While China has 56 different ethnic groups, the largest group Han Chinese represents about 94% of the population. As a result, minorities are often far and few between. During our programs trip to Xi’an, we took a trip the the famed Muslim street. Traditional food and tea from the Chinese Muslim background lined the street, right along side small trinkets and souvenirs. After talking to both Muslims and tourists to the area, it seems that the general attitude in China towards minorities is keep the two cultures peacefully separate.These different lifestyles, belief systems, and customs are able to coexist but very little intermixing of the culture occurs. With so many ethnic groups coexisting in China is seems somewhat strange that such little interaction between lifestyles occurs, but with Han Chinese representing such a large proportion of the population, the traditionally ‘Chinese’ life is almost exclusively derived from the Han background.
Another interesting characteristic of the Chinese majority is whether a person is classified as Chinese or not. A minority that exists in Chinese is the children of ex-pats of ex-pats who have lived in the country for more than a decade. In America, an individual merely need to immigrate to the country and they can be considered an American. This is not the case in China, however; if a person does not look like the Han Chinese ethnicity, they are immediately assumed to not be Chinese, and to not know how to speak the Chinese language. Even if someone born and raised in China will be told that they are not Chinese due to their ethnic background.
This characteristic of the general Chinese population may seem somewhat uninviting and closed off, but it is just a reality of life in China. For over 5000 years, the Chinese culture has grown and changed into many different factions, each with unique customs and characteristics. While the majority of the Chinese population views their country’s minorities as separate entities, the remaining 55 ethnic groups are still vibrate, important parts of this ancient culture.