Taiwan, Province of China?

[hansioux]

@meishijia

Sorry, that is quite funny

How funny it is a lot of times depends on the power dynamics. The fact is Mandarin and people who buy into the Mandarin dominated Han culture considers themselves elites and superior to others, since Mandarin is the only language for education, law, and business. As a result, them using stereotypes of groups whose language and culture are different as jokes seems racist. However, if today the power is balanced between different languages and cultures, they would just be considered fun jabs, like how European countries or American states like to poke fun of one another.

[hansioux]

@meishijia

Anyway, there is no real discussion to be had here. Greater China, is a geographical and sometimes cultural term that includes Taiwan

I think it’s a political term and sometimes cultural term invented by Chinese people trying to incorporate Taiwan.

[meishijia]

@hansioux

term invented by China that tries to include Taiwan.

Maybe

[Andrew]

@hansioux

I think it’s a political term and sometimes cultural term invented by China that tries to include Taiwan.

I see it fairly frequently for the regional headquarters of companies etc., where they’ve presumably decided it’s the least offensive/most neutral among the options.

Like I’ve said before, I’d find it easier to get offended by this if Taiwanese people/companies/government weren’t regularly using “China”/“Chinese” everywhere. But they are, so…

[hansioux]

@Andrew

Taiwanese people/companies/government weren’t regularly using “China”/“Chinese” everywhere

Most of those companies with China in its name were founded prior to the 1990s, and certainly before the first election that removed KMT from power. Many of those were originally named Taiwan back in the Japanese era, and were forced to change when the KMT took over.

[Andrew]

@hansioux

Most of those companies with China in its name were founded prior to the 1990s, and certainly before the first election that removed KMT from power.

They’re still there, though.

[hansioux]

@Andrew

They’re still there, though.

CSB tried to change most of them, and was branded as radical by KMT supporters and the US government.

[Mithrandir]

My son’s soccer team has “Chinese Taipei” on their uniforms. I thought this was an odd choice…the country/region of the team is unlikely to make a difference for anything the team ever does. I asked why they chose this and apparently 2 of the coaches played on the Taiwanese national team and that’s the language they used, so they wanted it on the kids’ team’s uniform to make it seem more like what the national team used. It still seems strange to me, but I’m just a guest here.

[Marco]

@Lettuceman

China, Province of Taiwan

@Lettuceman

@tommy525

And ?

Eww No. I wouldn’t want unification even under our rule.

[Marco]

@meishijia

Considering Taiwan’s population is majority Han Chinese

This is quite oversimplified. Most people have mixed with aborigines. Even if that percentage of lineage is small, most people have at least some aboriginal lineage in Taiwan.

@meishijia

Taiwan has significant cultural and linguistic ties to China, Taiwan meets the definition of greater China perfectly.

From Kuomintang colonialism.

[meishijia]

@Marco

most people have at least some aboriginal lineage in Taiwan

I don’t think this is true.

Would love to see some data though.

[Dr_Milker]

@meishijia

Would love to see some data though.

It’s complicated…

Anthropologist Chen Shu-Juo (2008:73) tracks the origins of what he calls the ‘‘myth of
indigenous genes’’ to a paper by neurologist Chen Shun-Sheng (1996), in which a miscalculation made by an ‘‘inconsistent arrangement of HLA allele frequencies’’ resulted in the erroneous conclusion that ‘‘20%–60% of Taiwanese Han have Indigenous genes.’’ The studies by Lin and colleagues lowered that figure to 13 percent. However, in a 2006 article Lin suggested that additional studies showed that 26% of Taiwanese Han have Aboriginal mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), suggesting a maternal indigenous lineage (Lin 2006). And in 2007, Lin published a new estimate; combining results of HLA, mtDNA, and Y chromosome testing, she concluded that ‘‘85% of Taiwanese Han have Taiwan Indigenous genes.’’

These new estimates produced a media flurry; all the major daily newspapers carried the story of the upgraded estimate. These numbers have been contested scientifically and politically, in press, at conferences, and in everyday conversations (e.g., Chen 2008). An editorial in the United Daily News newspaper (Lianhe Bao), for instance, was titled, ‘‘A civilized society should not embrace blood essentialism to agitate conflicts between Taiwanese Han and Mainlanders’’ (Chen 2008:82). In a conversation I had with two Taiwanese graduate students in biology, they skeptically remarked that it is significant that this estimate was published as a Chinese language newspaper editorial rather than in a peer-reviewed scientific journal. Indeed, in addition to the questions of methodological rigor that this observation raises, it also suggests that these numbers are intended for local audiences rather than international scientific consumption. Furthermore, Chen Shu-Juo (2008) suggests that the shifting estimates result from manipulating study sample sizes.

Nonetheless, these new numbers have been taken up as important ‘‘facts’’ in Taiwanese politics and identity by those who support an independent Taiwan and a distinct Taiwanese identity. The numbers, although taken as factual, are not stable and various numbers circulate; some still say 13 percent, others say 26 percent, and yet others prefer 85 percent. It is common, especially in political discourse, to make appeals to Aboriginal roots, as I discuss next. The numbers circulate in transnational and cyber spaces as well, even as their particular saliences may differ. Stephanie, for instance, wrote in a 2010 online discussion about Taiwanese identity for a US-based magazine, ‘‘I know that I am at least one-eighth Taiwanese aborigines. Seventy-eight percent of Taiwanese have aborigines blood in them as well.’’2 Similar claims abound on Internet sites, many aimed at a transnational Taiwanese audience, and nearly all such claims now contain a numerical estimate of one’s Aboriginality, of how many Taiwanese have Aboriginal genetics, or both. Thus, the numbers in this discourse shift depending on which studies one believes, one’s subject position, and one’s goals in invoking them. In all of the scientific studies cited the relevant genetic markers that appear to be of Aboriginal origin represent a very small portion of the genome. Nonetheless, the numbers remain part of a significant identity narrative.

https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1267&context=aprci

[GooseEgg]

The concept does not always include Taiwan, for instance Cisco uses “Greater China and Taiwan” to refer to the market

Greater China

[tommy525]

According to China
You are all Chinese

At least having a tiny bit of Han blood you are IN like Flint

Unlike the white race which seems to point out the part of you that is Not white

If you are black and white you are black

If you are Asian and white you are Asian

Etc

Obama is considered black while he is as much white as he is black

[Urracamesa]

In like Flint?

[tommy525]

@Urracamesa

In like Flint?

Google ?

[Urracamesa]

@tommy525

@Urracamesa

In like Flint?

Google ?

Google would likely tell you that the common expression is in like Flynn. It rhymes, you see. So, back to my question…

[tommy525]

pedantic much? Ok “In like flynn” it is then my bad

the pottery in question was 1862 and not 1861

gaw dang engrish teachers (not you…me, i was one)

[Urracamesa]

Definitely not an English teacher. Honestly wondered what you meant or wouldn’t have asked. Changed my tone after your response was to snarkily tell me to Google something that only existed in your head (and apparently in the title of an old movie).

[DogmaticStoic]

It depends on whose looking really. For Mexicans I’m too white, for whites I’m too brown for example