Manchu people
The Manchu people are an ethnic minority in China, primarily originating from Manchuria in Northeast China. Historically, they descended from the Tungus group and were known as the Juchen before establishing the Qing dynasty in 1644 after deposing the Ming dynasty. The Qing dynasty was notable for its military reforms and expansion, ruling China for over 250 years until its overthrow in 1911. Following this period, Manchuria experienced control shifts between China and Japan, particularly during the Japanese occupation in the 1930s. In contemporary times, the Manchu population exceeds 10 million but faces significant cultural assimilation into the Han majority, leading to a decline in the use of the Manchu language and cultural practices. Efforts to preserve their language and identity have intensified, especially as the number of fluent speakers dwindles to around one hundred by 2022. The Manchu experience reflects broader themes of ethnic identity and cultural preservation amidst pressures of assimilation within modern China.
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Manchu people
The Manchu people are a minority group within the Chinese population. They come from a province called Manchuria in Northeast China, bordered by Russia, Mongolia, and North Korea. Manchurians have existed in China for centuries. They descended from a group called the Tungus but have often used other names, including Donghui, Sushen, and Juchen.
At the time when they used the name Juchen, the Manchu people controlled most of Northeastern China before they began using the name Manchu and heading south to conquer Beijing in 1644. By 1680, the Manchu controlled all of China; they deposed the Ming dynasty and replaced it with the Qing dynasty. The Qing dynasty ruled for more than two hundred and fifty years before being overthrown in 1911. In subsequent years, Manchuria has been controlled by both China and Japan with no autonomous government of its own. The Manchu people in the twenty-first century make up one of China's largest minority ethnic groups, with a population of over 10 million.
Brief History
The Manchu people's rise to power and formation of the Qing dynasty started with the decline of the Ming dynasty, which faced economic depression and failing harvests. The Ming dynasty's problems made it vulnerable to attacks by bandits, who conquered the capital city of Beijing in 1644. The Manchu people reclaimed the city from the bandits and established their dynasty, though it would be several more decades before they had control over all of China.
The Qing dynasty focused on expanding and reforming China's military power, as well as reforming its tax policies and central government. The early Qing dynasty held strong power over China with emperors who brought the country out of economic depression and nearly tripled the size of the population between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
The late Qing dynasty was plagued with problems trading with foreign powers. After the British introduced China to opium, the Qing emperor banned the sale of opium within the country, an action that both the British traders and Chinese buyers defied. When the emperor's appointed commissioner in the anti-opium campaign destroyed twenty thousand chests of opium, the Opium Wars began. The Qing dynasty had no real defense against the British Empire's spectacular navy. To end the wars, the Qing emperor signed several trade treaties that opened further China's borders to European traders.
With the start of more open trade between the Chinese and the other world powers came the rise of the anti-foreigner sentiment within a large segment of the Chinese population. The anti-foreign movement began and spurred rebellions throughout China. The rebellions hurt the country deeply and claimed many lives.
The Chinese rebellion in 1911–1912 officially brought an end to the Qing dynasty. During peace talks between the rebels and the government, it was decided that the emperor would abdicate and a republican government would be organized uniting all of China.
Manchuria remained part of China until the 1930s, when Japan invaded it and claimed it as a Japanese colony called Manchukuo following the Mukden Incident in 1931. Japan's military took over the government, forcing the deposed Qing Emperor Puyi to figurehead the puppet government. With Puyi installed as the puppet emperor, Japan had greater access to Asia. But when Japan surrendered at the end of World War II, Manchuria was reclaimed by China and its citizens were repatriated into Chinese society.
Impact
In the twenty-first century, the Manchu people make up one of the largest ethnic minority groups in China but have been almost wholly assimilated into the majority group, the Han, to which more than 90 percent of the population belongs. The Manchurian identity has almost been erased, with very few Manchu people even speaking their own language. This precedent for assimilation existed even during the reign of the Qing dynasty.
During their early ruling years, the Manchu kept a definitive divide between the Chinese laypeople and themselves. The Manchu language became the official language of the state, and intermarriage between the other Chinese ethnic groups and the Manchu was forbidden. The Manchu children went to Manchu schools that taught them the language and history of their people. However, these efforts to keep the Manchu culture undiluted and exclusive ceased in the nineteenth century when the Manchu began to adopt the Chinese culture and language, as well as allowing intermarriage.
When the Japanese took over Manchuria, they closed the Manchu language schools and imposed Japanese language classes. China's reclamation of Manchuria resulted in the Chinese official language of Mandarin, with no Manchu language classes being taught again in any substantial number. As a result, the Manchu language will soon be extinct. This language is only used to read court and other official documents from the Qing dynasty—and most people who read the language do not know what it sounds like. The characters that are used in Manchu are phonetic and different from the Mandarin Chinese characters, which are pictorial. Other Chinese dialects use the same pictorial characters with different pronunciations, giving them a mutual understanding that is impossible between Manchu and Mandarin.
The inclusivity of minority ethnic groups is an issue for China in the twenty-first century. The fifty-six minority groups within China divide the people, and these classifications allow the government to watch the movements of those minority groups to prevent uprisings. The Chinese government divided the population by ethnicity but encourages assimilation into the majority group. Though the Chinese government has protected the languages of some ethnic minorities, the majority Han Chinese public does not wish to preserve the languages that are becoming extinct. The government offers minority education for a few grades in elementary school and broadcasts shows in minority languages for an hour or two a day. Many young people are forced to learn Mandarin Chinese with only a basic understanding of their mother language.
The forced assimilation has created a backlash, with more minority groups searching for ways to learn their mother tongues and understand their own culture. For the Manchu people, this became particularly important as their language and culture were becoming extinct. They continue to fight to preserve their language in a country that continues to force assimilation. By 2022, only about one hundred Manchu language speakers remained, prompting researchers to begin language preservation efforts using artificial intelligence.
Bibliography
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Johnson, Ian. "In China, the Forgotten Manchu Seek to Rekindle Their Glory." The Wall Street Journal, 3 Oct. 2009, www.wsj.com/articles/SB125452110732160485. Accessed 28 Nov. 2024.
"Manchukuo." New World Encyclopedia, www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Manchukuo. Accessed 28 Nov. 2024.
"The Mukden Incident of 1931 and the Stimson Doctrine." Office of the Historian, history.state.gov/milestones/1921-1936/mukden-incident. Accessed 28 Nov. 2024.
Na, Man-gap. The Diary of 1636: The Second Manchu Invasion of Korea. Columbia University Press, 2020.
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Tim, Leo. "Manchuria, the Manchus, and What It Means to Be Chinese." Epoch Times, 24 July 2015, www.theepochtimes.com/article/manchuria-the-manchus-and-what-it-means-to-be-chinese-1474310. Accessed 28 Nov. 2024.
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