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| Peoples |
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Over a billion people, about one-fifth of the world’s
population, live in China, geographically the third
largest country in the world, and the forecasts are
that this figure will reach two billion by AD 2000.
The number of cities bearing unfamiliar names, yet
with populations as great as those of London, New
York, or Tokyo, is astonishing. |
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| Humankind |
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In China there are people everywhere-you are never
alone, and every pavement is crowded. The roads between
them, previously the preserve of a few trolley-buses,
trucks, donkeys and bicycles, are rapidly becoming filled
with cars. Even the landscape has been shaped by man, for
every patch of fertile land, no matter how small, is rate
under cultivation. Wilderness is rare, and magnificent
works of nature Kunming, are not left to stand for
themselves but are “enhanced” by the addition of man-made
art. |
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| Similarities |
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| Considering the size of the country, these
are remarkably few regional differences north to south or
east to west. A Chinese, it is true, is more or province
before his country, since for him the differences are
great. But for the outsider the homogeneity of Chinese
culture is astonishing. This is largely due to China’s
history, for despite the presence of 56 different
nationalities within its borders, 92 percent of the
population is Han Chinese- that is to say, people with the
basic physical characteristics of slim build, black hair
and almond-shaped eyes, whose first languages is Chinese,
or a variant of it, and who loyally regard Beijing as the
national center of power. Traditional Han Chinese is
everywhere expect Xinjiang, large parts of yunnan, Tibet,
Qinghai, Inner Mongolia, and parts of Manchuria, and has
been so for some 2,000 years. |
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| Nationalities |
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| The other 55 nationalities, the remaining 5
percent of the population, nonetheless comprise an element
of Chinese life that cannot be ignored. Three nationalities,
the Tibetans, the Monogolians and the Uygurs, although
comparatively few in number, occupy homelands that make up a
large geographical proportion of the country-Tibet and
Qinghai, Inner Mongolia, and Xinjiang.In at least tow of the
cases, Tibet and to a lesser extent Xingiang, local
opposition to Han rule has manifested itself in violently
rebellious outbursts that have occasionally caught the
imagination of the outside world. The Chinese government,
which finds it hard to conceal its disgust with troublesome
minorities, deals with the problem by filling minority areas
with Han Chinese, who are sent either under duress or though
financial inducement. The result is that indigenous peoples
then become minorities in their own lands. |
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