Comparing Asian Nationalities | Asian American Poll

COMPARING ASIAN NATIONALITIES
(Updated Wednesday, Jan 22, 2025, 04:39:09 AM to reflect the 100 most recent valid responses.)

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WHAT YOU SAY

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look back to the glorious Tang Dynasty,

I think your applying too much western labeling on Asian culture. If you walk around China, HK, and Taiwan a bit. You will realise that social/economic divide are not similar to those in the western culture.

The only thing that really seperates the identity of the different groups of Chinese are the region dilects and accents in Mandarin. But I've rarly met any anomosity from any group due to my accents or speech pattern when I was in Asia. Unlike Western counterparts I don't think most Chinese have that great of a stigma of social standing if speech is accented or stilted.

The other thing that Chinese identitify with is thier home villiage, province, city, or some other geographical reference. This is usually the place of birth of the individual, or is tied into how many family members have not left the ancestrial location and keep good relations with the nuclear family in question.

Which is sometime why you see older Chinese immigrants do what I call the "March to the elephant grave." Usually when they are 60+ and think they are about to die. They start buying a plane ticket to Asia to visit their home geographic location, mentioned in the paragraph above, one last time. Which is kind of sad for most AA because they will probably be on the subway or BART system when it time for them to do the "March to the elephant grave"

In any event these to markers in Chinese identity usually proceed or are precursors to the identity of Toisan, Cantonese, Shanghainese, etc., etc., etc.

Japanese also have this type of divide Okinowa island.

American also have this type of regional divide to some extent. Accent speach pattern, eubonics, and geographic regionalism also extist in the USA.
AC Dropout Friday, March 01, 2002 at 08:24:54 (PST)

What Is "Chinese?",

As long you are still identitify with the terms "Hua Ren," or "Hua Ciao" in those stupid forms or applications your basically still Chinese.
AC Dropout Friday, March 01, 2002 at 08:01:02 (PST)

*sigh* I hope the taiwan/china thing settles!

AIYER, Taiwan people like Japan way tooo much. Sure they got nice hairstyles and clothes, but that should be the limit of copying them. Heck if we want to copy them, get 4 inches shorter!

Taiwanese who is part Southern Chinese , part Austronesian, part Dutch,

hello. You should not refer to taiwanese as a "mixed" group. What about the majority of chinese people in taiwan who will absolutely never ever marry the native taiwanese, let alone the dutch~ The chinese who came to taiwan were very discriminating, as depicted in many tv series in china desribing life in early taiwan. The native taiwanese were called "san dae gu leung" as insults by the chinese and seeing Hongkong, were it was occupied by the british, we know 99% of the chinese never produced offspring with the british. The original chinese people probably "mixed" with the other two groups... but what about the ones who fled from communist rule, who are known for their high class.I am sure they dont mix with the hybrids.It was no more than a few decades.

Chiu! Thursday, February 28, 2002 at 21:18:45 (PST)

The Taiwanese are a type of Chinese just like the Cantonese. However more unique in history and too distant to be united with China. I have no problem with the Taiwanese saying that they're separate or different.

In fact, they are probably 3 groups of Chinese subcultures. The Chinese (Han), Cantonese (Cantonese, Hakka and Hoklo) and the Taiwanese (Hoklo, Hakka, Aboriginal, Han and Japanese).

The China-Taiwan issue/divide brings out many things to discuss and ponder. One could argue that China is a country made up of smaller countries, because each province has a unique history and a unique people. China also has many minorities who are being assimilated or maybe not, such groups like the Koreans, Manchurians, Uigurs, Tibetans, Chinese Muslims, Mongolians, etc... There was even a recent study by some anthropologists stating that Northern Chinese are more closer to Caucasians than with Southern Chinese.

The "original" Taiwanese are either of Hoklo or Hakka origin, so they physically resemble the people of Southern Fujian and Eastern Guangdong. However, if you look closely, they are slightly different from the mainland Hoklos or Hakkas, revealing a mixture of some sort not found in China! I've seen pictures of the non-Chinese natives found in Taiwan and many of the Taiwanese look a bit like them.

The term "Cantonese" is also very loose and hard to define too.

Here are some Cantonese delights with different origins.

Salt Water Meat Pie - Ham Sui Kok(native Cantonese, a favorite among Toisans)

Marinated Fried Tofu - Yeung Tofu (Hakka)

Sharkfin Soup and Bird Nest's Soup - Yee Chee Tong, Yin Wor Tong (Hoklo and Chaozhou)

When the English encountered the Southern groups during the opium wars, they also noticed the 3 different groups and their unique stereotypes.

Cantonese (cunning, opportunistic, innovative, selfish, lacking courage)

Hakka (good natured, reserved, diplomatic, not witty, dull minded)

Hoklo (aggressive, fierce, bold, morally inept, lacking insight)

Cantonese always lived in the flatlands. Hakkas mostly resided in the hills. Hoklos made their homes by the sea or coastal areas.

Another group known as the Tanka make their homes on boats, they are very small in numbers and had no major impact in the evolution of the Cantonese culture.

Looking back....Tang Dynasty,

Yep, how does this pan out to the various groups of Chinese Americans? The younger generations will assimilate and call themselves AAs. The divisiveness only occurs in China or in Chinatowns, where immigrants congregated with only those who speak the same dialect or those who hail from the same region of China.

Btw, I'm a very "mixed" Chinese individual, so I know about the differences between the various groups. My grandfather on my mother side is Toisan, my grandmother is 50% Hakka. My dad and his family were from Chaozhou. Despite all of this , I identify myself as Chinese American or AA, and not with any of those groups mentioned.

Rivalry among the Chinese Thursday, February 28, 2002 at 17:57:35 (PST)

There was a poster questioning why some Taiwanese don't call themselves Chinese or think of themselves as Chinese.

I don't want to dive too much into a history lesson or genetics or stray too far from the topic (comparing Asian nationalities). But, I will write briefly.

There may be several reasons. I am Taiwanese-American. I have researched my bloodline. It turns out I am a mixture of Southern Chinese from Zhangzhou, Fujian; Quanzhou, Fujian, but also have Austronesian blood (original people in Taiwan) and Dutch blood (Jan Huygen van Linschoten). This combination is not unusual in Taiwan. During the Ching dynasty (when my Chinese ancestors moved to Taiwan) immigration was outlawed. But, my ancestors were single Chinese males, as were many Southern Fujianese men. They came as laborers to work for the Dutch (who at that time controlled Taiwan)- These Fujianese men married Austronesian women. Some of the Dutch also married Austronesian women. The off spring of both the Chinese/Austronesian and Dutch/Austronesian mixed. Many accounts of these are written in many books and articles including one by Dr. Kiyoshi Ito (yes, he's Japanese). While genetic studies show that many Taiwanese are a mixed (hybrid)- including studies by Dr. Marie Lin of the MacKay Memorial Hospital in Taiwan and Dr. Albert Chu, MD of St. Louis University School of Medicine.

Interesting enough, there is a Taiwanese folk saying that goes as "U Tang ah-gong, bo Tang ah-ma" translating to "We've got Mainland grandfathers, but no Mainland grandmothers. This folk saying is not far from reality. Interesting enough they referred to China/Chinese as "Tang" just as the Cantonese and other Southern Chinese. Additionally, Taiwan was and is a paternal society- so you would trace your ancestry paternally rather than maternally (which often overlooks many other genes/bloods- which often came in maternally).

But, the point is: ethnicity cannot simply be defined by blood. Even so, many Taiwanese have actually a hybrid blood- that includes Chinese blood, but you can't discount other blood. Then, there are questions of identity. Granted, there are also many Taiwanese who are asserting their identity because of political motives as well. However, defining one's ethnicity can be rather subjective.

I'm not trying to make any political statement here, just presenting one angle.
Taiwanese who is part Southern Chinese , part Austronesian, part Dutch Thursday, February 28, 2002 at 09:19:46 (PST)

"The vast majority [in Taiwan] still know they are ethnically Chinese."

Ethnicity is such a tricky thing. New ethnicity has always been formed out of older ones. We could go on (back & forth) whether Taiwanese are Chinese or not (depending on how you define ethnicity). Truly, you could make legitimate arguments on both sides.

What Is "Chinese?" Wednesday, February 27, 2002 at 20:19:44 (PST)

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