Society-TAIWAN-HOKKIEN

The Taiwan Hokkien consist of the Hokkien-speaking peasant villagers
of Taiwan, China's largest and most important island. Taiwan is located
on the Tropic of Cancer (lat. 23 degrees 30 min. N) in South China,
and is separated from the mainland by the Formosa Strait. The island
is about 230 miles long and 90 miles wide, consisting mostly of a
high range of rugged mountains occupying the central area and the
east coast.

During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, Taiwan was the home
base for Chinese and Japanese pirates who attacked shipping in the
South China Sea. Chinese from Fukien and Kwangtung provinces began
to emigrate to Taiwan in large numbers in the seventeenth century.
During this same period, the Dutch, Spanish, and Portuguese vied for
control of the island. Taiwan was made an independent kingdom of China
in 1661, a district of Fukien in 1683, and an independent province
of China in 1886. The island was ceded to Japan in 1895, at the end
of the Sino-Japanese war, but was returned to the Republic of China
in 1945. When the Communists conquered mainland China in 1949, Chiang
Kai-shek and the Nationalist government took refuge in Taiwan and
made Taipei their capital.

The four main languages spoken in Taiwan are Japanese, Taiwanese,
Mandarin, and Hakka. Taiwanese is spoken by 80 percent of the population.
The term Taiwanese (also Min-nan and Formosan Chinese) refers to the
Hokkien, i.e., those Chinese-speaking people who emigrated between
1600 and 1890 to Taiwan from the mainland southeast coastal province
of Fukien. There are two Hokkien dialects in Taiwan, which are mutually
intelligible. Mandarin is the official language of the government
and is used in the schools.

The total population of Taiwan in 1966 was 13,383,357. Although no
population statistics are available specifically for the Hokkien in
Taiwan, they are included in the Taiwanese category (along with the
Hakka), which comprises 86 percent of the total population (Barnett
1971: 62). The Hokkien are the major ethnic group on the island. Since
the beginning of the twentieth century, the population has been increasing,
due to a high birth rate (which is now decreasing), and also due to
a dramatic decline in the mortality rate, attributed primarily to
better public health facilities and improved sanitation.

Individual villagers are members of chia (families) and hu (households),
which are not necessarily coterminous. The average size of a chia
is 5.8 members. The chia are organized into a series of distinct agnatic
corporate groups. Persons with the same surname are considered to
be agnates having a common ancestor in the male line. Surname exogamy
is absolute. Historically, villages were often composed of people
with the same surname, but today this has changed.

Several hu are combined into lin (neighborhoods), and each lin has
a lin chang (a neighborhood leader), who is selected by consensus.
Above the lin is the li (ward), headed by the li chang (mayor). The
next higher level of administration is the township council. The mayor
and the representative to the township council are both elected officials.
One of the most significant units of government is the ts'un (village).
Even though the ts'un has few functions, it is the prime identification
unit for the rural Taiwanese. The ts'un functions as a registration
unit for land and as a postal address. The levels of government above
the ts'un are hsiang (township); ch'u (district); hsien (county);
sheng (province); and the Republic of China.

Historically, self-government on the local level has been a significant
part of the Chinese system, because the federal government rarely
extended as influence below the county level. Today, there are still
significant elements of traditional local control. Changes in the
election system include secret elections, majority vote, female suffrage,
and voting individually rather than by families. Even though national
government policies directly affect the villagers, they often do not
participate in national affairs.

The family is considered to be the most important social group, and
kinship units are significant factors in the social life of the village.
Certain changes in the society, however, are gradually affecting family
life, especially in the cities. These changes include urbanization
and industrialization, the increase of female education, the Land
Reform Program that was started in 1949, and contact with foreign
ideas. Among the rural population, many aspects of traditional family
life still remain, and the family is still the basic unit of social
security. The chia is the basic economic unit and consists of those
persons who are related by birth, marriage, or adoption, have common
property, and a common budget. The hu includes temporary residents,
such as distant relatives, servants, or workers. The Chinese kinship
system is classified as patrilocal, patrilineal, and patriarchal.
Although the extended family is the traditional ideal type of family,
two other families are preferred today in rural Taiwan--the stem family
and the nuclear family.

Kinship ties beyond the household are also important, particularly
with ch'in tsu (patrilineally related kin). The largest patrilineal
descent group is the tsu (clan). Members of the same tsu have the
same surname, they may be united through a common ancestral temple,
and they may live in the same community. In the past, the tsu was
comprised of many hundreds of people, spread out over a wide geographical
area. During the Japanese occupation (1895-1945), many clan functions
(political, educational, protective) were superseded by administrative
institutions. As a result, clans today are neither large nor numerous.

The economy of Taiwan is based mainly on agriculture and industry.
The central government enacted legislation to encourage economic development
and to provide for the equalization of land ownership through land
reform and the restriction of private capital.

Agricultural development has been sufficient both to feed the population
of Taiwan and have surpluses for export and industrial processing.
The most important agricultural products are rice, tropical fruits,
sugar, tea, and sweet potatoes. Pigs and poultry are raised, and fishing
has increased in scope and scale. The dairy industry has only recently
been introduced. Almost half of the population live on farms and are
engaged in farming, but increasing industrialization has changed the
structure of Taiwan's economy to such an extent that the contribution
of industry now exceeds that of agriculture.

Although religion is a major influence in their lives, most Taiwanese
do not participate in organized religions. Their religion is a combination
of Confucianism and animism, permeated with Taoist elements and often
placed in a Buddhist framework. Ancestor worship is a focal point
of Confucianism and animism. Animism and magic both play an important
part in the folk beliefs and practices of the rural people. The peasants
believe that the world is inhabited by benevolent and malevolent spirits
of animals, forces of nature, and human beings. Shamans and mediums
are used by the villagers to deal with these supernatural forces.
Many converts to Christianity have been made both by Protestantism
and Roman Catholicism.

Culture summary by Heather M. Fellows



Barnett, William Kester.
 An ethnographic description of Sanlei Ts'un, Taiwan, with emphasis on women's roles, overcoming research problems caused by the presence of a great tradition.
 Ann Arbor, University Microfilms, 1971.
 3, 15, 565 l.illus., tables.
 (University Microfilms Publications, no.
 71-2026) Dissertation (Anthropology) -- Michigan State University, 1970.


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