I'm curious why the  country's name  China comes from the Chin(Qin) dynasty while the name of the people comes from the Han dynasty?  It is odd.

also, the decapitated skulls from sacrifice victims found in Shang tombs: anthropolgists have have classified the skulls into various categories including Eskimoid, negroid,etc. sacrifice victims were brought in from areas outside of Shang China. The implications are limitless

This is because Chin (Qin) is the 1st imperial empire in chinese history. China was first unified into a country during Qin dynasty. However, people during Qin dynasty were either called "Qin people (Qin-ren)"  or 'hua-xia people".

It was during han dynasty that the people were 'unified' in terms of ethnicity. People at that time were called "han people" (han-ren).

I'm curious why the country's name China comes from the Chin(Qin) dynasty while the name of the people comes from the Han dynasty? It is odd.

This "Han" thing to me is really a ploy by the commies to be dirty and an attempt to erase the boundary of the different regional groups. I never liked it. I always view China as a bunch of different nations grouped into an empire. I do not like this homogenisation push that they are doing.

If they really want to go "Han" ... Fujian and GuangDong were never part of the Han empire (if i remember correctly). So does that mean that they are not "Han Chinese"?

It probably didn't come from Qin, a more accepted theory is that it came from the Sanscrit word for China.

It probably didn't come from Qin, a more accepted theory is that it came from the Sanscrit word for China.
I personally don't see much similarity between Qin and China. I know a few different dialects for Qin and they don't sound similar either.

There are pronounciation like Gin, Kin. None of them sounds anything like China. I don't know where the evidence for Qin = China comes from.

Note also that the russians call china Kitai (though I am not sure that it comes from the same origin).

Francois

I personally don't see much similarity between Qin and China. I know a few different dialects for Qin and they don't sound similar either.

There are pronounciation like Gin, Kin. None of them sounds anything like China. I don't know where the evidence for Qin = China comes from.

I favour the idea that it came from the Western Jin. The Sogdian letters from the fall of the Western Jin refer to China as "cinastan", and at this time Sogdians were going all over Central Asia and into north India.

The change from "K" to "ch" is not unusual in european languages.

For instance, dog, "küné" in greek, "canis" in latin, became "chien" in French (and btw was something like "kien" in old chinese...), "cat" is "gato" is spanish, and "chat" in French, "cantare" in latin gives french "chanter", and english "chant", many similar examples can be found. So, if the pronouciation was "Kin" or "Tchin", it could have evolved into China.

Note also that the russians call china Kitai (though I am not sure that it comes from the same origin).

More likely from Khitan.

Look at the Qinyong, Anyone who has no double-eyelid, could joking with others that he is pure Han-ethnic which seems more han ethnics exists in Monglia and Korea and Japan but not in China.

But is the 'ch' read as 'kh' as in German? Or "Ch" as in English? Or like 'k' or 'sh'? I thought that the English-like reading (and sh- reading) only happen before -i and -e, due to palatalization. Just like Ki- and Tsi- merged in Mandarin and Wu.

Perhaps that's true, some western country call China 'Cathay', probably from the empire "Kara-Khitai" found by 契丹 ethnicity.

What's special with 秦俑?

The palatalisation before i and e happens with c, but not with ch, "chat", "chine", "chien", "chanter" are all pronounced "sh", but "archeologie", "chitine", "cholesterol" are pronouced "k". The pronounciation as "k" is usually specific to greek roots, to translate the letter "khi", like "choir" or "archaealogy" in english. Note though that in words like "architecture" (in French) it is pronouced "sh", even though it is a greek root with a "khi". By the way, most of these greek words are late additions (post medieval).

dog is canis in latin (pronounced kanis), and gave the word chien ("sh") and the adjective canin (kanin).
horse is caballus in low latin ('k'), which gave cheval ('sh') and cavalier ('k')
to sing is cantare in latin, which gave "chanter" ('sh') and cantique ('k')

Well, few chinese people looks like 秦俑 now, so does the 汉俑. Look at their faces(Qinyong,Hanyong) carefully, you'll find that none of them has the born double-eyelids.

I ever heard that the double-eyelid(双眼皮） is a 显形遗传, any one once has a parent is not pure han ethnic, then this kind of face characteristic would keep in the next generations.

Now I ask you a question: Did you (or someone else) examine all the 秦俑? How about the Epicanthic fold? And is there any ancient picture that shows either double eyelid or epicanthic folds? (perhaps you can also show foreigner's ancient drawing by Chinese?)

You misunderstood the biology, because even though the heterozygote(mixed)-genotype person looks like the dominant (显形)gene carrier, they still carry the recessive (隐性) genes, and if you mix with pure recessive carrier you have 50% chance to get the recessive ones, and if you mix with other heterozygote 25% chance, though 0% with pure-dominant carriers.

But when examine the actual situation, that obviously the Koreans and Japanese had more single-eyelid than chinese, Northern han chinese than southern han chinese. I don't deny there might be all kinds of possiblities that how ancient han-ethnic looks like, maybe even the Huangdi had blue eyes as descripted not just for enlighten him more godness.

By the way do you have any picture of ancient people? Or the Qin Yong? And where do you find any comments on Huangdi's eye?
Do you know "Epicanthal folds"? Actually I rarely find anyone that has Epicanthal folds.

Mandarin had some palatalization by changing many of -a into -ia (as seen in words which are now read 'ya' in Mandarin).
Are there any 'cho','chu' and 'che' read with sh-? 'cha'/'chu' read with k-?

From the info I found in the web, "蒙古摺" is related to "內眥贅皮"? Perhaps we refer to the same thing.

Image of 內眥贅皮:
http://yuwenyan.home.bj001.net/X_CACHE/c02...2ac0cdb2cb3.JPG
I think most Chinese I see here is level 1 (1级) (of the top part of the picture)?

There is a difference between -e -i and other vowels for c and s, though
ce : se
ci : si
ca : ka
co : ko

to circumvent it, one can add a cedilla to the c : ç, for instance my first name is properly spelled
François, reads fran-soi
written Francois, it would read frankoi

As for greek prefixes and suffixes, a lot of spelling points come from the fact that greek had more letters for certain sounds:

the sound 'k', was either "khi" (kh) or "kappa" (k), greek prefixes with a khi are translitterated as 'ch' pronounced 'k'
archeo- (old)
those with a kappa as a 'k' (same pronounciation)
kilo- (1000)

same goes for the sound 't',
theta is translitterated as th : theme, esthete
tau is translitterated as t: meta- proto-

finally, rho ('r') is translitterated as r, except when it is the first letter, where it becomes "rh".

Haha, thanks.
But mine is right between level 0 and level 1 now.

So is one forced to write 'ke' and 'ki' (instead of 'ce' and 'ci') if they want to represent /ke/ and /ki/?

I thought the ç was a distinct sound from s.

t,th and k,kh are different sounds, but I don't see reasons why r and rh should be distinguished. There are only one r- in greek, the rho isn't it?
By the way do people in French usually read t the same as th, k the same as kh?

There was a sense of kinship and an identification with a shared history, but before 1800's, China had neither a concept of race nor ethnicity. A unified Han Ethnicity was propagated and exploited by revolutionaries to overthrow the Qing Empire.

Western Europeans identify with a common history and civilization as well, migration also abounded throughout Europe's history, this does not make Western Europeans one ethnicity.

This has been pretty interesting so far but there’s a crucial element that’s been missing through most of the discussion. Even the persuasive theory that locates the origin of what we today call ‘ethnicity’ in the way individuals have been classified according to loyalty to a particular state is based, inevitably, given the general nature of the vast majority of the records from this area, on the stories of the kings and bureaucrats running these states. The common people, though, are for the most part left out of the histories, as we have only become a political force in very, very recent times. (Obviously this is a worldwide phenomenon and it’s not only ancient “Chinese” history that has failed to emphasize any role played by “the masses.”) As half-serious examples, Han Wudi never had occasion, nor, presumably, would have felt the need, to go on TV and warn the Zhang Sans and Li Sis of the state “Either you’re with us, or you’re with the barbarians.” The option to go online and discuss personal perceptions of history with people from all over the world was similarly unavailable to the common people, or anybody else at the time. Things change, everywhere and constantly, and this leads us to new understandings of the world and our place in it. It’s been argued on this thread that something comparable to a ‘national identity’ existed prior to the 1800’s, but what that concept entails, and how it applies to the broad social spectrum, is subject to change given a variety of historical developments.

Feel free to explain these changes as the results of technological advances, the inevitable development of economic factors, cultural imperialism and the invasion of ‘foreign ideas,’ what have you, but many scholars argue that part of the shift that has led towards an emphasis on the role of the people has included a re-evaluation of the way a state is defined. The argument, simplified, is that ancient empires tended to be ‘center-based,’ that is, defined and understood at the time AS the Emperor and the court, while today we tend to believe a state should be understood as what’s inside its borders. (As a tangible example, on another post wuTao and Liang Jieming are raising points implying that the Great Wall may never have been viewed as the ‘border’ that we tend to assume it was today- it sure isn’t much of a border now) Since today these borders include lots of people who have more time on their hands, more access to information than ever before, and whose opinions suddenly matter, we’ve picked up the twin notions of nationalism and racism, beliefs in kinds of genealogical bonds of common heritage, and have imagined ourselves into a number of creatively-delineated communities in order to maintain the coherence of our modern states, and of course, the legitimacy of our governments.

It can possibly be argued that the PRC is currently somewhere in the middle of this transition, which is part of the reason why the government feels it can make claims and additions to ‘its history’ that seem absolutely ridiculous to ‘the rest of the world.’ While it’s standard practice to point the blame for the fact that citizens of the PRC currently have very little ‘freedom’ to examine their roles as part of the nation on the more ‘modern ideology’ of the fascist police state (the ability of the people to have the kind of discussions we have here is, put politely, still in its infancy), there may be something far more specific to the current ‘stage’ of the ‘Chinese’ historical experience at work here.

Here’s what I mean: as opposed to the (obviously indefensible) myths of ‘ethnic purity’ officially backed by a number of states historically influenced by ‘China’ --myths created under the pressure of modern nationalisms in an effort to define themselves as ‘not Chinese’ and based on erroneous perceptions of ‘relative homogeneity’-- there is zero case to be made for an unbroken ‘ethnic’ continuity, ‘Han’ or otherwise, in the history of ‘China.’ It is also impossible to argue that a unified political entity has been maintained throughout the entirety of the up to 5,000 years of “Chinese history.” What has existed, though, is a concept of correct governance, of states legitimatized by adherence to ideals that, applied in the right manner, draw the support of the ‘Mandate of Heaven,’ and (this is key) the various civilizations that have developed when states attempted to put these guidelines and historical precedents into practice. Most importantly, these ideas and others have been canonized into a huge number of texts, leading to the extraordinarily lofty position of what is possibly the single most unifying and relatively stable current in “Chinese history”- the written word. When the last few centuries moved in with their enormous social and technological transformations, as well as the total rewrite of ‘Chinese civilization’s’ place in this world, the ‘Han’ as an ethnicity was created as a reaction to the political environment to refer to the people in the more stable parts of the empire and to unify them as the carriers of the various permutations of ‘Chinese civilization.’ As mentioned in many other posts, the term has been used throughout history in a similar -but much more ‘immediately political-’ way, and one of the main differences in the modern usage is that this civilization and these social institutions are now supposedly carried on the chromosomal level.

Since today ‘ethnicity,’ ‘identity,’ ‘cultural heritage,’ ‘race,’ ‘the nation,’ etc, are such crucial concepts for our understanding of the world and ourselves, it is often very difficult for us to conceive of how newly invented these ideas are. A good place to start might be with the realization that ‘Sinification’ was probably a process in which the leaders of independent political entities chose to act within the well-established and influential frameworks we now associate with ‘Chinese civilization,’ which would first and foremost require the adoption of Chinese writing; as opposed to the very different idea of ‘acting like the Han people,’ which was most likely unconceivable at the time.

Otherwise, and the fact that this question is rarely asked and may even come off as completely unthinkable just goes to illustrate the relative uniqueness of the concept of historical ‘China’ among the other modern states, as well as its necessarily ‘multidimensional’ character- but what exactly is the justification for the common understanding that the PRC (which is slightly older than my mother) is entitled to the territory administered by the Tang Empire (618-907)? Or more relevant to the discussion given today’s terms, what connects the PRC to the Qing? Anywhere else on earth, the ‘Jurchen conquest’ of the Ming would most likely be viewed as a signal of the end of one state and the birth of another, but most dominant earlier readings of the ‘Chinese’ historical experience, having absolutely no ‘ethnic’ character, had very little difficulty fitting this ‘Manchu interregnum’ into the narrative.

An interesting effect of the ‘Han = China’ theory is that it takes the above, considerably smoother narrative of ‘Chinese History’ understood as interpretations of an idealized civilization, and smashes it up into total chaos, and by denying ‘real Chineseness’ to the ‘non-Han,’ the ‘Han’ themselves apparently get the short end of huge chunks of ‘their’ history. ‘Chinese Civilization’ is an enormously important part of the human experience that continues to have great ramifications and influence all across the world to this day. Like all nationalist projects, handing this history off to the ‘Han ethnicity’ for safekeeping is a new and temporary thing. Now we get to see how much longer this will last.

I do not contest it being an "ethnicity", or minzu in an unofficial, traditional, cultural sense. Of course Han can be a minzu in this sense. The Huaxia nucleus imposed its "Han civilization" and language quite hegemonically on several indigenous populations, and then obsorbed nomads like Xianbei then voila! Poeple grouped under the Han civilization who do not mark their lineage in a particularly distinctive way like Manchus or practice Islam, can pretty much be said to be "Han minzu". These include dubious lineages like the Jurchen Wanyan village now in Gansu, Khitay Yelu village in Shaanxi, various southern groups like Hakka who have rather strong tribal identities to set them apart form other Han minzu members. Please note that subgroups within Han minzu are very diverse.

But I do contest the modern, official classification of "Han minzu" as an unfair solution to the association between land and regional populations with regard to administration. However I do not radically challenge it. I do consider it to be a product of its time but wish different official "nationalities" and subgroups of "Han minzu" can slowly phase themselves out of the system by cultivating positive identities based on studying thier own traditions and histories.

I believe a more regionalized version of associating different Han minzu subgroups and ethnicities currently now identified as Han minzu, can be a healthy substitution for the current system in which a humungous, supposedly homogeneous "majority" is pitted against supposedly "bantustanized", supposedly unassociated "minority" groups. In fact this sytem, closely modeled after Joseph Stalin's nationalities categorization system, has been halted, or frozen in time by the Chinese Communist government as early as 1958. It found no substitution for it, nor did it wish to continue categorizing new-found ethnic groups.

So far they've discovered at least one "semiofficial" ethnic group called the "Kucong" and could not recognize it as an official nationality or group under any other. You need not go far to find groups like "Mosuo", "Ke", which were previously thought to be part of an official nationality. Meanwhile semiofficial efforts have been carried out regionally, not nation-wide, to recognize the ethnic identities of Hakka and other Han subgroups like Chuanqing, Danjia etc. But they are little known to us because of the unofficial nature.

Taiwanese independence movement has introduced to us the term "zuqun" (subgroup of Han). But Mainlanders already used a similar term "minxi" before. However, "zuqun" implies "distinction through interaction" while "minxi" implies "distinction through systematic classification".

No. The "Han" as an ethnicity only existed since the Republican era, NEVER before. There was an identification of being "people of the fallen Han empire," but it was neither based on ethnicity nor politics. Chinese before the Republican era never considered there to be a common Chinese culture either. People in the north (Jin,Liao) had their own cultures; people in the east (near the Yangtze river) had theirs; and so on. The entire "Han ethnicity" has been a remarkable fabrication achieved only in the past 150 or so years.

你也应该知道"汉族"作为一个"现代单一民族"是中华民国建立以后的事, 与孙文的种族理论有很大关系. "汉族主义"的理论基础是单薄的, 不能随便奉为真理. 也不是我不想当汉人了, 个人选择和学术最好分清楚点. 我祖先是珠矶巷移民, 几百年来都是三角洲和广府的主流群体, 这是不可任意篡改的. 但要不要"炎黄神话"作为"最大部落"的依据, 要不要把隋唐视为"华夏", 把辽金视为"夷狄", 要不要把一种工具通用语硬说成是"民族共同语", 要不要把同一套"汉服"从商汤时代穿到崇祯时代, 这是更加严肃的话题.

我认为, 汉族主义是封闭排外的, 严重地扼杀了近代国人的创造力和对汉文化和历史多元性的认识, 同时带有盲目西方民族主义和现代化的因素, 违反了东方文化心理的和谐. 特别提到的是最近的"汉服运动". 虽然我支持民主声音对北京"辫子文化"的批评, 也支持采薇作坊等对传统美学的努力, 但对该运动本身的片面性和排外性感到很遗憾. 不要以为"春秋的", "汉代的" 就代表最纯粹的汉认同. 这种纯粹主义会遮盖历史上汉文化多元的,时代独特的表达. 另外就是对阿尔泰民族太狠了, 忽视了他们对汉文化的贡献, 助长了中国人自大,固步自封的阿Q劣根性, 与汉唐的宽容和开放恰恰相反.
中国政治,文化,社会,经济对地方和族群的下放是很重要的. 没有COMPARTMENTS的轮船沉得特别快. 文化单一化,文化帝国主义的社会, 如纳粹德国, 苏联, "内陆美国", 特别容易产生群体疯狂和极端排外运动.

Perhaps you are right but I want to konw whether the concept of 'Han' had already appeared before the era that you gave or not.Admittedly,the concept was employed by SunWen for his political determination thereby the people who lived under the oppression of the Qin dynasty can be united.But that is not a reason to approve the statement that the concept never existed before the era of SunWen.Why did not the concept appear and why was not it employed by others before SunWen?It is a enigma.Maybe you can show me some references and bibliographies in order to testify that the concept did not existed before SunWen actually and you are right completely.I’m expecting.

@nishishei

who are the English really? They are the descendants of Vikings, Normans, Britons, Brits, Celtics, Romans.......and of course Anglos and Saxons, if you think English is an ethnicity, then Han definitely is...i agree with the previous poster that to deny the existence of Han Ethnicity is to deny the existence of ethnicity itself.
yuefei also called himself a Han, and again how do you explain the poem? the Tang Ming huang was referred to as "The Emperor of the Hans".

Thus we can see that from the beginning, 'Han' was not purely an ethnic concept but more an ethno-cultural complex.

Yeah.Do you think it is necessery or not?Somebody said that it can bring out cerntain vicious effection such as violence,nationalism,nihilism etc.I think each coin has two sides including it.

The Han concept existed only in the ancient states. Now they revived that concept in the modern world. The Yue concept was also recognized recently. So the Han was fill up the patriotic emptiness in people's heart. So the Yue Nan (Vietnam) was some what similar.

'Han' in its modern usage covers as diverse a group of people as 'European'. The main difference from Europeans is a common written language, a unitary (though multi-ethnic) state, and a sense of shared history. However, it seems that the 'Han' identity only becomes a big deal when reacting against an 'Other'. In normal situations, regional differences in China take priority over the idea of Han identity, and local identities are felt more keenly than national ones.

Even "discriminations" in one family cannot be avoided. Younger kids were treated with more care, etc. Conflicts inside one family, between father mother brother sister... Hey hey, how large is the divorce rate?

The Xia and Shang were Han racially, but the term Han wasn't in use until much later.

The Xia and Shang people could not be said to be racially Han.
By the time Han empire was established, it incorporated the Zhou people from territories west to the Shang, not to mention the Man from the south, Yi, Rong and Di etc.

Han as a race is a bigger melting pot.

The Xia, Shang and Zhou are essentially the same people and belonged to the same ethnic group - the Hua Xia. There is no sufficient evidence to show that the Zhou were "foreign invaders".
Before the Han Dynasty, the Chinese people were known as Hua Xia.
During the Zhou Dynasty there was some mixing with the Rong, Di, Yi and Man peoples.

The term Hua Xia is just an umbrella term.

Terming Xia, Shang and Zhou people as belonging to the same ethnic group but not others in the same region is being very arbitrary.

What do you mean by "umbrella" term?

It is not arbitrary. Shang and Zhou shared the same language, for example.

How do we know that they shared the same language?

'Han' seems to have become popular as a name for the majority ethnicity in north China only at the time of the Northern Qi dynasty, when it was mostly used by the Xianbei elite in a hostile and derogatory sense.

But the people of the Southern Dynasties were not called 'Han' by the Xianbei; they were commonly known as 'Nanren' (southern people), or more offensively as 'Daoyi' (island barbarians).

The script was one derived from other, but if the language were so different then the usage would be drastically changed.

what did the Southerners call Northerners?