Hakka - Orientation



Identification. "Hakka" is the Yue (Cantonese) pronunciation of the term that translates literally as "guests" or "stranger families" or, less literally, as "settlers" or "newcomers." The name "Hakka" (in Mandarin, "Kejia") is likely to have originated from the descriptive term used before the seventeenth century in population registers to distinguish recent immigrants from earlier Yue inhabitants. During the nineteenth century, in certain contexts, the term "Hakka" carried negative implications, but by the early twentieth century, following a period of ethnic mobilization, "Hakka" became more widely accepted as an ethnic label.


Location. Hakka are widely scattered throughout the southeastern provinces of the People's Republic of China (PRC), but most are concentrated in northeastern Guangdong, east of the North River, in the mountainous, less fertile region of Meizhou Prefecture. Meizhou, which includes the seven predominantly Hakka counties that surround Meixian (located at approximately 24° N and 116° E), is considered the Hakka "heartland" and is claimed by many Hakka as their native place. Sizable Hakka populations are also found in southwestern Fujian, southern Jiangxi, eastern Guangxi, Hainan Island, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and, in lesser numbers, in regions of Sichuan and Hunan. By the twentieth century Hakka could be found on virtually every continent, from South and Southeast Asia and the Pacific to Europe, North and South America, Africa, and the Caribbean.


Demography. Estimated at over 38 million in the People's Republic of China in 1990, the Hakka population accounts for approximately 3.7 percent of the total Chinese population. In 1992, the International Hakka Association placed the total Hakka population worldwide at approximately 75 million.


Linguistic Affiliation. Today many Hakka throughout the world no longer speak Hakka, but traditionally the Hakka language was the single most important cultural feature that served to distinguish Hakka from other Chinese. The version of Hakka dialect spoken in Meixian is considered the standard form and can be transcribed into standard Chinese characters as well as other Chinese vernaculars. While many Hakka claim that the Hakka language is more like Mandarin than Cantonese is, linguists classify Hakka as Southern Chinese along with Yue and Min (Hokkien) languages, signifying that these dialects developed from a variety of Chinese spoken in southern China between the first and third centuries A.D. Hakka, once classified by linguists as part of the Gan-Kejia Subgroup, is now considered a separate category.

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