Talk:Chinese people

Define "China" in lead section

My rewritten text included the following sentence, which was removed by User:Beardfrun:

While China most typically refers to the People's Republic of China in contemporary usage, the name can also refer to Taiwan, Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, or other areas in East Asia currently or historically considered Chinese.

Since that sentence was removed, there are no links to Taiwan, Hong Kong, or Macau on the page (nor to East Asia or Mainland China, but those are less central to the notion of "Chinese people"). Notwithstanding Beardfrun's edit summary, "Most of these are explained in the three sections below," there is no explanation of the somewhat controversial relationships among these places on the page. It's my personal opinion that nuanced explanations are not really necessary on this page, but there should be links to pages where the details are explained. Cnilep (talk) 00:01, 25 July 2014 (UTC)

What about China (geographical region) or Chinese civilisation? 203.145.95.250 (talk) 12:57, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

It refers, doesn't it?

Recently User:Bhny edited the lead section with the somewhat elliptical edit summary "WP:REFERS". According to the essay "Writing better articles", leads should avoid the wording "Foo refers to..." in favor of "Foo is...". However, according to the same section of the same page, "Disambiguation pages mention the term, so in such cases it is correct to write "The term Great Schism refers to" etc.

This page is a WP:DABCONCEPT, which might be thought of as an article with disambiguation page-like function. One of the canonical examples of a broad concept article, Football, begins, "Football refers to a number of sports" etc. However, another canonical example, Particle begins, "In the physical sciences, a particle is a small localized object" etc.

So, is this page about the label Chinese people and the various things that refers to, or is it about the concept of Chinese people? Cnilep (talk) 04:07, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the link to dabconcept. I still think my edit was correct as the whole lead is just one sentence with one meaning. If there were a few distinct meanings, "refers to" would make sense, otherwise it is redundant. Most of the examples on dabconcept don't say "refers to". The lead to this article actually needs expanding and if this results in multiple meanings, "refers" might be appropriate. Bhny (talk) 15:48, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

Qing Opening to the Ocean

Another editor added The Qing Opening to the Ocean: Chinese Maritime Policies, 1684–1757 to the References section. Since it was not cited as a reference for material in the article, I moved it to Further reading.

I'm not sure whether the book is relevant to the topic of Chinese people. I've not read the book, but a review in the International Journal of Maritime History calls it a useful history of "the Chinese state's attitudes toward maritime trade in the seventeenth and eighteenth century". This does not sound specifically relevant the topic of Chinese people. Cnilep (talk) 03:53, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

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"Greater China" again

I undid these edits "per cited source". Whether to refer to "China", "Greater China", or a specific set of nation-states has been a point of contention on this page, as is common in articles touching on history and politics. In the past another editor placed a "citation needed" tag on the claim that Chinese people refers to Greater China. Harry Harding's article, "The concept of 'greater China'", specifically addresses that claim. Harding suggests that the term Greater China emerged in the 1980s, primarily to refer to "rapidly increasing interaction among Chinese societies around the world". He notes that the reference of the term varies, with some people using it to refer to "commercial ties among ethnic Chinese", others to "overseas Chinese", and still others to a set of places: Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, and China, sometimes also including Singapore.

The definition of Chinese people might be said to encompass people from "any regions or countries historically associated with 'China'", but the currently cited source makes no such claim. Cnilep (talk) 05:15, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

Infobox

The Infobox listing numbers of Chinese people in various countries seems inappropriate for this page. The point this page makes is that the phrase Chinese people can refer to various things (nationality, ethnicity, ancestry, etc.). Therefore a list of thirty-odd countries with citations to twenty-six different sources almost certainly mixes different meanings. @Lysimachi: added the box, and @Lemongirl942: once removed it then later modified its contents. I'd like to hear their opinions and work out a consensus with other editors before making any more changes. Cnilep (talk) 02:14, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

@Cnilep:: I don't have very strong preference as to whether those numbers must be put here, but as far as I know all those references mention "Chinese" (in English or other languages), so this is definitely the page where they fit the best. Note that similar numbers can be found in pages such as Vietnamese people, Taiwanese people and Japanese people. I don't see why those numbers cannot be listed here. Lysimachi (talk) 13:52, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

By the way, the reference for Taiwan doesn't say there are "22,287,000" "Chinese" in Taiwan. I doubt its verifiability. Lysimachi (talk) 13:56, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

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Recent page move, redirect, etc.

Patience is appreciated for this somewhat complicated history:

On 30 November 2016 User:Prisencolin changed this article, replacing all content with a redirect to Han Chinese. The edit summary read, "WP:POVFORK of several better written articles, 'Chinese people' is probably WP:PRIMARYREDIRECT into Han Chinese, links won't really be broken due to overlapping meaning". That same day I reversed the change, leaving the edit summary, "Undid revision 752245025 by Prisencolin (talk) de facto article deletion".

I also left a comment at User talk:Prisencolin#Chinese people. In addition to noting my 'undo', I expressed my opinion that the term "Chinese people" refers not only to Han Chinese but also to other ethnic groups and nationalities. I then added Category:Broad-concept articles to the article to reflect the fact that the article treats many related meanings of its title. See Wikipedia:Broad-concept article.

My comment at the User talk page received no reply between 30 November and today (4 January). There was also no discussion on the article talk page, or anywhere else as far as I know.

On 3 January Prisencolin moved 'Chinese people' first to 'Chinese people (including minorities)' and then to Chinese people (in general) several hours later. The edit summary of the first move stated, "WP:BOLD, this is sort of a pov fork, WP:PRIMARYREDIRECT into han"; the second noted "sounds pov". Chinese people is currently a redirect to Han Chinese, as it was briefly on 30 November.

It is my opinion that the disambiguator "(in general)" suggests, contra Prisencolin's edit summaries, that this page treats the primary, albeit vague meaning. As I have suggested, Han is a synonym of one common meaning of Chinese people, but the phrase has other equally common meanings, including "citizens of China", "Chinese ethnic groups", and "overseas Chinese" among others.

It would be helpful to hear from users such as User:Beardfrun, User:Lysimachi, User:Lemongirl942, or others who have opinions about the content of this article. Cnilep (talk) 02:21, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Han Chinese is the subset of Chinese people that are most likely to be associated with the term, thus can be considered a form of WP:PRIMARYREDIRECT. Yes the distinctions between ethnicity, ancestry, and nationality are hazy, but the plain fact is that the Han make up a supermajority of "citizens of China", "Chinese ethnic groups", and "overseas Chinese" and other contexts about "Chinese" and "people". The second paragraph of the WP:BCA says: "However, if the primary meaning of a term proposed for disambiguation is a broad concept or type of thing that is capable of being described in an article, and a substantial portion of the links asserted to be ambiguous are instances or examples of that concept or type, then the page located at that title should be an article describing it, and not a disambiguation page. Where the primary topic of a term is a general topic that can be divided into subtopics, ..., the unqualified title should contain an article about the general topic rather than a disambiguation page." Idea that Chinese primarily means Han is controversial, but as far as the numbers game goes it's not meant to be chauvinist, neo-colonialist or anything else negative. Additionally, considering the current quality of this article, it's probably better to point our readers towards a more complete article that is mostly overlapping with with one. It's either that or perhaps the Han article itself should just be re-titled "Chinese people".--Prisencolin (talk) 03:57, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I personally think this kind of a move requires an RFC. Technically speaking Han Chinese is a subset of Chinese people. And the term Chinese people is an ambiguous term applying to both ethnicity (in this case referring to Han Chinese) and nationality (in this case referring to citizens of PRC). I have asked to revert the move as it needs a discussion. Personally, I think an encyclopaedia should help readers understand the differences and nuances in the terms. --Lemongirl942 (talk) 01:31, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

One thing that bothers me and seems rather inaccurate is that the Chinese page linked to this article refers to Chinese nationals (中國人 Zhōngguórén) specifically whereas the more general term for Chinese people regardless of specific ethnicity or nationality (華人 Huárén) is linked to a rather awkward disambiguation page titled Ethnic Chinese. For clarification, while "Han people" is technically an ethnic subset of the Chinese people as you guys pointed out, the Chinese term Huárén more broadly covers Han and all the other ethnic groups traditionally considered Chinese regardless of nationality. However, these terms get mixed up between many Chinese people I know, both in Chinese and English. Many believe Huá people is 100% interchangeable with Hàn people due again, to the predominance of the Hàn in making up the Chinese people. Many Mainland Chinese make no distinction between Chinese nationals (中國人 Zhōngguórén) and people of the Chinese civilization (華人 Huárén), a distinction that Hong Kong people, Taiwanese people, Chinese Americans, Chinese Canadians, and other overseas Chinese take pains to make. Contrary to this article, usage of the term Huárén is not limited to Southeast Asia and is prevalent in all Chinese communities outside of Mainland China.

My point is that first, I don't think it makes sense for there to be a disambiguation page titled Ethnic Chinese. An ethnic Chinese is technically a Han Chinese. Rather, this page, covering the broad term "Chinese" that in English can refer to ethnic identity (漢人 Hànrén) , cultural identity (華人 Huárén), or nationality (中國人 Zhōngguórén) could be the disambiguation instead. "Ethnic Chinese (disambiguation)" could be merged with this page with the Chinese interwiki link at 華人 Huárén, and this page becomes simply a disambiguation page. A different page could be set up for Chinese nationality (中國人 Zhōngguórén).

If not, and if you guys believe that the primary topic of "Chinese people" is some vague meaning encompassing all ethnic groups conventionally grouped under the Chinese civilization and cultural identity, then this page should remain a full-fledged article, albeit linked with the Chinese page on 華人 Huárén since this is the technical and common term in the Chinese language for this broad meaning. I am of the opinion that in English, when we say "Chinese" we mean Chinese in a very broad and generalized sense, not referring particularly to either ethnicity or nationality, but rather either or. This is why I believe that the primary topic for Chinese people is 華人 Huárén not "Chinese nationals" (中國人 Zhōngguórén) as the current Chinese interwiki link would imply for the readers. Sol Pacificus (talk) 02:54, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

Should it be Chinese peoples instead? 203.145.95.250 (talk) 13:19, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

DNA section

Is this new subsection on DNA/Prima Nocta really appropriate here? This isn't my area. The content seems weirdly sourced. Jessicapierce (talk) 06:12, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

Article quality

It has come to my attention that this article is written fairly poorly in comparison to several other nationality-related articles. For example, there isn't a statistics-infobox on the right. Also, the demographics are covered very briefly throughout the article. Jargo Nautilus (talk) 05:16, 4 December 2019 (UTC)

Picture of porter

This image has been repeatedly removed even though it is appropriate for the page. It is an image of a Chinese man, on a page about Chinese people. The first person to remove the image is a user that has referred to Chinese people as "ugly". The second person to remove the image is a person who has referred to a Javanese man as a "Dirty barbaric flat nosed indonesian javanese subhuman". The individuals who have removed this image are clearly not here to contribute productively, and therefore I see no rational justification for the image's removal.

Further, Koreans and Vietnamese people are examples of articles that place an image of a person from that demographic at the top of the article.

—Tookabreather (talk) 22:54, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

The editor who recently removed this picture (Namwonyap) also vandalised the article by inserting a photograph of Javanese people with the following caption: "Dirty barbaric flat nosed indonesian javanese subhuman with its wife." I don't believe that their opposition to the inclusion of this image of a Chinese porter should be taken seriously. Edit: The editor's account was confirmed as a sockpuppet account today and they have been indefinitely banned. Jargo Nautilus (talk) 05:11, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Edit protected

To add {{failed verification}} after the refs for Hong Kong, Macau and Singapore in the line "Han Chinese people also comprise approximately 95%, 92%, 89% and 74% of the population of Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau and Singapore respectively". The sources refer only to Chinese rather than Han. 203.145.95.250 (talk) 13:15, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

 Done, except with {{better source needed}}. ◢  Ganbaruby!  (Say hi!) 01:06, 19 January 2021 (UTC)

It's doubtful if such sources ever exist. That isn't asked in censuses, and no research has ever looked into the other fifty-five "nationalities" as identified in the People's Republic in these three countries. 219.76.24.202 (talk) 12:48, 19 January 2021 (UTC)

Or indeed in any other country. 219.76.24.202 (talk) 11:16, 20 January 2021 (UTC) IP hopping sock. See Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/14.0.180.170/Archive.

Merger proposal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

To not merge; distinct topics warranting separate discussion. Klbrain (talk) 07:57, 2 September 2022 (UTC)

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I propose merging Zhonghua minzu into Chinese people § Zhonghua minzu (the "Chinese nation"). A merger would not cause any article-size or weighting problems in Chinese people. --Balkovec (talk) 09:05, 6 April 2022 (UTC)

I don't think that these are the same concept, Zhonghua minzu is about the concept of a multi-ethnic "Chinese nation" and its political connotations and meaning while this article seems to be more about people from that country in a civic sense, the differences should probably be properly articulated rather than just grouped together as the same thing. While I recognise that these two concepts have significant overlapping areas they are fundamentally different things and need dedicated articles to explain these differences and their origins. --Donald Trung (talk) 09:44, 6 April 2022 (UTC)

@Donald Trung I fail to see the difference you write about between civil and political meanings. Can you clarify a little what is the difference in connotations and meaning between the terms "Chinese nation" and "Chinese people"? For a specific analysis of the population of China there is Demographics of China. For the dominant Chinese ethnic group there is Han Chinese. Balkovec (talk) 09:57, 6 April 2022 (UTC)

@Balkovec:, well, the concept of "a nation" and "a people" aren't the same, "a nation" is often seen as a monolithic ethnicity with one language and one culture, the concept of "中華民族" is supposed to be one of multiple races of people sharing the same "Chinese nation", meanwhile the idea of "the Chinese people" (中華人 / 中國人) is the idea that China is already a monolithic nation state where all members are the same homogeneous people. The idea behind "中華民族" is that multiple ethnic groups share the same civilisation, Han Chinese are just one category of people that fall under this "nation", as the article reads "Since the late 1980s, the most fundamental change of the PRC's nationalities and minorities policies is the renaming from "the Chinese People" (中国人民 or Zhōngguó rénmín) to "the Chinese Nation" (Zhōnghuá mínzú), signalling a shift away from a multi-national communist people's statehood of China to one multi-ethnic Chinese nation state with one single Chinese national identity." Where the idea of 中國 is national while 中華 is that of a civilisation that shares a nation.

A good contrast would be "Vietnamese people", there are no "Kinh Vietnamese", Vietnam is regarded as a "nation state" and all minorities are subordinate to the domination of the "民族越南" which is treated as interchangeable to the concept of Vietnam while minority kingdoms like Champa are "gloriously subjugated", the same applies to Korea, while China where the majority ethnic group are the Han Chinese or Japan where the dominant Yamato ethnicity are separate from the Japanese nation. Multi-ethnic societies have different concepts of "nations" if they seek to be a "nation state" than (supposed) monolithic / homogeneous "nation states" which tend to be solely based on the dominant ethnic group. In this concept of "the Chinese nation" other ethnic groups like the Manchu people are regarded are "equally Chinese" as the Han people, while in some chauvinistic interpretations of "Chinese people" this only includes the Han (like how "Vietnamese people" and "Korean people" are used). --Donald Trung (talk) 17:18, 6 April 2022 (UTC)

@Donald Trung, I still can not understand the need for the existence of two articles. Your example with Japan is very indicative: there is an article about the dominant Yamato ethnicity (in the case of China, this will be an article of the Han Chinese), and there is article about the Japanese nation (in the Chinese case, this will be an article of the Chinese people). Japan's nationality policy has also changed, but there is no separate 'Japanese nation' article from 'Japanese people'. Balkovec (talk) 17:31, 6 April 2022 (UTC)

@Balkovec:, my bad, I used the wrong example. What I meant to say is that nationality and "nation" isn't the same, the idea behind Zhonghua Minzu isn't the same as "Chinese people" as a nationality. For example it leads to a lot of bullshit historiography like "The concept of Zhonghua minzu nevertheless also leads to the reassessment of the role of many traditional hero figures. Heroes such as Yue Fei and Koxinga, who were originally often considered to have fought for China against barbarian incursions, have been recharacterized by some as minzu yingxiong (ethnic heroes) who fought not against barbarians but against other members of the Zhonghua minzu (the Jurchens and Manchus respectively). At the same time, China exemplified heroes such as Genghis Khan, who became a "national hero" as a member of the Zhonghua minzu." from the Zhonghua Minzu article. Meanwhile the "Chinese people" article very clearly states that it's about either "Huaren" and "Zhongguo-ren", these concepts aren't the same as "the Chinese nation", these concepts are very much specifically about the political idea of "Chinese people" as relating to the PRC, note "People from Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), may also be referred to as "Chinese" in various contexts, though they are usually referred to as "Taiwanese". The territory of Taiwan is disputed and the ROC has limited recognition of its sovereignty." while the term Zhonghua Minzu can also include Republic of China nationals.

The core issue is that "Chinese nationality" and the supposed "Chinese nation" aren't the same concept hence separate articles for them exist. Any subject of the Chinese state and their diaspora can be considered "Chinese people" while Zhonghua Minzu is the concept that argues that the subjects of this land share a cultural continuum. The latter is also a Chinese appropriation of the European concept of nationalism while the term "Chinese people" is no different from "Austro-Hungarian people" referring to people associated with a country. --Donald Trung (talk) 07:28, 7 April 2022 (UTC)

Strong Oppose and Snowball Close Zhonghua minzu includes all people of Greater China (Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan), the Chinese people includes all people with Chinese heritage (e.g. Chinese Singaporeans, Malaysian Chinese, and Chinese Americans etc.). They are not the same thing.

By the way, I noticed that this proposal was initiated by a WP:SOCK, please WP:SNOWCLOSE this discussion. Thank you. 2001:8003:9008:1301:B53A:FCA1:6300:2556 (talk) 08:32, 9 June 2022 (UTC)

Oppose Zhonghua Minzu has enough details to deserve its own article and not be merged into this one. --JasonMacker (talk) 15:38, 9 August 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Taiwan is not Roc

Please update 2600:1012:A01B:52C3:884E:4242:B949:B892 (talk) 15:39, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Requested move 17 July 2024

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) Frost 15:00, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

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Chinese people → ? – I think this article should be moved to another title, possibly something like 'Chinese people (national)', and then the current title redirected to the 'Chinese' disambiguation page, because 'Chinese people' could equally refer to this article and to the 'Han Chinese' ethnic group. PK2 (talk; contributions) 06:17, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Oppose – it isn't the case as claimed above that "Chinese people" can be used equally as equivalent to either the ethnic label "Han" or the national label "Chinese". Beyond that, fundamental issue, a parenthetical disambiguator would be the worst of all worlds. Remsense诉 06:31, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

• I oppose the title "Chinese people (national)" as confusing and unclear. What does the word "national" clarify there? For readers who are confused about the distinction between Chinese people in general and Han Chinese specifically, we already have a hatnote, and I think that's sufficient. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 13:35, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

  In multi-ethnic countries, people often have a national identity and a sub-national ethnic identity Kowal2701 (talk) 12:28, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

  That's true, but this article isn't about the national identity. It includes overseas Chinese as well as Chinese people in greater China. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 00:37, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose. Not much of a solution in search of no problem whatsoever. -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:53, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.