; pinyin: wàipó) and "Listen to Mother" (Chinese: 聽媽媽的話; pinyin: tīng māma de huà), he voiced his high regard for family values. He addressed personal issues about his failure to enter university in "Split" (Chinese: 分裂; pinyin: fēnliè), his resentment towards the paparazzi in "Besieged From All Sides" (Chinese: 四面楚歌; pinyin: sìmiànchǔgē), "Rice Fragrance" (Chinese: 稻香; pinyin: dào xiāng), a song from his 9th album Capricorn encourages people not to give up their dreams even when facing difficulties in life, the sadness of becoming a clown in "Uncle Joker"(Chinese: 喬克叔叔; pinyin: Qiao Ke Shu Shu) and highlighted the importance of individuality in "Popular Imitation" (Chinese: 紅模仿; pinyin: hóng mófǎng).

Collaborations[link]

Chou began as a songwriter for other singers and continued this area of work even after he debuted his own career in singing. He has composed frequently for Jolin Tsai, Landy Wen, and occasionally for other Taiwanese singers such as Coco Lee, S.H.E, Vivian Hsu, Leehom Wang, Will Liu, Valen Hsu, and Hong Kong pop stars Edmond Leung, Gigi Leung, Jordan Chan, Edison Chen, Karen Mok, Leo Ku, Eason Chan, and Joey Yung, as well as a one-time collaboration with Howard Su. He has also written for singers outside of his generation—over one dozen songs for his mentor Jacky Wu, later also for Taiwanese singer Jody Chiang, and Hong Kong singers Jacky Cheung, Andy Lau, Aaron Kwok, and Kenny Bee.^{[21][22][23][24]}

He initiated the band Nan Quan Mama in 2004, selecting band members and overseeing their album production. The group has been noted for sounding too similar to their mentor;^[25] as a result, Chou has reduced his involvement in the band,^[26] but continues to help increase their exposure to mass audiences by inviting them as guests performers for his own concerts and music videos.^{[27][28][29][30]}

He has performed live duets with Landy Wen,^[28] Jolin Tsai,^[31] and former girlfriend news anchor Patty Hou,^[32] but only two studio recordings of duets have been formally placed in his own albums: "Coral Sea" (Chinese: 珊瑚海; pinyin: shānhú hǎi) in 2005 with Lara Veronin (of Nan Quan Mama)^[33] and "Faraway" (Chinese: 千里之外; pinyin: qiānlǐ zhīwài) in 2006 features Fei Yu-Ching, who began his career in the 1970s.^[34]

Besides working with singers, Chou's longest-running collaboration is with lyricist Vincent Fang, as they both started their careers in the music field in 1998. The compilation album Partners (Chinese: 拍檔; pinyin: pāi dàng) featured 12 songs, each consisting of Chou's musical and Fang's lyrical compositions.^[35] Fang has written the words to more than 40 of Chou's songs, was the chief editor of Chou's book Grandeur de D Major (Chinese: D調的華麗; pinyin: D diào de huálì), and is now Chou's business partner (together with Chou's manager JR Yang) for the record company JVR Music.^[36][37]

Jay Chou was also featured in Cindy Yen's (袁詠琳) song "Sand Painting" (畫沙) released in October 2009.

Jay Chou collaborated with Kobe Bryant on "The Heaven and Earth Challenge"(天地一鬥) in order to "promote youth creativity, as well as an upcoming slam-dunk competition in China." The song was released at a press conference before the NBA All-Star Game on 20 February 2011.^[38]

World tours[link]

Jay Chou's 3D enhanced stage at his Singapore concert in 2010, as part of his The Era World Tour

Jay held his first series of five solo concerts, titled Fantasy Concert (范特西演唱會), with the first stop on 11 January 2001 at Taoyuan Arena, Taiwan. Followed by two shows at the Hong Kong Coliseum, one in Malaysia and ended in Singapore on 10 February 2002. His second concert tour, The One Concert (The One 演唱會) commenced on 28 September 2002 at Taipei Municipal Stadium, followed by 11 stops and ended at Shenzhen Stadium, China on 3 January 2004.

Two more series of world tours followed: Incomparable Concert (無與倫比演唱會) in 2004 and Jay Chou 2007 World Tours (2007世界巡迴演唱會), with stops in cities such as Taipei, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Beijing, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Las Vegas, Toronto and Vancouver. In 2010, to celebrate Jay's 10 year career in the entertainment industry, he embarked on his fifth series of concert tour titled, New Era World Tour (超時代演唱會), with the first stop of three concerts from 11 to 13 June 2010 at Taipei Arena, followed by 24 stops ending in Malaysia on 5 March 2011.

World tours/Live (DVD) album releases

• 2001 – Fantasy Concert (范特西演唱會)
• 2002 – The One Concert (The One 演唱會) – Jay Chou The One Concert Live
• 2004 – Incomparable Concert (無與倫比演唱會) – Incomparable Jay Concert Live
• 2007 – Jay Chou World Tours (世界巡迴演唱會) – Jay Chou 2007 the World Tours Concert Live
• 2010 – New Era World Tour (超時代演唱會) – Jay Chou 2010 The Era World Tours Concert Live

Other works[link]

Movie career[link]

Chou formally entered the film industry in 2005 with the release of the movie Initial D (頭文字Ｄ). He has since acted in three other movies, directed one film and more than a dozen music videos. Chou, who once said "I live because of music",^[39] ventured into movies because he felt the need for a new challenge. As fans have grown concerned that movies will compromise his music career, Chou has repeatedly reassured that movies are a source of inspiration and not a distraction; at the same time, he realizes the need to balance both careers and maintain his place in the music field to garner the continued support of fans.^{[40][41][42][43]}

Acting[link]

Jay Chou at a promotional event for Kung Fu Dunk in January 2008

Entry into acting was an unexpected move for Chou.^[41] His high school English teacher thought he was capable of very few facial expressions,^[6] and the director of Hidden Track (2003, a movie in which Chou had a cameo role) said that his strong individualistic personality will not make him a good actor.^[44] In 2005, Chou's first role as the lead actor in Initial D served two purposes: to launch his acting debut, and to increase his exposure to Japanese audiences.^[45] This film is based on the Japanese comic Initial D, where Chou played Takumi Fujiwara, a gifted touge racer who is quiet and rarely shows expression. Some reviewers criticized his bland acting^[46] while others felt he performed naturally, but only because the character’s personality closely mirrored his own.^[47][48] His performance in Initial D won him Best Newcomer Actor in Golden Horse Awards and Hong Kong Film Awards.^[49][50] Chou’s second film was Curse of the Golden Flower (2006). As a supporting character, he drew much of the attention of Chinese reporters; Chou’s involvement in this movie was announced in its own press conference,^[51] separate from the meeting held for Chow Yun-fat, Gong Li, and the other actors. Chou portrayed Prince Jai, the ambitious second eldest prince and general of the Imperial army whose personality epitomizes Xiao (孝), the Chinese virtue of filial piety. In this internationally released film, North American audiences saw Chou for the first time. According to Chinese movie critics, comments about his acting ranged from "lacks complexity"^[52] to "acceptable,"^[53][54] but was critically praised by Western reviewers.^{[55][56][57][58][59]} His performance in Curse of the Golden Flower was nominated Best Supporting Actor in the Hong Kong Film Awards.^[60] In the 2008 film Kung Fu Dunk, Chou portrayed a kung fu student and dunking prodigy, and the film earned over ¥100 million (US$14.7 million).^[61] Chou portrayed Kato in The Green Hornet, directed by Michel Gondry and released in January 2011, after Hong Kong actor Stephen Chow withdrew from the project; the film grossed over $228 million worldwide.^[62] MTV Networks' NextMovie.com named him one of the 'Breakout Stars to Watch for in 2011'.^[63] In May 2011, Chou started filming for a new movie, The Viral Factor directed by Dante Lam and starred various well known artistes such as Nicholas Tse, Bai Bing and Lin Peng. The movie was released in theatres over Asia on 17 January 2012. With most of the scenes shot in the Middle Eastern and Southeast Asian countries, earlier filming process has been slightly disrupted due to political conflicts in the Middle East. In 2012, Jay Chou announced that he has started the filming process to the sequel of his directorial debut "不能说的秘密" (Secret/A Secret That Cannot Be Told), collaborating with his lifelong friend, 刘畊宏/Will Liu. It has been tentatively being named as "不能说的秘密2" (Secret 2/A Secret That Cannot Be Told 2) and is expected to be released in 2013.

Directing[link]

Chou acquired his first directing experience in 2004 through music videos. He initially experimented with a song by the group Nan Quan Mama titled "Home" (Chinese: 家; pinyin: jiā) where he was involved throughout the entire process from research to editing. After learning the difficulties of being a director, he refused to direct again even at the request of his record company.^[64] However, his interest resurfaced again as he directed music videos for 4 of the 12 songs in own album November's Chopin in 2005,^[65] and later television advertisements.^[66][67] By 2006, he had taken responsibility for the storyboard, directing, and editing of music videos for all his songs.^[40] It is unclear how the public appraises his work, since music videos are rarely the subject of critical review; however, director Zhang Yimou said that Chou's directing abilities may surpass his own in the future, after viewing several of Chou's music videos.^[51][68]

In February 2007, Chou finally directed his first movie Secret. The story he wrote is based loosely on his relationship with a high school girlfriend, with a plot focused on music, love, and family.^[69] He stars as the lead actor of the film with Kwai Lun-Mei‎ as the female lead, and Hong Kong veteran actor Anthony Wong as Chou’s father. Despite previous experience in filming music videos, Chou admits that movies are more challenging due to storyline and time constraints.^[69] This movie was released in July 2007.^[70]

In 2005, Jay Chou played the male lead in Initial D, and according to reports, he will be back to direct the sequel, while Andrew Lau, who was a co-director of the first Initial D, will take on the role of the producer.^[71]

[edit] Book: Grandeur de D Major

Chou published his first book titled Grandeur de D Major (simplified Chinese: D调的华丽; traditional Chinese: D調的華麗; pinyin: D diào de huálì) on 25 November 2004.^[k] This 200-page book features a prologue written by his family, friends, and co-workers; the main section is a compilation of his personal attitudes, philosophies, and recollections of childhood experiences along with pictures from his music videos, many of which have never been released; and lastly, a list of the artist's major awards, musical and lyrical compositions, and discography. For the usually low-profile singer, this book revealed his personality and convictions that has served as the basis of his musical and public image. He demonstrated a strong appreciation of family values with an especially deep connection with his mother and maternal grandmother. His confidence and dedication towards music is evident as he dedicated 2 out of 7 chapters to music: the current state of the industry, his composition methodology, and the importance of individualism to his success in music. This pride is contrasted against his modesty and self-assessed naivety about many aspects in life, particularly regarding relationships and marriage.

Endorsements[link]

Chou has been a spokesperson for popular brands such as Pepsi (2002–2007), Panasonic (2001–2005), Motorola (since 2006), M-Zone/China Mobile (since 2003), Levi's (2004–2005), Deerhui (sporting goods, since 2003), Metersbonwe Group (casual wear, since 2003), Colgate (2004–2005), popular computer game Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos (2002), and science and nature magazine National Geographic (2005).^[72][73] To maximize the celebrity branding effect, advertisements are nearly always linked to his music and TV commercials are occasionally directed by him.^[66][67] He acted as the tourism ambassador for Malaysia in 2003.^[74][75] In April 2008, Jay signed with Sprite and collaborated with artistes such as Angela Chang and JJ Lin in commercials. He also did a Sprite commercial with Kobe Bryant and specially wrote a song named "天地一斗 (Battle of the Incomparable)" featuring Kobe Bryant for the commercial. In June 2011, Jay expanded his area of endorsement into the field of technology, becoming the designer and spokesperson of the "N43SL Jay Chou Edition" laptop of ASUS Computers. The laptop is most notable for its lid design, sound system, start-up and shut-down tones, and a unique 'J' font for its key. All of which, except for the sound system, are designed and composed by Jay himself.

Accolades[link]

From the launch of his music career in 2000, Jay Chou has won more than 350 singer, singer-songwriter, and producer awards in Asia.^[12] The highly coveted Golden Melody Awards in Taiwan^[j] awarded "Best Album" for his debut CD Jay (2000) in 2001, and five awards (including "Best Album", "Best Composer", and "Best Producer") in the following year for the album Fantasy (2001). However, failure to win "Best Album" for three consecutive years has left him disheartened with award ceremonies. Although he continues to win more than 20 awards per year from various organizations in Asia, Chou has stated he will rely more on album sales as an indicator of his music's quality and popularity.^[76] In 2004, 2006, 2007 and 2008, he was awarded Best-Selling Artist in Taiwan by World Music Awards for the albums Common Jasmin Orange, Still Fantasy and On the Run.^[77]

Media and public relations[link]

Public image[link]

Chou's 2007 tour outfit exhibited at the Hard Rock Cafe 40th anniversary tour in Seattle, 2011

Despite living under continual media scrutiny, Chou's public image has changed little over the years as he emphasizes individuality as his "personal philosophy".^[6][78] In his music, this is also evident as he fuses Chinese and Western styles and explores topics unconventional for a pop singer, which have been described as "authentic" and "revolutionary".^[6][10][11] The media describes a hard-working^[79] perfectionist^[6] with clear self-direction^[80] who is occasionally regarded as competitive^[81] and a "control freak".^[6] There is a misunderstanding about his nickname "Chairman Chou" (Chinese: 周董; pinyin: Zhōu dǒng), used by both the press and fans to underscore his domineering personality and impact on Asian music,^[82] but also points at his musical talent.^[20][79] Yet the origin of this nickname emerges from his fever of collecting antiques as the word "董" comes from "antique" in Chinese (古董). Outside of music, Chou is reported as shy, quiet,^[80][83] modest, and views filial piety as "the most important thing".^[84] In-line with his aim to present a positive image,^[16] he is a non-smoker, non-drinker, and does not go to nightclubs.^[85] Government officials and educators in Asia have awarded him for his exemplary behaviour,^[86] designated him a spokesperson in the youth-empowerment project "Young Voice" in 2005 and an anti-depression campaign in 2007,^[87][88] His lyrics for two songs^[i] has been incorporated into the school syllabus to inspire motivational and filial attitudes.^{[89][90][91][92]} In November 2007, Chou was criticized for attending the funeral of Taiwanese gang leader Chen Chi-li to console Chen's son Baron Chen, whom Chou met while filming Kung Fu Dunk.^[93][94][95] In 2011 Chou performed on the New Year's Gala program on China's Central Television.^[96]

Response to the news media and paparazzi[link]

As with other stars, Chou has expressed a strong dislike of the paparazzi. In the early years of his career, unwanted attention by the media was usually dealt with by avoidance. In-line with his quiet nature, he frequently wore baseball caps and hoods while lowering his head and evading eye contact during interviews.^[83] In recent years however, he has been less passive about the invasion of his privacy. To discourage the paparazzi from taking unsolicited pictures, Chou is known to photograph the paparazzi that follow him.^[97] He openly calls the paparazzi "dogs" and tabloids "dog magazines", as shown in his lyrics for "Besieged From All Sides" (Chinese: 四面楚歌; pinyin: sìmiànchǔgē). The media have also accused Chou of evading compulsory military service^[98] by feigning to suffer from ankylosing spondylitis. Later that year he was acquitted after providing the relevant medical records and letters from the army confirming a lawful exemption from draft dated before the start of his music career.^[99]

Despite constant harassment and stalking by the media, he does acknowledge that not all media attention is unwelcome.^[100] Coverage by international journals and news agencies such as Time,^[6] The Guardian,^[101] and Reuters^[78] help ascertain his influence on mainstream culture. An editorial written by Kerry Brown of Chatham House named Chou as one of the 50 most influential figures in China, one of only three singers on a list dominated by politicians and corporate owners.^[102] At the end of 2009, he was included on JWT's annual list of 100 Things to Watch in 2010.^[103]