Polysemous Han
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Sino-Platonic Papers is pleased to announce the publication of its three-hundred-and-seventy-first issue:
“The Multifaceted Saga of the Ethnonym Han,” by Sanping Chen. (free pdf)
ABSTRACT
The term Han designates one of the largest categories of collective identity in the world, representing the great majority of the population in both mainland China and Taiwan. However, this same Chinese character han has had persisting negative connotations in both literary and colloquial use, a long tradition that continues to this very day. After discussing the intimate relationship between this ethnic identity and the notion of China being the “central country,” this paper examines the paradox of the derogatory connotations associated with this proud endonym, tracing their origin to the “Barbarian” conquerors of northern China in the early medieval period. The seldom-noted fact that the descendants of these nomadic conquerors continued to dominate China for centuries sealed the Chinese language’s long memory of the Janus faces of the ethnic name Han.
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All issues of Sino-Platonic Papers are available in full for no charge.
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Selected readings
- "The historical phonology of 'Han', the main Chinese ethnonym" (4/14/20) — guest post by Chris Button
- "Guys and gals: Or, why the 'Chinese are called Han'"
- "What does the Chinese word '女漢子' mean?" (Quara)
- "Renewal of the race / nation" (6/24/17)
- Joshua A. Fogel, "New Thoughts on an Old Controversy: Shina as a Toponym for China", Sino-Platonic Papers, 229 (August, 2012), 1-25 (free pdf)
- Victor H. Mair, "The North(west)ern Peoples and the Recurrent Origins of the 'Chinese' State", in Joshua A. Fogel, The Teleology of the Modern Nation-State: Japan and China (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005), pp. 46-84.
- Victor H. Mair, "The Classification of Sinitic Languages: What Is 'Chinese'?, in Breaking Down the Barriers: interdisciplinary studies in Chinese linguistics and beyond (Festschrift for Alain Peyraube), pp. 735-754 (free pdf), esp. pp. 739-741.
- "Huaxia: pre-Han cognomen of the Middle Kingdom" (7/3/24) — with very long bibliography,