Hoklo people

Hoklo

Tan Goan-kong　Baosheng Dadi　Su Song　Mazu Yu Dayou　Koxinga　Lin Yutang　Tan Kah Kee
Total population
Around 60 million (est. worldwide)
Regions with significant populations
Mainland China	Fujian Guangdong Hainan
Taiwan	Majority of Taiwanese
Hong Kong	A minority population
Macao	A minority population
Malaysia	Largest group of Malaysian Chinese
Singapore	Largest group of Chinese Singaporeans
Indonesia	Largest group of Indonesian Chinese
Myanmar	One of the 3 largest groups of Burmese Chinese
Philippines	Majority of Chinese Filipinos
Languages
Hokkien of Minnan Chinese and/or Mandarin. Diaspora also speak their respective home country's language(s)
Religion
Chinese folk religions (including Taoism, Confucianism, ancestral worship and others), Mahayana Buddhism and non-religious. Minority: Christianity.

Minnan-speaking areas in South China and Taiwan. Only the speakers of Quanzhou Zhangzhou (also known as Hokkien) are seen as Hoklos.

The Hoklo people (endonym Hok-ló lâng, Hō-ló lâng, or Ho̍h-ló lâng) are Han Chinese people whose traditional ancestral homes are in southern Fujian of South China. They are also known by various endonyms (above), or other related terms such as Min-nan people (閩南人) or Hokkien people (福建人).

In a narrow scope, "Hoklo people" refers mainly to people who speak and use the Hokkien dialect of Min Nan Chinese spoken in southern Fujian, Taiwan, Singapore, and by many overseas Chinese throughout Southeast Asia. Besides, Hoklo Taiwanese is the major ethnic group of Taiwanese People.

In a wider scope, "Hoklo people" can include speakers of other Min Nan dialects, such as Zhongshan Min, Zhenan Min, Teochew dialect, and Hainanese.

Definition

In general, the Hoklo people can refer to one of the following:

In Taiwan

Main article: Hoklo Taiwanese

About 70% of the Taiwanese people descend from Hoklo immigrants who arrived to the island prior to the start of Japanese rule in 1895. They could be categorized as originating from Xiamen, Quanzhou, Zhangzhou, and Zhangpu based on their dialects and districts of origin. People from the former two areas (Quanzhou-speaking) were dominant in the north of the island and along the west coast, whereas people from the latter two areas (Zhangzhou-speaking) were dominant in the south and perhaps the central plains as well.

During the two centuries of Qing rule, a large number of Hoklo men took aboriginal brides. As some of the plains aboriginals also adopted Chinese customs and language, many of those who today categorize themselves as Hoklo have some degree of indigenous ancestry. Thus, Hoklo culture in Taiwan has deviated from that in mainland China due to Austronesian and Japanese influences.

The deep-rooted hostility between Taiwanese aborigines and (Taiwanese) Hoklo, and the Aboriginal communities effective KMT networks contribute to Aboriginal skepticism against the DPP and the Aboriginals tendency to vote for the KMT.

When Taiwanese Han "blood nationalists" tried to claim Plains Aboriginal ancestry in order to promote Taiwan independence and try to claim an identity different from that of mainland Chinese in spite of the fact that their own ancestry is overwhelmingly that of recent migrants from China and genetic tests show differences between them and plains aborigines, their claims were decidedly rejected by the actual descendants of Taiwanese Plains Aborigines, who seek to preserve their own traditional culture since the abuse of claiming their ancestry by Taiwanese "blood nationalists" to create a unique Taiwanese identity based on blood negates the actual significance of having Plains Aboriginal ancestors.

Within the Taiwanese Han Hoklo community itself, differences in culture indicate the degree to which mixture with aboriginals took place, with most Hoklo Han in Northern Taiwan having almost no Aboriginal admixture, which is limited to Hoklo Han in Southern Taiwan. Plains aboriginals who were mixed and assimilated into the Hoklo Han population at different stages were differentiated by the historian Melissa J. Brown between "short-route" and "long-route".

Indonesia and Malaysian Hoklo or Hokkien

Main article: Malaysian Chinese

Main article: Chinese Indonesians

The Hoklo or Hokkien make up one of the Malaysian Chinese groups. There are also Hokkien or Hoklo among the Chinese Indonesians.

Haifeng, Lufeng and Leizhou in Guangdong, China

The people of Leizhou and the non-Hakka people in Haifeng and Lufeng are Hoklo people, in a narrow scope, but are often being mistaken as Chaozhou/Teochew people in Hong Kong and Southeast Asia.

Chinese characters for Hoklo

In Taiwan, there are three common ways to write Hoklo in Chinese characters (Min Nan pronunciations are given in POJ), although none have been established as etymologically correct:

• 福佬 (Hok-ló; lit. "Fujian folk") – emphasizes their connection to Fujian province. This is not an accurate transliteration in terms from Hokkien itself, although it may correspond to an actual usage in Hakka.
• 河洛 (Hô-lo̍k; lit. "Yellow River and Luo River") – emphasizes their purported long history originating from the area south of the Yellow River. This transliteration is a phonologically inaccurate folk etymology; the noun Hô-lo̍k does not exist, although the Mandarin pronunciation Héluò has gained currency through the propagation of this inaccurate transliteration.
• 鶴佬 (Ho̍h-ló; lit. "crane folk") – emphasizes the modern pronunciation of the characters (without regard to the meaning of the Chinese characters); it is a phonologically accurate transliteration. This variant is used by the Chinese Wikipedia version of this article.

In Hakka, Teochew, and Cantonese, Hoklo may be written as 學老 (lit. "learned aged") and 學佬 (lit. "learned folk").

Despite the many ways to write Hoklo in Chinese, many Taiwanese will use the term Hō-ló to refer to the language and Hoklo culture.

See also

• Demographics of Taiwan
• Taiwanese people
• Teochew people
• Hokkien dialect
• Hoklo (disambiguation)