Talk:Hoa

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Contents

[edit] Majority of boat people Hoa?

I raised my eyebrows when I read that ~85% of the Vietnamese boat people actually were ethnic Chinese. I need FULL refernce on that claim, as I believe the number to be ridiculously high. My parents were boat people themselves and they believe the number to be far far off the mark. Most boat people were ethnic Vietnamese. I believe most Vietnamese that actually were boat people can confirm that fact. I am removing the statement until I see a full reference, (a longer text with the numbers in context, posted on this Talk page.) I've also got to say that I'm sorry the Vietnamese government treated the Chinese in Vietnam badly, but there is no need to play down the suffering experienced by ethnic Vietnamese. The claim that Chinese make up the majority of the boat people from Vietnam is nothing short of historical revisionism.

It is also pointed out below, that the article contains mainly citations from a Chinese Communist paper in 1982, right after the Sino-Viet war, and is highly propagandist. The number of Hoa people that left the country could hardly be millions. The total number of ethnic Vietnamese that left Vietnam after the war was around two million...Tridungvo 22:48, 17 February 2007 (UTC)


The Boat People were ethnically Vietnamese. They are classified as Hoa because they may have a grandfather or great-grandfather who was Chinese, even although all the other grandparents or great-grandparents were Vietnamese.

[edit] Neutrality

The articles contains mainly citations from a Chinese paper published in 1982, right after the Sino-Vietnam War. It is highly propagandist. Add up the number of how many Hoa people left the country, you end up in millions... LOL


[edit] Occupations

Warning! The above paragraph is very misleading. It's a bad translation of the original vietnamese paragraph. The original vietnamese paragraph is below:

"Để đối phó lại phong trào cách mạng ở miền Nam Việt Nam trong thế trận phát triển không ngừng, đế quốc Mỹ, một mặt dùng quân sự đánh phá nông thôn, khủng bố mạnh ở đô thị, tiến hành "chiến tranh đặc biệt"; mặt khác, để có chỗ dựa về chính trị, đế quốc Mỹ nuôi dưỡng và phát triển tầng lớp tư sản mại bản ở Sài Gòn - Chợ Lớn. Họ lũng đoạn nền kinh tế miền Nam, chiếm 80% cơ sở công nghiệp gia công chế biến, 90% đại lý buôn bán và 50% bán lẻ, 80% ngân hàng tín dụng, 42 công ty có số vốn trên một tỷ đồng (trước đây ở miền Nam chỉ có 60 công ty có số vốn lớn hàng tỷ đồng). Thông qua hoạt động kinh tế, giai cấp tư sản mại bản đã nắm được trong tay mình hàng vạn công nhân và có ảnh hưởng lớn đến các tầng lớp lao động khác ở thành phố Sài Gòn - Chợ Lớn."

From the book called "Chung Một Bóng Cờ" published in 1993 in Ho chi Minh city. Visit the link below see the full page which contains the paragraph (in Vietnamese): http://www.hochiminhcity.gov.vn/home/left/gioi_thieu/lich_su_van_hoa/lich_su/tp_chung_nhan_cua_dong_chay_ls/khang_chien_chong_my/nguoihoa.htm?left_menu=1 (added by an unsigned user)

Actually, no, the text was taken word for word from the Library of Congress country studies, published in 1987: [1] --Yuje 00:47, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Where did they get the statistics from?

They got the statistics from the communists. Americans are ignorant about Vietnam, and its history and culture. That's why they lost the war. All the information about Vietnam they have is from the books the vietnamese communists or other Vietnamese wrote.

I'm Vietnamese myself, and I lived in Saigon at the time. Let me tell you, Hoa people were often bullied by Vietnamese at the time. Only rich Hoa people could get away with the bullying by briding South Vietnamese Government officials for protection.

Most Hoa people of the South live in District 5 (Chinatown) of Ho Chi Minh/Saigon city but still they only accounted/account for 50% of the population of the district. Hoa people there are known as Tau Cholon. Cholon means "Big Market", and Tau means "Chinese". Tau Cholon implies the Hoa people living in District 5 where Big Market is.

South Vietnam is big. It's hundreds of times larger than District 5 of Ho Chi Minh/Saigon city. Before 1975, Hoa people only accounted for 1% of the whole population of South Vietnam. So how could 1% of the whole population possibly control 80% of South Vietnam's foods...? It just doesn't make sense at all. You can say that they controlled 80% of their Chinatown's economy but not the entire South Vietnam's economy. The ones that really controlled a big percentage of South Vietnam's economy were the Vietnamese goverment officials.


P.S: Note that the statistics was released by the Viet Cong. If they hadn't released it there's no way LOC could have gotten it and misinterpreted it.

Saigon-Cholon was the former name for Saigon City/Ho Cho Minh City. LOC thought that Saigon-Cholon was the district that most ethnic Chinese live in so they misinterpreted the whole thing.


To be fair Nguoi Tau literally means "Boat People" but shouldn't Viet Nam Hoa kieu be a translation as well? ~ Epod.

--- Um, a technical thing= Chinese in South Vn did not make up "1 percent" of the South Vietnamese population before 75 but about 5 percent. More than 60 percent of the currently 85 million people in Vietnam right now were born after 75.


[edit] Hoa and Jing (Gin) people

  • Hoa = Chinese Vietnamese (Chinese heritage, Vietnamese citizen)
  • Jing (Gin) people = Vietnamese Chinese (Vietnamese heritage, Chinese citizen)


However the Hoa's are genetically more Gin than Han Chinese. The Vietnamese classify them as Chinese simply because they claim at some point in their genetic history, there was a Chinese ancestor. The Hoa look like other Vietnamese, and not at all like a Han Chinese.

The Jing's in China are also genetically Vietnamese. They have not intermarried Hans, and their physical appearance is still Vietnamese.

[edit] Hoa anymore???

I noted that the term Hoa applies to ethnic Chinese living in Vietnam. Yes, many ethnic Chinese do not have direct origins with china and have roots directly from Vietnam instead. Once they are out of Vietnam, I dont think they are ethnic Chinese of Vietnam anymore. As one can see, a person's race cannot be changed. Once the Hoa emigrated to other countries, they are considered ethnically Chinese (American), with origins from Vietnam. At most this makes them ethnically Chinese (American) and by national origin Vietnamese (American). Thus once these chinese emigrates to other countries they are no longer Hoa, unless the term Hoa is a totally separate ethnic group from the Chinese/Vietnamese.

It's actually quite possible to change someone's race. Where I live, one second, I'm white, the next second I'm Asian, the next second I'm Chinese, the next second I'm Han. My DNA doesn't change, but how people look at me does. Race and ethnicity are social categories, not biological ones. I have noticed that Vietnamese Chinese, Indonesian Chinese, and Malayasian Chinese who emmigrate to the United States or Canada, still form distinct social groups. As an encyclopedia, it is important to describe, so the best thing to do is to find a Hoa who immigrated to somewhere else, and ask them how they see themselves. Roadrunner (talk) 23:37, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Thus I made the necessary amendments. If you have any objections, feel free to raise them here, but I would appreciate at least a notification from my talk page. Thanks.Mr Tan 15:43, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Christy Chung

I note that Chung is the daughter of a Chinese father and a Vietnamese mother; however, she was born in Canada and has never lived in Vietnam, or held Vietnamese citizenship. The term Hoa refers to ethnic Chinese living in Vietnam, or at least Chinese born in Vietnam. She is a mix of Chinese and Vietnamese, and that her Chinese father has nothing to do with Vietnam. Thus is she a Hoa at all? She is a Chinese Canadian and Vietnamese Canadian, that's all. You might want to query me if you have objections. Mr Tan (talk) 15:44, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] ** THIS ARTICLE HAS BECOME A RACIST JOKE **

This article has become little more than a reinforcement of popular myths and is highly patronising to many people around the globe as a result. In particular, this article:

1.Falsely implies that most Cantonese and Teo Chew peoples are of Han ethnicity. In fact nothing else can be further from the truth. In fact, their ancestors were the victims of one of the worst genocides in world history at the hands of various Chinese armies. Once subjugated, the existences of distinct Cantonese and Teo Chew ethnic identities (as opposed to 'regional' identities) were 'conveniently' forgotten by most people in the world (and tragically to this day). Thus from this point of view, the label of Han ethnicity was a brutal imposition upon the Cantonese and Teo Chew peoples against the wills of the said local peoples.

2.Fails to clearly state that the Cantonese and Vietnamese peoples are very similar, both culturally and genetically and that most people of Cantonese or Teo Chew ancestry who come from Vietnam are also of Vietnamese ancestry (due to very high rates of inter-cultural marriage).

3.Fails to make any real distinctions between the concepts of ancestry and ethnicity whatsoever. There is more to ethnicity than simply being descended from a particular ancestor. Naturally, ethnic identities evolve and may even change over time (but not counting genocides). One could even argue that the concept of ancestry is nothing more than a political and social misconstruct since a recent scientific study has proven beyond reasonable doubt that all modern humans were descended from Africans.

4.Contains contradictory information and inappropriate references. Some of the information also appears seriously out of date. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.105.147.120 (talk) 23:27, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

The above points, in particular, MUST be taken seriously. Someone who is an expert on the subject matter of this article must edit this article IMMEDIATELY to remove the blatant biases in the article (including population figures).

I also note that parts of this article could intensify unnecessary divisions between 'native' Vietnamese people and Vietnamese people who happen to have Cantonese or Teo Chew ancestry.

If this article is not fixed by 21 March 2008, 00:00 UTC, this article will be **NOMINATED FOR DELETION**.

Note: I would have attempted to correct some of the biases in the article, but owing to the fact that most of the required references are very difficult to obtain (and generally not found on the internet), I have called for an expert to fix the article instead.

UPDATE: Procedures for proposing that this article be deleted are now underway.

[edit] Urgent issue that must be addressed now

There is something in this article and this talk page itself that suggests that the article is in danger of ending up in a state of disrepair. Of great concern is the fact that the article promotes an 'us and them' attitude between ethnic Vietnamese and other Viet peoples. The article fails to explain that the term 'Hoa' is really just a political label that was used to marginalise certain people. It also fails to explain that there is no real difference between the so-called 'Hoa' and the 'native' Vietnamese.

Also of concern is the propaganda throughout the article. There is an urgent need to check each reference in the article to see if they are suitable. We also need to delete any sentences that cannot be substantiated.

The first step that needs to be taken is to remove all references to 'Overseas Chinese' and 'Chinese' except where they are explicitly referring to the labels that various Vietnamese governments or the local populace have imposed (in which case the wording is altered appropriately). By doing this, a very serious point-of-view problem will be resolved and will also help towards ridding this article of politically motivated propaganda.

Also, note that the 'native' Vietnamese are probably really a collection of ethnic groups (one being the Kinh people) rather than a single monolithic entity. This point may need to be addressed too.

Therefore, I have commenced cleaning up the article as a matter of urgency. If you have any comments or suggestions, I will be more than happy to see it. 122.105.145.169 (talk) 11:46, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Some of the propaganda and other questionable material have now been removed or reworded. In particular, most of the references to 'Chinese' have been eliminated for neutrality's sake and I believe that most, if not all, of the communist propaganda made up by the CCP have been deleted. However, further improvements are required (including the addition of relevant, balanced information that is not already in the article) if the NPOV and factual accuracy tag is to be removed. 122.105.145.169 (talk) 12:21, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Do we really need a section on 'Hoa' concentrations around the world? As far as I am aware, these 'communities' exist in the same locations as 'other' overseas Vietnamese communities. In fact the descendants of 'Hoa' people who have migrated from Vietnam to other countries are rarely distinguishable (probably less than 1 in 100 cases) from descendants of 'other' Vietnamese-born people on the basis of culture, appearance, social class or language. 122.105.146.66 (talk) 05:14, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

I will also move that this article be no longer part of Wikipedia: WikiProject China. It is widely accepted amongst Mainland Chinese, Hong Kongers and even Taiwanese that the Hoa people are not of Chinese ethnicity at all;

This isn't true. I know Hoa, and think of them as ethnic Chinese. The important thing is that *they* think of themselves as ethnic Chinese. You can have multiple ethnicities Roadrunner (talk) 22:40, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
Not quite right I am afraid. In Sydney, Australia, most descendants of the 'Hoa' people do not say that they are ethnically Chinese; instead, they say that they are ethnic Vietnamese, Cantonese or Teo Chew in accordance to what they view their ethnic identity to be. Many of these people also observe that there is practically no difference between Cantonese and Vietnamese peoples in a genetic sense and that the Cantonese and Vietnamese languages are very similar. 122.105.145.151 (talk) 00:29, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
Well then, Sydney, Australia is very different from Austin, Texas. If you can find something citable then it can be posted. Do these people that you speak of have a website where they state their views on ethnicity? If so, it would make a wonderful addition to the article. Can you find academic articles or newspaper reports on how Hoa in Sydney, Australia see themselves? If all else fails, can you get a few people fron Syndey, Australia to agree that this is what they actually see. Roadrunner (talk) 15:00, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

These people consider the Hoa a subset of the Vietnamese ethnicity. I believe that the said WikiProject designation just highlights a case of double standards: on the one hand, the populaces of China, Hong Kong and Taiwan regard the Hoa as ethnically Vietnamese and not Chinese; but on the other hand, some propagandists from the same countries continually exploit (for their own interests) the prolonged discrimination against Hoa people at the hands of some Vietnamese, convinced that they can label people whatever they want. 122.105.146.66 (talk) 05:23, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

I have just requested that this article be no longer part of Wikipedia: WikiProject China at the appropriate WikiProject talk page. If approval is sought, I will remove that deplorable template that has promoted nothing but an 'us and them' attitude. 122.105.146.66 (talk) 06:07, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Since there has been no response at all regarding the disputed template at the appropriate WikiProject talk page, the template has now been removed. 122.105.144.54 (talk) 10:59, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Agree with Roadrunner. Suggesting something then assuming a consensus in 4 hours and nominating the whole article for deletion are nothing but biased POV. Vietnam and China consider them ethnic Chinese. Those people consider themselves ethnic Chinese. The so-called dispute has no ground under WP:NPOV. (FYI, some can consider northern Chinese less Chinese than the southern Chinese. Southern Chinese dialects resemble ancient Chinese much better than northern dialects. It's very silly to consider Cantonese or Fujianese "not Han Chinese" (as compared to the Li in Hainan, the Yao or Zhuang in Guangxi, etc.) HkCaGu (talk) 17:35, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
Also there may be groups of Chinese that don't think of Hoa as Chinese, and if someone can find a verifiable source for this, it should be added. However, the notion that the original poster had that *in general* Chinese don't think of Hoa as ethnically Chinese is pretty clearly false. I'd actually be interested if the original poster can find *any* ethnic Chinese that doesn't consider Hoa to be ethnic Chinese.
Also the fact that Hoa are also thought of ethnically Vietnamese means nothing to whether or not they are thought of as ethnically Chinese. People can have multiple ethnicities. Also the intersection between politics and ethnicity is interesting since all of the Sino-Vietnamese I know (in the Central Texas area) are *politically* very Vietnamese and don't any particularly loyalty or sympathy to either the PRC or ROC (which is different from some of the Malaysian or Indonesian Chinese that I know). They however, also tend to dislike the Hanoi government, and most of them fly the South Vietnamese flag, and are active in Vietnamese exile groups in the United States. Roadrunner (talk) 23:49, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
Can we at least say that the Hoa people are considered ethnically Vietnamese? After all, this is what the article originally said.
If you can find a citable source that says that are, then sure. If you can't, then no. Roadrunner (talk) 14:56, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
By the way, I don't believe that most Hoa, like other overseas Vietnamese, continue to fly the South Vietnamese flag overseas. I do agree with the statement about the political activism though.

122.105.145.151 (talk) 00:29, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm curious exactly who you are and what your background is, since you don't seem to have much exposure to overseas Chinese communities or overseas Vietnamese communities yet you insist on posting what you think their views are. If you go to places in Texas and California where there are large concentrations of overseas Vietnamese, you see the flag of the Republic of Vietnam all over the place. Roadrunner (talk) 14:56, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Chinese attitudes toward Hoa

This statement that Chinese in the PRC, Taiwan, and Hong Kong uniformly do not regard Hoa as ethnic Chinese is false. Here are statistics on overseas Chinese in Vietnam from the OCAC in Taiwan

http://www.ocac.gov.tw/english/public/public.asp?selno=1163&no=1163&level=B

Here is the website of OCAC in Ho Chi Minh city

http://www.ocac.gov.tw/overseas/index.asp?nodeno=6132&con=1&cou=44

That has some good information about Sino-Vietnamese

I'm looking for statements from the PRC, but I found this article talking about resettlement of 200,000 Hoa Refugees in China after the fall of Saigon

http://jrs.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/13/4/374

and these two pages

http://www.jstor.org/pss/2201663

http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst?docId=97787930

I've removed the statement that Chinese don't consider Hoa to be ethnic Chinese, since I've come up with several citations indicating that they do, and I certainly do, and the Hoa I know think of themselves as ethnic Chinese. If you can find a contrary citation we can argue the issue.

Also the idea that people from Mainland China, Taiwan, or Hong Kong don't think of Hoa as ethnic Chinese is a bit silly since Hoa is a literal translation of the Chinese term "hua" meaning ethnic Chinese. The Chinese term for Hoa, is literally Vietnam ethnic Chinese.

Roadrunner (talk) 22:51, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Just be aware that sources that come directly from the communist Vietnamese or PRC governments are NOT to be trusted at all. Care should also taken for any source about the Hoa people coming out of the ROC government (since the ROC is often pressured into telling high tales to the world in order to satisfy the demands of the PRC) or the American Library of Congress (as they rely too heavily on sources provided by the Viet Cong). 122.105.145.151 (talk) 00:29, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Fine, let's see your sources, and we can argue the issue. Roadrunner (talk) 14:31, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Let me make two facts plain. Firstly, the Hoa people are rarely, if ever, distinguishable from other ethnic Vietnamese. They are virtually genetically identical (indeed, even DNA studies show that the Cantonese and Vietnamese peoples are almost genetically identical). The culture of the Hoa people is also almost identical with Vietnamese culture and if they happen to speak Cantonese, Teo Chew, etc then it is done in a Vietnamese accent. Some descendants of the Hoa people outside Vietnam who did not learn to speak Vietnamese during their childhood have sought to do so later in life, acknowledging their Vietnamese heritage.

Secondly, it is hard to believe that any culturally minded Hoa person or their descendants would want to label themselves as ethnic Chinese.

It's hard for *YOU* to believe this, but they do. If you can come up with *any* citation on the internet that says that they don't, we can discuss the issue. Otherwise, I don't see anything to discuss here. Roadrunner (talk) 14:31, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

The simple fact is that their ancestors (dating back to the 2nd century BC) were victims of one of the worst genocides at the hands of the Han Chinese military. Given the horrific nature of the conquests, yet the almost non-recognition that the conquests amounted to genocide, I will leave the article Nam Viet to do the rest of the talking. May be after we all read the said article, then we will have a long and hard look at the genocidal acts committed against the Cantonese, Teo Chew, Vietnamese and other Viet peoples by the Han Chinese throughout world history. 122.105.145.151 (talk) 00:29, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] ABout the WikiProject China template

I am afraid that the deplorable WikiProject China template will have to stay off the talk page until an appropriate response appears at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_China. There has been no opposition to the original motion for more 24 hours. 122.105.145.151 (talk) 00:47, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

I just objected. Roadrunner (talk) 14:47, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
That's now how things work here. You still don't have consensus. There's nothing wrong with pages labeled with multiple WikiProject Templates. And the fact that Hoa is mentioned as part of Overseas Chinese should warrant inclusion. I see you have your biased views about the close relations between people of present-day Southern China and Vietnam. But those days are long gone. Southern Chinese don't hate Northern Chinese today for killing their ancestors (or with all the immigration, hardly anybody can be sure they're all southern-blooded). Since Northern Song was defeated by the Jurchens, the Han Culture has been survived by southerners and only southerners until the Ming Dynasty moved back to present-day Beijing. And since Southern Song, present-day Southern China has fully assimilated to the Han Chinese culture. If you have enough knowledge in linguistics, you'll understand that present-day southern Chinese dialects have much more similarities to Mandarin than Vietnamese, and I'm talking about grammar here. Grammar is everything in linguistics, not vocabulary, which can be influenced by foreign powers (at one time or another, Chinese influence in Japan, Korea or Vietnam--see sinosphere). Stop talking about "genocides". This ain't the crusaders, holocaust or Yugoslavia. HkCaGu (talk) 03:30, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
When the user of the above post said that the days of viewing the peoples of present day southern China and Vietnam as being closely related are long gone, which era was he referring to? I was under the impression that this view is as strong as ever especially among many culturally minded overseas Vietnamese.
I don't know what overseas Vietnamese think in general about the relationship between China and Vietnam, and would be very interested in having their views included. However, I do have some idea about what overseas Chinese think (since I happen to be one), and the statements that you added about how overseas Chinese see the Hoa and how they see themselves are just plain *wrong*. Now if you can point to some websites or literature that suggests that my view of things is incomplete, I'd be happy to discuss the issue. Roadrunner (talk) 14:45, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
Also, any reader who comes across the claim that there is no hatred because of the alleged genocide and that the 'genocide' was not a genocide should ignore or dismiss the claim on the spot. As I have said in a previous posting, the article Nam Viet speaks for itself the fact that the alleged genocide really happened. As for the hatred, where is the evidence?
The fact that the father of modern Chinese nationalism Sun Yat-Sen was Cantonese ought to say something. Traditionally Cantonese have been some of the most nationalistic Chinese, because they had more contact with European imperialism than northern Chinese. What happened a thousand years ago is something that no one cares about today. Roadrunner (talk) 14:45, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
On the contrary, there are nationalist movements that are beginning to spring up that agitate for Cantonese independence from China.
If you can point to a website, that would help the discussion. There aren't any very strong movements for Cantonese independence that I know of. There is a movement for Hong Kong democratization, but that's different. Roadrunner (talk) 14:45, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

122.105.146.168 (talk) 13:22, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Authoritative sources

I agree that websites from the ROC or PRC governments shouldn't be taken as authoritative sources on objective reality, but websites from the ROC and PRC governments should be taken as authoritative sources on what the official and unofficial views of the ROC and PRC governments are toward the world. In this case, I used those sources to point out that both the ROC and PRC consider Hoa to be ethnically Chinese, and therefore that statement that Chinese uniformly think of Hoa as ethnically Vietnamese is just wrong.

Now it may be that in Sydney, Australia, overseas Chinese think of Hoa as ethnically Vietnamese. I don't know, I've never been to Sydney, Australia. It may also be that in Sydney, Australia, Cantonese think of themselves as Vietnamese. I don't know. If this is the case, it needs to be added, but you need some sort of credible evidence that this is the case before doing that. Basically, you just need something that indicates that you aren't making this stuff up.

Also Sydney, Australia is not the world. Even if people in Sydney, Australia have these views, it seems incorrect to change all of the categorizations to conform to the classifications there.

Roadrunner (talk) 15:14, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Nam Viet - Huh???

I'm reading the article on Nam Viet, and I see absolutely nothing there that talks about genocide or suggests that it happened. Again, if you have any scholarly articles that talk about genocide in the context of Nam Viet or any current groups that view Nam Viet as a genocide, it needs to be added to that article.

Most of our 21st century ideas on race, state, and ethnicity were actually created in the 19th century, and Nam Viet seems to be a good example of how confusing things can get if you project 19th century idea back to the 1st century, and the article does a good job of explanation the sorts of confusions.

You find lots of ironic things and interesting things with DNA testing. I wouldn't be surprised at all if most Cantonese are genetically similar to people in northern Vietnam than they are to people in Shandong. Also looking over the history of Vietnam, I wouldn't be too surprised if people in Saigon are genetically closer to people in Phnon Phem than they are to people in Hanoi.

So what? This just goes to show how ethnicity and race are social/political classifications and not biological ones.

Roadrunner (talk) 15:23, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Sorry about my ignorance about what was going on at Nam Viet days ago. It turns out that some anonymous editor had the audacity to vandalise Nam Viet by removing one crucial paragraph. I have fixed the vandalism now so all editors interested can reread the article as it stood before the vandalism occurred.
For the record, the affected paragraph was as follows.
The Yue, under the domination of the Han (Han Wudi) was forced, wiped, tortured and enslaved to repair and enhance the Great Wall of China.
So, there you go. And for anyone willing to see it, there is a lot of indirect evidence regarding the genocides out there! All that is needed is a little 'reading between the lines' in order to get past some rather sneaky euphemisms such as 'assimilated' and 'absorbed'. 122.105.148.25 (talk) 00:38, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
I reverted that paragraph pending citations. If you are going to be making accusations of torture and genocide, you'll need to mention where those accusations come from. Acceptable sources would include any historical work (either Chinese or Vietnamese), any peer reviewed work, or any history book. If you can even find a situation in which some current group levels an accusation of torture and genocide, that would also work.
I don't care if it's a biased source as long as it is citation. What I'm looking for is *any* source.
Also one group absorbing another isn't evidence of torture or genocide.

Roadrunner (talk) 02:25, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

One question that I have for you that you might try answering while you are doing your research. If Han Wudi was responsible for committing genocide against the Yue, then how come current Cantonese and Vietnamese seem to be genetically related to the Yue. If Han Wudi was successful at wiping out the Yue, or overwhelming them with northern settlers, then how come any of the people on Guangdong are related to the Yue. The second question is if Han Wudi moved large numbers of Yue to the north in order to work on the Great Wall, then shouldn't we see lots of northern Chinese with Yue ancenstry, and isn't this fundamentally inconsistent with your view that Cantonese and Vietnamese are more similar than northern and southern Chinese?
Again, if you aren't making this up, then you should find some history book that explains all of this. Again, I don't care how biased the history book is. It just needs to be something citable.

Roadrunner (talk) 02:35, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

When I was talking about genocide I was talking about it in a broad sense; that is, all the horrors associated with it. Too many people believe that genocide simply means wiping out one or more peoples by systematic murder. But as any one who has read genocide knows, genocides do not necessarily lead to the depletion of targeted groups.
Again, I don't object to you adding charges of genocide to the Nam-Viet article if you can properly cite those charges. If you can, then the reader can make up your their mind as to the accuracy and relaiblility of those sources. If you can't find a citation for the sources, then there is no basis for discussion. Also if you add your sources, I can add mine. There is a whole section of the Cambridge History of China regarding the settlement of southern China, and their view is that most of the population movements happened after the fall of the Han dynasty, as people were moving away from the political mess in the north. Roadrunner (talk) 12:44, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
What does happen is that the cultures of the targeted peoples are either severely damaged or disappear. In the case of the genocides committed against the Viet peoples, many of these peoples survived; however, the native cultures of many of these peoples simply disappeared. For example, virtually all Viet peoples spoke a language that did NOT belong to the Sino-Tibetan family circa 500 BC. However, within 1500 years thereafter, all this changed.
And most second generation immigrants to the United States lose their language, and no one in Spain except the Basque speaks the pre-Roman languages, and Welsh has declined in Wales sharply this century. Personally, I think that labelling all examples of cultural shifts as genocide wildly cheapens the term, and puts a moral equivalence between Welsh coal miners speaking English with death camps, and that strongly cheapens the horrific experiences that people in death camps went through. Roadrunner (talk) 12:44, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
Today, only a handful of Viet peoples actually have ties to the cultures of their ancestors; the others have simply lost their identity and are unable to escape the indignity of being associated with a culture that had severely mutilated their identity in the first place.
We all came from Africa, and everyone has gone through lots of cultural shifts and changes along the way.
Indeed, many of the Vietnamese people still smear the Cantonese people by labeling them 'Chinese' despite their common histories of being oppressed at the hands of the Han Chinese throughout world history.
Ummmmm..... I hate to tell you this but every Hoa and Cantonese person that I've ever met is quite proud of being labelled Chinese and no one considers it a "smear". To be honest, a lot of overseas Chinese like being labelled as members of a Chinese minority since it makes them think of themselves as better than the majority population.
I do know that a lot of Vietnamese nationalist identity involves portraying history as a struggle to avoid Chinese domination, and I'm interested in knowing what the Vietnamese (as well as Chinese) history books say about Nam-Viet. If Vietnamese are taught about Nam-Viet as "Chinese genocide" I'd be interested in knowing that, although I frankly doubt it because 1) there isn't much of a cult of victimhood in Vietnamese history 2) although Vietnam wants to establish itself as separate from China, there isn't a desire to create a blood feud and 3) if you talk negatively about the Sinicification of Guangdong, then you have a problem with you talk about the Vietnamization of Cham and Khmer peoples in what is today southern Vietnam. One of the ironies is that both Vietnam and China are both relatively new nation-states which were created in the 19th and 20th century, which is one reason both insist on having histories that go back thousands of years.
Finally, you do seem to have interesting views about history, but we are trying to write an encyclopedia article so your views (and my views) don't matter much. We both need to find citable sources that group X thinks Y. If there is a significant number of people that share your views, they need to be included in the encyclopedia.
One final thing about cultural preservation and growth. My experience is that if you want people (including your kids) to adopt a culture, you just *can't* present everything in terms of victimhood and oppression. If identity X is solely identified with victimhood and oppression then people will tend to run away from it, if they have a choice and in both Australia and the United States, they do (i.e. they can become "white"). Identity isn't solely (or even mostly) determined by genetics, and people have a lot of choice in the identities that they take, and my experience has been that people tend to have good reasons for the choices they make.

Roadrunner (talk) 12:44, 10 June 2008 (UTC)


122.109.121.215 (talk) 07:01, 10 June 2008 (UTC)