[2] However, the demotion of prior local languages into "dialects" across cultural and educational landscapes resulted in a pushback of the policy and eventually rescinded as Taiwan democratized.
[4] The policy was initially nonmandatory, but quickly escalated towards the end of World War II in order to turn Taiwan into a military base.
[5] After Japan's defeat in World War II, Taiwan was surrendered to the Chinese government, specifically the KMT-administered regime.
[7] However, four years later, the KMT lost the civil war to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and fled to Taiwan for refuge.
[4] However, most of the Taiwanese who resided in Taiwan prior to the KMT-rule do not understand standard Mandarin due to the "Japanization" during the Japanese colonial rule.
"[6] Language workshops, educational reforms, and the standardization of traditional Chinese characters were created to support the monolingual policy.
[8] By wielding military power, political domination, and cultural hegemony, the KMT helped solidify the indigenous, Hokkien, and Minnan native identity, which led to anti-Mainlander ethnic nationalism.
However, because income inequality forced many of the Native populations to work in labor without much job mobility, many Minnan and Hokkien speakers were still able to communicate in their mother tongue.
[9] Pockets began to develop among the Hakka, Minna, and indigenous groups where they would hold secret meetings to practice and teach themselves their own languages.
[8] Especially with the Minnan and the Hokkien making up a strong majority of the Taiwanese population, embracing local languages became a political strategy in election campaigns to attract Native voters.
Especially with Taiwan's current ambiguous national status, people are uncertain on the course of reversing the 50 years of acquired Modern Written Chinese and Han characters.