What does it mean to be Hakka in Taiwan,mainland China, and Southeast Asia? A new book of essays examines the cultural and historical identity of this Chinese ethnic group that numbers in the tens of millions.
Hakka, literally "guest people" or, by extension, "strangers" are the descendants of Han Chinese who migrated from north China in five successive movements southward, beginning in 317 and ending in the second half of the 19th century. The majority, however, fled south to escape the nomadic invasions into their homelands around the turn of the 10th century, at the end of the Tang dynasty. Editor Nicole Constable and her six co-authors, all but one of whom are anthropologists, consider the question of Hakka identity. In her introductory chapter, Constable takes issue with the generally accepted answer: that Hakka are simply those who call themselves Hakka, or who are so labeled by others. This is, she believes, insufficient.
Seven subsequent chapters examine the cultural and historical construction of Hakka identity, and its social, political, and economic relevance in different locales and contexts. Myron Cohen's contribution, a reprint from work done in 1962, examines the role of dialect in Southeast China. Because the original piece was written in fulfillment of requirements for Cohen's master's degree in anthropology, the general reader is apt to find some of the technical terminology daunting. Still, the author's major points are clear: Those who migrated from the north found lands already occupied by indigenous populations who, in contrast to the Mandarin spoken by Hakka, employed dialects including Cantonese, Wu, Chaochou, and variants thereof.
In some cases, the newcomers arrived in areas where their presence exceeded the capacity of the land to absorb them. Even where this was not the situation, locals typically asserted prior rights to potentially usable fields and were able to limit the quantity and quality of land available to the migrants. Not surprisingly, this caused frictions between old and new inhabitants. Early 18th century sources indicate that by 1730, Hakka and Cantonese lived interspersed over a wide area of Guangdong province, and that there was considerable violence between the two populations. According to several 19th- century Western observers, Hakka, whatever their level of eminence in their own community, would participate in these confrontations, whereas wealthy Cantonese would hire the less economically prosperous members of their groups to fight for them.
Although allowing that the sort of conflicts that occurred in southeast China during the 19th century might have taken place, albeit in different form, even if the area had been composed of only one dialect group, Cohen concludes that the bonds of dialect cut across ties of kin, class, and residence, and subsumed groupings that resulted from different historical processes.
As latecomers, Hakka were typically obliged to farm the more marginal lands that locals were less interested in protecting. Some landlords were also willing to lease their less productive holdings to Hakka, but only in exchange for a substantial rental fee. Such exigencies may account for the widely-held belief that Hakka are characterized by a penchant for hard work and frugality: these traits were necessary for survival. Hakka women are reputed to be especially hard workers. Unlike the rest of Chinese society, Hakka women did not bind their feet. Since women with "lily feet" could not work in the fields, the practice of foot-binding represented a form of conspicuous consumption that the Hakka could ill afford. Hakka women's contributions to their families economic well-being also gave them a voice in familial decision-making. Although this fell well short of equality, it was nonetheless greater than that of more cloistered Chinese women.
Two separate studies of Hakka communities in Hong Kong's New Territories present striking contrasts. Elizabeth Lominska Johnson's examination of the Hakka of Tsuen Wan, on the southwestern side of the New Territories, finds the inhabitants firmly convinced that they are the indigenous people of the area. They refer to themselves as pentujen, literally original people of the place, vis-à-vis pentijen, which has the same meaning for Cantonese speakers.
The inhabitants of Tsuen Wan do not assume that language affiliation, the basis of their ethnic identity, is fixed. Several of Johnson's interviewees asserted that some of the Tsuen Wan lineages were originally Hoklo or Cantonese, but became Hakka over time. Likewise, a Hakka lineage was said to have become Chaochou after emigrating to Southeast Asia. Tsuen Wan people had not been involved in the 20th-century Hakka identity movement, which asserts the existence of essential and distinctive Hakka characteristics and a unique history. Even some of the visible manifestations of Hakka culture, acknowledged by Tsuen Wan residents to be expressions of their identity, have disappeared. These include certain features of women's clothing, including a rectangular headcloth, a flat hat with a back cloth fringe, and an apron made of three panels stitched together. Hakka women no longer necessarily wear these; conversely, some non- Hakka women do wear some or all of these items.
Moreover, the heavy labor traditionally done by Hakka women, unicorn dancing (as opposed to the lion dancing of the Cantonese), and the singing of mountain songs have virtually disappeared. Hakka and non-Hakka engage in similar occupations. No one Johnson spoke to expressed a sense of being stigmatized because of being Hakka. Being Hakka was a matter of neither shame nor pride, but rather simply an aspect of their being--acknowledged, but not asserted.
In Shung Him Tong Tsuen, in the northeast quadrant of the New Territories, the situation is quite different. Nicole Constable's subjects spoke with a sense of urgency about being Hakka. They evinced a strong sense of pride in their identity, recommended books and theories about Hakka history, and recited lengthy lists of famous Hakka people to her. Constable advances a surprising reason for the high degree of Hakka consciousness among Shung Him Tong residents: they are Christians.
For unknown reasons, the missionaries of the Basel Evangelical Society who arrived in China in the mid-19th century chose to focus their efforts on Hakka speakers. The mission, churches, and schools they founded created a new social context in which Hakka identity could be expressed. Members of the new social group had not only their religious views in common, but also their language and the label Hakka. Moreover, since conversion to Christianity was considered an act that alienated individuals from their Chinese roots, the separate identity of the converts was reinforced. They destroyed idols, ceased to perform prescribed rituals, no longer contributed to local shrines and temples, and even stopped worshipping their ancestors.
The local cemetery, a place of great community pride, actually represents a synthesis of traditional and Christian beliefs. Easter, specifically linked by residents with Ching Ming, the annual ceremony of sweeping the ancestral graves, brings the entire church family together to visit the tombs, arrange floral offerings, and sing hymns. Elderly worshippers commented that they would be pleased to be buried there since, even if their descendants forgot them, they would be guaranteed a visit from the church family at least once a year.
Ironically, at the same time Christianity made Shung Him Tong Tsuen's residents feel more Hakka, it made them less traditionally Hakka in terms of dress and customs. However, villagers subscribe to the stereotype of themselves as harder-working, more frugal, and more honest than their Cantonese neighbors. They believe that, if the Cantonese are wealthier than they, it is not because Hakka lack good business sense but because, as good Christians and good Hakka, they do not consider wealth to the ultimate measure of success. Both sexes are proud of the fact that Hakka women work hard; some feel that the reason is that Hakka males tend to be lazy and helpless.
Sharon Carstens' research into the Malaysian Hakka community of Pulai (on the northeastern coast of the Malaysian Peninsula, just south of the Thai border) also yielded some surprises. Carstens had studied the Hakka tongue in Taiwan; attended Hakka weddings, festivals, and folk-singing competitions; and elicited stereotypes about Hakka from both Hakka and non-Hakka. Arriving in Pulai, she found that the inhabitants spoke a dialect very different from the one that she had studied. In addition, they did not understand the folk songs she had taped, and had little to say about differences between Hakka and other dialect groups in Malaysia, no matter how much she asked. Their attachment was to Pulai as a historic, geographic, and cultural entity, and they saw themselves simply as poor rural Chinese in a state run by, and for, its Malay majority.
A few people were able to sing songs they identified as Hakka, and some wedding and funeral customs were observed. But when the old man who conducted them died, people remarked matter-of-factly that they would ask a Cantonese who lived nearby to conduct ceremonies.
Despite their identification with a generalized Chinese identity rather than a Hakka one, Carstens found that the people of Pulai had characteristics that were distinct from other Chinese Malaysians. First, in clear contrast to the successful entrepreneur stereotype of the Chinese in Malaysia, Pulai people preferred to rely on subsistence rice- farming, and several told the author that they had no head for business. Second, the political and economic orientation of the community was unusually egalitarian. Carstens suspects that this may have been a factor predisposing Pulai people to sympathize with, and give help to, the communist guerrillas--a crime which the Malaysian government suspected them of. Third, Pulai women routinely engaged in heavy agricultural labor. This did not translate into an enhanced position in community affairs, with one exception: a women's organization sponsored its own worship service during the Pulai festival honoring Kuanyin, the Goddess of Mercy.
These distinctive features aside, Carstens notes that intermarriage between different Chinese dialect groups within Malaysia has been increasing. This would seem to portend a continuation of the erosion between the cultural patterns of Hakka and non-Hakka. Attempts to reverse this process would require more conscious efforts to retain cultural distinctiveness than currently exist.
The Hakka of Calcutta, in Ellen Oxfeld's study, present a very different picture. The three different Chinese communities in that city are quite distinct in both language and economic specializations. Cantonese are primarily associated with carpentry, Hubeinese with dentistry, and Hakka with tanning in the leather industry. The Chinese are not unique in being tied to particular economic niches--different Indian castes and dialect groups are as well. This has been explained as a function of Calcutta's economy of scarcity. Because there are not enough jobs to go around, people tend to cling as closely as they can to the occupation identified with their group, and to count on fellow members for support.
The Hakka, as well as other Calcutta Chinese groups, have a status system based entirely on wealth. In sharp contrast to the Hong Kong and Malaysian Hakka described in previous chapters, Calcutta Hakka place high value on entrepreneurial skills. In families that become wealthy, there is a tendency for women to participate less actively in the daily operations of the business, thus also modifying the stereotype of the hardworking Hakka female.
Howard Martin's study of Hakka in Taiwan describes a more nuanced pattern of relationships. Unlike the Hakka populations described earlier, the Taiwan Hakka movement is not located within a well-defined community: its leaders appeal to all Hakka on the island. Hakka are simultaneously members of an open society with a strong consumer ethos, which pushes its members toward assimilation with other Chinese groups. Taiwan's Hakka are not characterized by violence, different appearance, the practice of heterodox religions, or economic marginalization. The Hakka movement in Taiwan rose out of the perception that Hakka interests were excluded from the bargaining process between mainlanders and Taiwanese about power and privilege.
Martin identifies three overlapping and non-antagonistic factions within Taiwan's Hakka movement: traditionalists, moderates, and radicals. Traditionalists believe that the world's Hakka population is, or should be, one--and that all Hakka groups should stay in touch with each other. They are hence more in sympathy with the Kuomintang (KMT) position on unification with mainland China--and perhaps, although the author does not say so, even more with the New Party position--than they are with that of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), many of whose members favor an independent Taiwan.
Moderates hold that the differences between the Hakka on Taiwan and those who live on the mainland are simply too great to bridge. They feel that neither the KMT nor the DPP will respond to Hakka interests unless pressured to do so. Properly organized, moderates contend, the Hakka could constitute a swing vote, thus exercising considerable leverage beyond their actual numbers.
The radicals are, Martin points out, radical only in contrast to the traditionalists and moderates. They think of themselves as democrats and pluralists. There is a range of differences within their views, but most radicals endorse an independent Taiwan, a strong Hakka presence in national politics, and the creation of a new Hakka identity on the island. The words of a Hakka anthem written by one radical leader are critical of members of their group who hark back to glorious exploits on the mainland. Taiwan, not China, is home.
One of the few issues on which members of the Hakka movement agree is the need to arrest the decline of the Hakka tongue. However, as noted by Sharon Carstens with relation to the Hakka of Malaysia, strong social and economic forces continue to erode differences, including linguistic differences, among the different Chinese groups of Taiwan.
Ninety percent of the approximately 37 million Hakka speakers live within the borders of the People's Republic of China (PRC), most of them in western Fujian, eastern Guangdong, and southern Jiangxi. The communist government does not classify Hakka as an ethnic minority, and indeed they would object if the government did. They point out that, having fled to avoid barbarian invasions from the north and having intermarried but little with the peoples they found in the south, Hakka are more authentically Han than any other group in China. Linguists have confirmed that present-day Hakka more closely approximates the Mandarin spoken in the Tang and Sung dynasties than that currently accepted as standard on both the mainland and Taiwan.
Because they are not regarded as a separate group, the government has no special policies for the Hakka, and until recently almost nothing was written about them. In the final chapter of this book, Mary Erbaugh points out that the word Hakka is a hostile Cantonese coinage denoting impoverished wanderers, and carrying the same connotations as gypsy or Okie in the West. What is not publicly voiced, but is nonetheless a matter of pride for those citizens of the PRC who are conscious of their background, is the role of Hakka in the communist revolution. Six of the nine main soviet bases were in Hakka areas; the Long March led largely Hakka-speaking soldiers from Hakka village to Hakka village up through Sichuan; and a disproportionate number of heroes of the revolution, including marshals Chu De, Chen Yi (and, although the author does not mention him in this list, Ye Jianying), were Hakka. The most prominent Hakka figure in the PRC today is Deng Xiaoping. Yet not even in a forty-one volume set of biographies of party heroes is the Hakka background of these or other prominent individuals mentioned.
As those who study mainland politics are painfully aware, because something is not publicly stated does not mean it does not exist. Though Erbaugh does not mention it, Ye Jianying was able to employ his Hakka connections, as well as, interestingly, his Cantonese connections, to make himself virtually impregnable to attacks by his fellow Hakka, Deng Xiaoping. After Ye's death, a memorial hall--perhaps the communist equivalent of an ancestral temple--was constructed in his honor in Meixian, the heartland of the mainland's Hakka. Ye's son became governor of Guangdong province and accepted a position in Beijing only after being able to appoint a long-time family retainer to succeed him as governor.
This official silence, however, presents Erbaugh, the only linguist among the contributors to this volume, with a difficult task. She hypothesizes that Deng Xiaoping's policy of opening China to the outside world provided an important stimulus for the revival of Hakka consciousness. The word Hakka first appeared in the headlines of the People's Daily in 1991, soliciting overseas funding for construction projects in Meixian, a Hakka folk festival, and the Hakka history section of a proposed Beijing Museum of Overseas Chinese History. Coming out has its pitfalls, however. Erbaugh notes that anti- communist Cantonese excoriate the Long March by calling it the Hakka Road, refer sneeringly to Mao Zetung's (non-existent) Hakka origins, and denounce Deng Xiaoping as "that little Hakka."
She might also have observed that encouraging the revival of a dormant group identity may be a decision that the mainland government will come to regret, especially when it involves funding from outside sources. As several recent examples have shown, groups who receive external funding have been able to use it to establish a degree of autonomy.
These chapters add valuable historical detail and cultural context to be our knowledge of the Hakka. There seems no generalization about the Hakka that holds true in all cases. Some groups seem to be losing their identity and are unconcerned about it. Others are rediscovering that identity, despite the risks it may pose. Still others have had their identity reinforced through outside forces, even though those forces have significantly modified Hakka traditions. Some Hakka say that they are poor because they have no business sense; some because they eschew the pursuit of wealth. Other Hakka value entrepreneurship and have become prosperous. Ironically, in the end the authors' research reinforces the validity of the definition of Hakka that Constable's introductory chapter finds too simplistic: Hakka are those who call themselves Hakka or who are so labeled by others.
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June Teufel Dreyer teaches at the University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida. The second edition of her latest book, China's Political System: Modernization and Tradition, was published by Allyn & Bacon in 1996.