Here’s something that annoys me to no end. When I tell my Taiwanese friends that I have a girlfriend they ask “Is she a Chinese?” now correct me if I am wrong but are we not in Taiwan. Is this a Taipei, Northern Taiwan thing because when I was living in Chia Yi the question would be “is she Taiwanese?”
People from the south consider themselves to be Taiwanese and those in the north consider themselves to be Chinese. Very strange.
Well, officially, Taiwan is a province of the Republic of China…therefore, Taiwanese is a subset of Chinese…so none of your friends are technically wrong…so nothing really to get annoyed with…
You know, the other day, I opened an account at First Bank on RenAi Road Sec. 4 and they gave me this wonderful red banner with a New Years greeting written on it…I thought it was nice and promptly went home and stuck it next to my front door…who knew that a few days later, as I was returning home, some guy was ripping it off my wall…I was kinda shocked…and asked him what he was doin’…and he yelled at me for being a KMT supporter…I had a closer look at the banner, and noticed that it was written by the KMT mayor of Taipei City (Ma Ying Jiu)…sheesh…the guy should relax…
I’m a Chinese.
Ethnically, culturally, linguistically, most people in Taiwan are Chinese. It’s the political aspect that gets you in trouble. Why can’t someone be both? Someone from, say, Florida, is both Floridian and American. Even someone from Mexico is both Mexican and American.
What would a person in the US of Chinese descent say if asked “Are you Chinese?” Such an ambiguous question can be taken to mean so many different things. I am technically Chinese as my passport and ID say “Republic of China” on them. I also could say I am a Taiwanese citizen. The only reason I’d want to yell at or physically threaten someone over the issue was if I wanted to prove in public that I really didn’t have an inferiority complex and just wanted attention, albeit in an infantile fashion.
Taiwanese are culturally, ethnically, and linguistically Chinese in the same sense that the vast majority of Americans, Kiwis, Australians, and Canadians are Britons.
The problem is partly linguistic:
in English, “Chinese” denotes language, country or ethnicity in general, but in the Chinese language, you have different terms for this.
Our obvious translation for “Chinese people” would be zhongguoren, but some Taiwanese nationalist hotheads would see this as meaning “citizens of China,” i.e. the PRC and excluding Taiwan.
A more neutral term would be “huaren,” which does not denote nationality.
I’m European, but my wife considers herself to be both Taiwanese and Chinese, the first is her country, the second is her ethnicity.
Here in Taiwan, it is politics that makes this a dangerous topic. Taiwanese nationalists will reject the term “Chinese,” while mainlanders - especially elderly ones - would not want to be called Taiwanese.
As usual, the truth is somewhere in the middle. To me, Taiwan is the country, Chinese the ethnic group, so most people here - with the exception of aboriginals - would be both.
Picking up on what enzo+ said, I would say that many of the above may be classified as ‘Westerners’ or sometimes ‘European’ while still retaining their national identities. Same for people who can be classified as ‘Chinese’ (from China, Taiwan, HK, a subset of Singaporeans, Malaysians, etc. etc.) while still retaining their ‘local’ identity.
I know in Hong Kong they differentiated between mainlanders ‘dai luk yun’ and Hong Kongers ‘heung gong yun’ but everyone was still ‘jung gwok yun’ - Chinese. I think the Taiwanese friends basically just want to know whether you’re dating ‘one of them’ as opposed to ‘one of you’ 
[quote=“daasgrrl”]Picking up on what enzo+ said, I would say that many of the above may be classified as ‘Westerners’ or sometimes ‘European’ while still retaining their national identities. [/quote] I know you said
“sometimes ‘European’.” However, you have to watch generalizing Americans as European. Many of the original immigrants to areas of North America that became the US were European. However, today, there is a wide variety of ethnic groups that all have the same nationality - American. That is why you see so many hyphenations in the US (along with PC-ism).
I am European-American. More specifically, I am Scottish-German-American, as my ancestory is from Scotland & German. I, however, prefer to be known just as an American. Though, these days, with ol’ Dubya in power that is not such a good thing. But, I digress…
From my understanding, the majority of people in Taiwan, with the exception of the native peoples, are ethnically Chinese. Whether they came over in the last 50 years (mainlanders) or in the last few hundred years, most are “products” of China (no matter what it was called at the time their ancestors left).
Taiwanese, then, is their nationality. So, that in Taiwan today, the majority of people are either Native Taiwanese (aborigines) or Chinese-Taiwanese (everyone else, no matter when they or their ancestors arrived on this island).
What they choose to call themselves is a matter of choice – mostly political. I usually refer to my bf as Taiwanese… mainly to distinguish in the minds of people back home that he is from Taiwan and not the PRC.
Just my NT$2
Absolutely. I’m well aware of that, and the same is true of Australia and probably all the other countries mentioned. The main point I was making is that I didn’t think calling Americans, Australians etc. “Britons” (in terms of culture, language and ethnicity) was the same thing as calling Taiwanese “Chinese”. I thought using the generalisation already put forward was the easiest way to make that distinction and suggested ‘Westerners/Europeans’ as a catch-all term for the ethnic group I thought was being implied by the term “Britons”.
Of course you can be a Taiwanese European (I don’t imagine there are many of you!) or an American Chinese. The main point is that culture and ethnicity are different, but Chinese describes both. So you can best avoid confusion by being Chinese Chinese
Only ethnically are Americans etc. non-Britons, as many of our ancestors hailed from countries outside of the British Isles. But linguistically? We all speak English (except for a sizable minority of Hispanics and those Quebecois). And culturally we are 90% Anglo, as well - hard to argue against that, despite the shallow veneer of multi-culturalism. Culturally your average Yank, and certainly your average Aussie or Kiwi or Canuck, has a hell of a lot more in common with an Irishman or Englishman than with a Frenchman or Italian. That’s so obvious that most people don’t even blink and therefore easily forget about it - it’s very easy to overlook the blatantly obvious.
I am a Taiwanese.
But I can be a Taiwanese, Chinese, Asian, Easterner, and Earthman when necessary. The question is why?
If Mr. Bush invite me to join his new space plan, I would be glad to be a Martian.
===============I don’t think there can be any questions about this now. A Chinese person is a Chinese national. A Taiwanese person is a Taiwan national. Same as a British person is a UK national, and an American is a USA national. Period. Anyone who says different is refusing to see the handwriting on the historical wall.
=============The only people in Taiwan who are Chinese are people who carry a passport from CHINA.
============Anyone who is a citizen of this island nation is a Taiwanese. From 2004 onward, there can no longer be any confusion.
==========At least, that’s what everyone tells me.
[quote=“lane119”]===============I don’t think there can be any questions about this now. A Chinese person is a Chinese national. A Taiwanese person is a Taiwan national. Same as a British person is a UK national, and an American is a USA national. Period. Anyone who says different is refusing to see the handwriting on the historical wall.
=============The only people in Taiwan who are Chinese are people who carry a passport from China.
============Anyone who is a citizen of this island nation is a Taiwanese. From 2004 onward, there can no longer be any confusion.
==========At least, that’s what everyone tells me.[/quote]
Well, I’m glad we got that cleared up. 
But, uh, what about the writing on my passport? It says I’m Chinese and just mocks The Wall’s handwriting. They’re in the other room arguing about it right now.
maybe they just think that you wouldn’t date an Asian (chinese or taiwanese in this case) in Taiwan. Lots of foreginers in TW still date their own kind, not a lot, of course. So maybe that is what they meant?!
I am Taiwanese, simple as that, I wasn’t born in China so of course I am not a Chinese. I love Taiwan, my country, that is another reason why I am a Taiwanese…
If you want to call yourself a Chinese, then go back to China and live there.
[quote=“MiakaW”]
maybe they just think that you wouldn’t date an Asian (Chinese or Taiwanese in this case) in Taiwan. Lots of foreigners in TW still date their own kind, not a lot, of course. So maybe that is what they meant?![/quote]
At least for me, if I ask “Is your girlfriend a Chinese?”, I mean what MiakaW said.
[quote=“MiakaW”]
If you want to call yourself a Chinese, then go back to China and live there.[/quote]
I won’t call myself a Chinese in Taiwan. However, if I go back (not yet do that), I will say I am a Chinese so as to keep Mainlanders’ mouths shut and save my time to enjoy myself there.
The problem of nation identification is less obvious & significant than the problem of culture and tradition identification. From a baby to an adult, what I’ve learned connects myself to Big China. If you ask me to change all garbage/treasure I’ve learned, please pay me to do that. I have too many jobs to do in my life.
When ordinary people ask this, no matter what I answer, they will nod and smile.
When politicians and belligerent people ask this, no matter what I explain, they will disapprove and be full of shit in their mouth.
But honestly, I purpose an Earth nation, not the fake UN, like “Star War”. Then nobody will need an ARC here.
There needs to be a word to cover the Chinese that don’t live in China - the ones in Singapore, Taiwan, Malaysia, etc., similar to the word Hispanic that covers people of Iberian language & culture living in many different countries. Sinophone? There isn’t really an adequate word covering us Anglophones, either.
Wouldn’t that be “Overseas Chinese”? (of which there are two types: “hua qiao” and “hua yi”, depending on where you were born).
Then there’s me, the “mutant overseas Chinese”. My grandfather was born and raised in Harbin (Heilongjiang Province), and he has a Republic of China birth certificate (this was before the communists won, actually before the Japanese invaded Manchuria too). He’s an ethnic Russian, and according to the PRC authorities, Russians are one of the official “minority groups” in China (and thus are legally “Chinese”) … so that makes me technically an “Overseas Chinese” (“hua yi” but not “hua qiao”). 
[quote=“MiakaW”]I am Taiwanese, simple as that, I wasn’t born in China so of course I am not a Chinese. I love Taiwan, my country, that is another reason why I am a Taiwanese…
If you want to call yourself a Chinese, then go back to China and live there.[/quote]
Yes! Agree! But only nationality-wise.
How people define themselves ethnically is up to them, because it becomes really complicated (Mien, Hakka, etc…). “Chinese” per se is not homogenous ethnically.
But people should not ignore the fact that culturally speaking most people on Taiwan are still very Chinese. Dragon Boat Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival has nothing to do with Taiwan specifically but they are still celebrated as national holidays. I wonder if DPP will propose to eliminate them and replace them with “Cheng Chen-Gong Victory at Zeelandia Day” or perhaps “Lee Teng-Hui Day”?
Perhaps you can try “Taiwan Tong Bao?”
Huh ? What is that supposed to mean ?