Wiki: Map of highland tribes

Reviving Ethnic Diversity:

Preserving Taiwan’s Austronesian[1] Aboriginal Languages

“Language is much more than collections of words with meaning that can be translated – they embody whole perspectives on meaning which are not readily capable of translation, and they are a key resource for understanding culture.”

“Taiwan has been colonized by the Spanish (1626-1642), the Dutch (1624-1662), Ming Dynasty loyalist Koxinga (1662-1683), the Ching Dynasty (1663-1895), the Japanese (1895-1945), and the Republic of China (1945 to the present).”[2] As a result Taiwan’s Austronesian Aboriginal population have suffered injustice, hardship, subjugation, and forced cultural assimilation. Today they represent less than two percent of Taiwan’s 22 million people, a similar proportion to that of Canada (3%) and Australia (1.8%).[3]

The Aboriginal population was divided, by colonisers, for convenience, into two groups the Pingpu (plains) people and Kaoshan (mountain) people.[4] These two groups were further divided into nineteen groups, twelve of which are now officially recognised by the Taiwanese government. The colonial classifications are rejected by some and are just one of many issues contested by the island’s 400,000 Aboriginal people in their fight to reassert their cultural identity.[5]

Today their cultural loss is exacerbated by widespread societal discrimination that assists in maintaining inequities in employment and education. “Household incomes of Taiwanese Aboriginal peoples are less than 40 percent of the national average and Aboriginal unemployment is significantly higher than the national average.”[6]

Due to forced relocations of aboriginal communities and decades of forced cultural assimilation the indigenous cultures and languages of Taiwan are seriously endangered. …..click here to read more