Taiwan - Ethnic groups



The term "Taiwanese" is often used when referring to those Chinese who are natives of the island as distinct from the 2 million "mainlanders" who migrated from China after the end of World War II. Most of the more than 20 million inhabitants of Taiwan are descendants of earlier immigrants from Fujian and Guangdong (Kwangtung) provinces in South China. They form several distinct groups. The Hakka are descendants of refugees and exiles from Guangdong who came to Taiwan before the 19th century; they are farmers and woodsmen who occupy the frontiers of settlement. The more numerous Fujians are descendants of peasants from Fujian who migrated to Taiwan in the 18th and 19th centuries; they form the bulk of the agricultural population.

The aboriginal population is primarily of Indonesian origin. They live mainly in central and eastern Taiwan. They are mainly divided into nine major tribes, with the Ami, Atayal, Paiwan, and Bunun accounting for about 88%; the balance is mainly distributed among the Puyuma, Rukai, Saisiyat, Tsou, and Yami. The language and customs of the aborigines suggest a close resemblance to the Malays.

In 1999, Taiwanese constituted 84% of the population; mainland Chinese 14%; and aborigine 2%.

Also read article about Taiwan from Wikipedia

User Contributions:

1
roden simeon
....I have just recently view a film about the indigenous people of Taiwan and I saw that there are similarities about the culture of the Igorots(inhabitants of Northern Luzon, Philippines) and to the culture of the indigenous people of Taiwan.... and I also heared rumors that Igorot people are descendants of many races.. IS there a posibility that we are really descendants of the taiwan people....
I have viewed some programmes about the various ethnics group found in Taiwan and found out some of the cultures and traditional costumes are quite similar to the Bidayuh people in Sarawak, Malaysia. I would like to exchange some words of the language spoken by the Tsou people in Taiwan for my comparasion if any have similar meaning.
3
john Ting
Can anyone from any of the nine indigenous people of Taiwan please show me where i can get a vocabulary list of word for numbers 1 to 10 and also words for "cat", "dog", "chicken", "man", "woman", "rice", "buffaloe", "bird". My great grandmother, a Dusun priestess, told me that the Dusun ancestors came from "Pogun Sina" or "China Homeland" to North Borneo a long time ago. I want to do comparison. None of the ethnic language in Yunnan match with my Dusun dialect. I am writing a book of my ancestors.

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