Hongkongers

Hongkongers
Chinese香港人
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinXiānggǎng rén
IPA[ɕjáŋ.kàŋ.ɻə̌n]
Hakka
Romanizationhiong1 gong3 ngin2
Yue: Cantonese
Yale RomanizationHèunggóng Yàhn
JyutpingHoeng1gong2 jan4
IPA[hœŋ˥.kɔŋ˧˥.jɐn˩]

Hongkongers (Chinese: 香港人; Jyutping: Hoeng1gong2 jan4), Hong Kongers, Hong Kong citizens and Hong Kong people are demonyms that refer to a resident or native inhabitants of Hong Kong, such as the Punti and Tanka, although they may also refer to others who were born and/or raised in the territory.

Prior to British colonization, the Hong Kong population were overwhelmingly native inhabitants. During British rule, the Greater China identity, shaped by Chinese cultural heritage, were observed in the events such as the 1920s Canton–Hong Kong strike. In 1989, the Tiananmen Square massacre caused shifts of the Hong Kong identity towards anti-communism, giving rise to localism.

Legally and technically speaking, the term Hongkonger generally refers to a resident of Hong Kong after the 1997 handover of Hong Kong. However, overseas Hong Kong population or their descendants may culturally self-identify as Hongkongers.

Terminology

The terms Hongkonger and Hong Kongese are used to denote "a native or inhabitant of Hong Kong". According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word Hongkonger first appeared in the English language in an 1870 edition of The Daily Independent, an American-based newspaper. In March 2014, both the terms Hongkonger and Hong Kongese were added to the Oxford English Dictionary. In contrast, the Merriam-Webster Dictionary of American English adopts the form Hong Konger instead. The form Hong Konger also seems to be preferred by governments around the world. In 2008, the U.S. Government Publishing Office decided to include Hong Konger as a demonym for Hong Kong in its official Style Manual. The Companies House of the UK government similarly added Hong Konger to its standard list of nationalities in September 2020. The aforementioned terms all translate to the same term in Cantonese, 香港人 (Cantonese Yale: Hèung Góng Yàhn; lit. 'Hong Kong person').

During the British colonial era, terms like Hong Kong Chinese and Hong Kong Britons were used to distinguish the British and Chinese populations that lived in the territory.

The term Hongkonger generally refers to a legal resident of Hong Kong, as defined under Article 24 of the Hong Kong Basic Law. Residents are holders of Hong Kong Identity Cards, classified as permanent or non-permanent residents. The right of abode may be acquired through birth in Hong Kong or other routes, including family reunification through a one-way permit for eligible mainland Chinese residents. Formally speaking, the government of Hong Kong does not confer its own citizenship, although the term Hong Kong citizen is used colloquially to refer to permanent residents of the city. Permanent residency does not require a language or civic test, while Cantonese proficiency and knowledge of local customs may be considered at the discretion of authorities in applications for Chinese nationality through naturalisation.

Ethnicity and background

According to Hong Kong's 2021 census, 91.6 per cent of its population is Hongkongers and Chinese, with 29.9 per cent having been born in mainland China, Taiwan or Macau. Historically, much of the Han Chinese trace their ancestral origins from Southern China as Chaoshan, Canton, Taishan, Fujian, Jiangxi, and Zhejiang. For example, in the 1850s–60s as a result of the Taiping Rebellion and in the 1940s prior to the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949. Thus, immigrants from Guangdong and their descendants have long constituted the majority of the ethnic Chinese residents of Hong Kong, which accounts for the city's broad Cantonese culture. The Cantonese language, a form of Yue Chinese, is the primary language of Hong Kong and that used in the media and education. For that reason, while there are groups with ancestral roots in more distant parts of China, such as Shanghai and Shandong, as well as members of other Han Chinese subgroups, such as the Hakka, Hokkien, and Teochew, residents who are Hong Kong-born and/or raised often assimilate into the mainstream Cantonese identity of Hong Kong and typically adopt Cantonese as their first language. Cantonese continues to remain the dominant language, spoken by 93.7% of the population in 2021. However, Mandarin has become increasingly important in daily life, with more residents speaking it due to growing ties with the Mainland. This change in linguistic trends is shaping the territory's cultural future and its role within the greater Chinese-speaking world.

Simultaneously, there has been an increase in the number of new immigrants from mainland China, influencing both demographic composition and linguistic trends in the territory. At the same time Mainland China holds the largest number of Hong Kong residents outside of Hong Kong.

Ethnic minorities

In addition to the Chinese supermajority, Hong Kong's minority population also comprises many other different ethnic and national groups, with the largest non-Chinese groups being the Southeast Asian communities which include the Filipinos (2.7 per cent), Indonesians (1.9 per cent), as well as the Thais and Vietnamese. In 2021, 0.8 per cent of Hong Kong's population were of European ancestry, many (48.9 per cent) of whom resided on Hong Kong Island, where they constitute 2.5 per cent of the population. There are long-established South Asian communities, which comprise both descendants of 19th and early 20th-century migrants as well as more recent short-term expatriates. There are small pockets of South Asian communities who live in Hong Kong including Indians, Nepalese, and Pakistanis, who respectively made up 0.6 per cent, 0.4 per cent, and 0.3 per cent of Hong Kong's population in 2021. Smaller diaspora groups from the Anglosphere include Americans, Britons, Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders. There are also small pockets of East Asian communities, such as the Japanese and Koreans, living in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong population by ancestral origin (1961–1981)[citation needed]
Ancestry 1961 1971 1981
Number Percentage Number Percentage Number Percentage
Hong Kong260,5058.3185,6994.7124,2792.5
Guangzhou and Macau1,521,71548.62,072,08352.62,455,74949.2
Sze Yap573,85518.3684,77417.4814,30916.3
Chaozhou257,3198.2391,4549.9566,04411.4
Other parts of Guangdong244,2377.8250,2156.4470,2889.4
Fujian, Taiwan, Jiangsu, Zhejiang178,6265.7235,8726.0351,4547.0
Other parts of China43,6441.448,9211.2103,5312.1
Foreigners[clarification needed]49,7471.667,6121.7100,9062.0
Total3,129,6483,936,6304,986,560

Cultural identity

"Hongkonger ethnic group" is manually written in the questionnaire of the 2018 New Zealand census.

Hong Kong culture is primarily a mix of Chinese and Western influences, stemming from Lingnan Cantonese roots and later fusing with British culture due to British colonialism (Chinese: 粵英薈萃; Jyutping: jyut6 jing1 wui6 seoi6).

From 26 January 1841 to 30 June 1997, Hong Kong was formally a British crown colony and later a British dependent territory, except for a brief period of Japanese occupation during World War II between 1941 and 1945. English was introduced as an official language of Hong Kong during British colonial rule alongside the indigenous Chinese language, notably Cantonese. While it was an overseas territory, Hong Kong participated in a variety of organisations from the Commonwealth Family network. Hong Kong ended its participation with most Commonwealth Family organisations after the handover of Hong Kong in 1997; although it still participates in the Association of Commonwealth Universities and the Commonwealth Lawyers Association.[citation needed] Moreover, Hong Kong also has indigenous people and ethnic minorities from South and Southeast Asia, whose cultures all play integral parts in modern-day Hong Kong culture. As a result, after the 1997 transfer of sovereignty to the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong has continued to develop a unique identity under the rubric of One Country Two Systems. Nonetheless, the historical memories and legacies related to legal frameworks and schooling systems, as well as the privileged status of the English language as a cultural and symbolic capital, complicate Chinese national identity despite the return of sovereignty.

After the handover of Hong Kong, the University of Hong Kong surveyed Hong Kong residents about how they defined themselves. The number of Hong Kong residents identifying as "Hong Kongers" slowly increased over the decade of the 2010s, reaching a high watermark during and immediately following the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests, with over 55 percent of all respondents identifying as "Hong Konger" in a poll conducted in December 2019, with the most notable spike occurring amongst younger residents. Following the passage of the 2020 Hong Kong National Security Law and a subsequent wave of emigrants from Hong Kong, that percentage has declined; in its latest poll published in June 2022, 39.1% of respondents identified as Hong Konger, 31.4% as Hong Konger in China, 17.6% as Chinese, 10.9% as Chinese in Hong Kong, and 42.4% as mixed identity.

Diaspora

Apart from mainland China, where the largest number of Hongkongers are found outside the territory, the Hong Kong diaspora can be found in Taiwan and several English-speaking countries such as Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Most Hongkongers living outside of Greater China form a part of the larger overseas Chinese community.[dubious – discuss] Waves of the migration of Hongkongers to other parts of the world took place following the Sino-British Joint Declaration in 1984, following 1989, and in the years prior to the territory's transfer to China in 1997, though a significant percentage returned in the years following. A new emigration wave occurred following the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests and the United Kingdom's enactment of the BN(O) visa scheme.

Notable people

See also

Culture

Notes

  1. ↑ Formally, the government of Hong Kong does not confer "citizenship". The term Hong Kong citizen is a colloquialism used to denote a permanent resident of Hong Kong. Permanent residents of Hong Kong typically hold citizenship from China or another sovereign state.
  2. ↑ From the 19th century to 1983, British Dependent Territories were referred to as Crown Colonies. Several years after the handover of Hong Kong, British Dependent Territories were renamed British Overseas Territories.

References

  1. ↑ Fong, Vanessa L.; Murphy, Rachel (2006). Chinese Citizenship: Views from the Margins. Routledge. p. 149. ISBN 1-1341-9597-4.
  2. ↑ Lam, Jeffie (19 March 2014). "'Hongkonger' makes it to world stage with place in the Oxford English Dictionary – Amid anti-mainland sentiment, Oxford dictionary recognises city's local identity". South China Morning Post. Archived from the original on 30 July 2019. Retrieved 2 September 2019.
  3. ↑ "New words list March 2014 | Oxford English Dictionary". Archived from the original on 28 June 2014. Retrieved 9 July 2014.
  4. ↑ "Hongkonger – definition of Hongkonger in English from the Oxford dictionary". www.oxforddictionaries.com. Archived from the original on 26 October 2014. Retrieved 23 June 2016.
  5. ↑ "Hong Kongese | Definition of Hong Kongese by Oxford Dictionary on Lexico.com also meaning of Hong Kongese". Lexico Dictionaries | English. Archived from the original on 20 October 2020. Retrieved 2 February 2021.
  6. ↑ "Definition of HONG KONG". www.merriam-webster.com. Archived from the original on 12 March 2016. Retrieved 2 February 2021.
  7. ↑ "'Hongkonger' makes it to world stage with place in the Oxford English Dictionary". 19 March 2014. Archived from the original on 1 June 2015. Retrieved 23 June 2016.
  8. ↑ U.S. Government Printing Office (16 September 2008). "Style Manual 2008" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 12 April 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2021.
  9. 1 2 "List of nationalities". GOV.UK. Archived from the original on 31 January 2021. Retrieved 2 February 2021.
  10. ↑ Lai Tung-kwok (22 May 2013). "Application for naturalisation as a Chinese national". Legislative Council of Hong Kong. Archived from the original on 13 December 2013. Retrieved 7 December 2013.; quote: "However, it has to be pointed out that the knowledge of the Chinese language is only one of the factors to be considered. This does not imply that applicants who do not know Chinese will be refused, nor will those who know Chinese necessarily be eligible for naturalisation as Chinese nationals. ... At this stage, we have no plan to institute examinations similar to those used by some foreign countries in handling naturalisation applications."
  11. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "2021 Population Census". Archived from the original on 14 November 2022. Retrieved 8 May 2023.
  12. ↑ John Thomson 1837–1921,Chap on Hong Kong Archived 19 October 2017 at the Wayback Machine, Illustrations of China and Its People (London,1873–1874)
  13. ↑ Info Gov HK. "Hong Kong Gov Info." History of Hong Kong. Retrieved on 16 February 2007. Archived 18 April 2007 at the Wayback Machine
  14. ↑ Alex Lo (February 2014). "Why Cantonese is a real language in Hong Kong". Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 31 March 2015.
  15. 1 2 2011 Population Census – Summary Results (PDF) (Report). Census and Statistics Department. February 2012. p. 37. Archived (PDF) from the original on 22 May 2013. Retrieved 23 October 2013.
  16. ↑ Melvin Ember; Carol R. Ember; Ian Skoggard, eds. (2005). Encyclopedia of diasporas: immigrant and refugee cultures around the world. Diaspora communities. Vol. 2. Springer. pp. 94–95. ISBN 978-0-306-48321-9.
  17. ↑ "Immigration Autonomy". Immigration Department Annual Report 2009-2010. Archived from the original on 23 June 2012.
  18. ↑ Ng Sek Hong (2010). Labour Law in Hong Kong. Kluwer Law International. p. 19. ISBN 978-90-411-3307-6.
  19. ↑ "Han Chinese, Cantonese in China, Hong Kong". 2015. Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 31 March 2015.
  20. ↑ Odine de Guzman (October 2003). "Overseas Filipino Workers, Labor Circulation in Southeast Asia, and the (Mis)management of Overseas Migration Programs". Kyoto Review of Southeast Asia (4). Archived from the original on 4 May 2007. Retrieved 18 March 2007.
  21. ↑ Lilley, Rozanna. [1998] (1998) Staging Hong Kong: Gender and Performance in Transition. University of Hawaii. ISBN 0-8248-2164-5
  22. ↑ Tsao, J.; Hardy, I.; Lingard, B. (2021). "Schooling in Hong Kong, youth aspirations, and the contesting of Chinese identity". British Journal of Sociology of Education. 42 (2): 196–212. doi:10.1080/01425692.2021.1882836.
  23. ↑ "Almost nobody in Hong Kong under 30 identifies as "Chinese"". The Economist. ISSN 0013-0613. Archived from the original on 22 November 2019. Retrieved 25 August 2024.
  24. ↑ "Categorical Ethnic Identity". HKPORI – 香港民意研究所 – The Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute Limited (HKPORI) was registered in Hong Kong as a limited company on 19 February 2019 and started to operate on 4 May 2019. It is a direct continuation of the Public Opinion Programme (POP) of The University of Hong Kong (HKU) after it spins off from the university. Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute. 27 January 2021. Archived from the original on 21 June 2022. Retrieved 5 June 2022.