Brief History - The 56 Nationalities in China
In many of China's cities and towns, it is commonplace to see two or mere edlic groups living together, While they live in the same towns however, they still maflltain their individual communities, The communities of the different ethic groups provide the political, economic and cultural intercourse seen in China's long history. For instance,in Xingjiang, Yunnan, Guizhou and Guangxi, a certain minority people live in compact communities and contain members of a number of other nationalities. The Tibetan people have a population of 4.5 million, mainly living in Tibel, Qinghai,Gansu and Sichuan autonomous region and provinces. The 55 minorities speak more than 60 languages, and go mthorities have their own written languages, The three major religions in the world ( Bnddhism, 1slam and Christianity) have their adherents among lhe minority nationalities. Chinese minority people enjoy complete freedom of religious belief since 1949. Take Tibet's important legacy ( Buddism, Tibet medicine,Tibet literature, Tibet music and dance and Tibet architecture) as example, it is carefully protected since 1949.
China serves as home to 56 ethnic groups ( each of the 10 big ethnic groups has a population of more than one million). Han (Huaxia) majority makes up 91.5% of the total population of Chinese. The Central People's Government has given effective aid of materials and funds to the minorities annually since 1949. It has led to marked Improvements in their living standards and the quality of medical care. As a result, the minority people have achieved an increase in birth rate and fast population growth.The combined population of China's minority nationalities reached over 67 million (double the 1949 figure) in 1990s. The average annual growth rate stands at about 2.9%. Han people have only one chiId per couple according to the family planning policy
introduced in 1979, however, the national autonomous areas have been permitted to pursue there own family planning pohcles in the light of locaI conditions. For nstance Hezhen is the smallest ethnic group in China with a population of 1, 4O0 people in 1990s. Poverty plus utter lack of medical service affected them so much that they were on the verge of extinction with only 3O0 people left by ]949. The Hezhens Iive in the
northernmost Heilongjiang Province. Hezhens set up a nationality township in Fuyuan County in 1956 under the new government's regional autonomous pogcy
During the past feudalist society, the Hart people and the minorities were never on an equal footing. Either the Han rulthg classes were in command, riding roughshod over the minorities, or some minority groups sat on the throne, ruthlessly encroaching upon the rights of the Hans. The Northern Dynasties (Xianbel m nority 386--58] ) , the Yuan DyRasty (Mongolian minority, 1279--1368) and the Qing Dynasty (Man minority, 1644--1911) are the three periods of minority ruling dynasties in Chinese history. However, the relations between the Hans and the minorities were not limited to exploitation. Over the centuries, they have gradually developed cooperative relations in political, economic and cultural sphei~s. It is hard at one stroke to put an end to the discriminatory attitudes which had prevailed in the Hal/ majority over the past centuries. This attitude was aggravated by some errors of the " ef " deviation with respect to
ehnc problems from 1958 to 1977. Those nationality policies proved effective in the past were revived and carried forward again from 1978. Of course, completely resolving all of the historical misunderslandings still extant between the Hans and the minority groups is not a simple matter, it will take a considerable period of time to thoroughly straighten out the effects of many years of historical clashes. Since 1978,
the government has taken numerous concrete steps to deal with the problems aiming at pushing forward economic and cultural development in the minority areas and build a legal and harmonious relation.