Identity
During the Qing dynasty, the term Zhongyuanren was synonymous with being Chinese, especially referring to Han Chinese and Hui Muslims in Xinjiang or Central Asia.
Because of religious reasons, while Hui people do not consider themselves Han and are not Han Chinese, the Hui consider themselves wider Chinese and also refer to themselves as Zhongyuanren. The Dungan people, descendants of Hui who fled to Central Asia, called themselves Zhongyuanren in addition to the standard labels Lao Huihui and Huizi. Zhongyuanren was used generally by Turkic Muslims to refer to general Chinese people. When Central Asian invaders from Kokand invaded Kashgar, in a letter the kokandi commander criticizes the Kashgari Turkic Muslim Ishaq for allegedly not behaving like a Muslim and wanting to be a Zhongyuanren (Chinese).
Read more about this topic: Dungan People
Famous quotes containing the word identity:
“The modern world needs people with a complex identity who are intellectually autonomous and prepared to cope with uncertainty; who are able to tolerate ambiguity and not be driven by fear into a rigid, single-solution approach to problems, who are rational, foresightful and who look for facts; who can draw inferences and can control their behavior in the light of foreseen consequences, who are altruistic and enjoy doing for others, and who understand social forces and trends.”
—Robert Havighurst (20th century)
“During the first formative centuries of its existence, Christianity was separated from and indeed antagonistic to the state, with which it only later became involved. From the lifetime of its founder, Islam was the state, and the identity of religion and government is indelibly stamped on the memories and awareness of the faithful from their own sacred writings, history, and experience.”
—Bernard Lewis, U.S. Middle Eastern specialist. Islam and the West, ch. 8, Oxford University Press (1993)