Sinicization
Areas of influence include diet, writing, industry, education, language/lexicon, law, architectural style, politics, philosophy, religion, science and technology, value systems, and lifestyle.
The historian James A. Millward has claimed that the People's Republic of China has used the concept of sinicization as a means to obscure Han settler colonialism.
As early as the 11th century BC, some of the Baiyue peoples in the Yangtze River Delta started to sinicize, marked by their establishment of the Wu State.
Over time, the mutual contact between Baiyue peoples and Han Chinese, as well as southward spread of Han Chinese, mostly as war refugees,[citation needed] led to the sinicization of most of the Baiyue populations that remained in southern China, be they in the Yangtze Valley or in coastal areas from the mouth of the Yangtze to the Gulf of Tonkin.
The numerous tribal groups in the north and northwest who had been heavily drafted into the military then exploited the chaos to seize power by local Chinese warlords.
Though an age of civil war and political chaos, it was also a time of flourishing arts and culture, advancement in technology, and the spread of Mahayana Buddhism and Daoism.
[9] The Mongol-led Yuan dynasty appointed a Muslim from Bukhara, Sayyid Ajall Shams al-Din Omar, as governor of Yunnan after conquering the Bai-led Dali Kingdom.
[21][22] The natives of Yunnan were instructed by Sayyid Ajall in such Confucian ceremonies as weddings, matchmaking, funerals, ancestor worship, and kowtow.
[22][23] The governor was praised and described as making "the orangutans and butcherbirds become unicorns and phoenixes and their felts and furs were exchanged for gowns and caps" by He Hongzuo, the Regional Superintendent of Confucian studies.
The "orthodox" historical view emphasized the power of Han Chinese to "sinicize" their conquerors, although more recent research such as the New Qing History school revealed Manchu rulers were savvy in their manipulation of their subjects and from the 1630s through at least the 18th century, the emperors developed a sense of Manchu identity and used Central Asian models of rule as much as Confucian ones.
[42] The Vietnamese Nguyễn emperor Minh Mạng sinicized ethnic minorities such as Khmers, Chams and Montagnards, claimed the legacy of Confucianism and China's Han dynasty for Vietnam.
[43] Directing his policies at the Khmers and hill tribes,[44] Minh Mang declared that "We must hope that their barbarian habits will be subconsciously dissipated, and that they will daily become more infected by Han [Sino-Vietnamese] customs.
[55] Strict surveillance and mass detentions of Uyghurs in the Xinjiang internment camps is a part of the ongoing sinicization policy by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
[57][58][59][60] The camps were established under CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping's administration with the main goal of ensuring adherence to national ideology.
Examples of this policy included the renaming of Japanese-named streets with mainland geographical names, the use of Mandarin Chinese in schools and punishments for using other regional Chinese languages, or "dialects" (such as Hakka and Hokkien), and teaching students to revere traditional ethics, develop pan-Chinese nationalism, and view Taiwan from the perspective of China.
[73] Sources quoted by Radio Free Asia have stated that in present-day Tibet, traditional Tibetan festivals have "been turned into a platform for propaganda and political theater" where "government workers and retirees are barred from engaging in religious activities, and government workers and students in Tibetan schools are forbidden from visiting local monasteries.
"[79][80] In 2019, TSPM chairman Xu Xiaohong made a pledge to eliminate any Western "imprint" from Chinese faith saying "[We] must recognise that Chinese churches are surnamed 'China', not 'the West'" and "No matter how much effort or time it takes, our resolution in upholding the Sinicisation of Protestantism will never change, and our determination to walk a path that is adapted to a socialist society will never waver.
I am convinced that an important intellectual and pastoral challenge arises in an almost natural way from the bringing together of these two terms, which indicate two real visions of the world.
[87][88] Cardinal Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state, in a 2019 interview with the CCP-owned Global Times newspaper, claimed that sinicization was a form of 'inculturation', which is a Catholic missionary term that refers to adopting local culture to proclaim the gospel.
He stated in the interview: "These two terms, "inculturation" and "sinicization," refer to each other without confusion and without opposition: in some ways, they can be complementary and can open avenues for dialogue on the religious and cultural level.
In 2018, a confidential directive was issued ordering local officials to "prevent Islam from interfering with secular life and the state's functions".
[75] In 2018, over one million Chinese government workers began forcibly living in the homes of Uyghur Muslim families to monitor and assess resistance to assimilation, and to watch for frowned-upon religious or cultural practices.
[95][96] These government workers were trained to call themselves "relatives" and have been described in Chinese state media as being a key part of enhancing "ethnic unity".
[100] In July 2023, the United Front Work Department's Central Institute of Socialism developed a plan to "meld Islam with Confucianism" using the Han Kitab texts as a guide.
