Zhuang Culture Research - China Zhuang Studies Library

Author: Huang Guiqiu
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-04-01
Features: Zhuang Studies is an emerging concept that has evolved from traditional Zhuang research, representing an academic discourse of a new era. It gradually entered the academic field in the 1990s with the establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Studies Association. Its emergence and growth are inevitable developments in academic progress, rooted in profound historical context. Its construction requires the collective efforts of all parties. The Zhuang ethnic group is the most populous among China's ethnic minorities. The Zhuang people are primarily distributed across Guangxi, Yunnan, Guangdong, Guizhou, Hunan, and Sichuan provinces and autonomous regions. According to the 1982 census, Guangxi had 12.332 million Zhuang people, accounting for 33.8% of the province's total population of 36.42 million and over 90% of the national Zhuang population (by 1990, Guangxi had 14.1542 million Zhuang people). They are mainly concentrated in the four prefectures of Nanning, Baise, Hechi, and Liuzhou, with some scattered across 66 counties within the region. The Zhuang-inhabited areas cover approximately 60% of Guangxi's total area. The Zhuang language belongs to the Sino-Tibetan language family, Zhuang-Dong branch, and Zhuang-Dai sub-branch, divided into Northern and Southern dialects. Historically, the Zhuang people developed a system of square Zhuang characters, known as "Tusuxuzi," modeled after Chinese characters. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the Latin-based Zhuang script was created and gradually promoted. The Zhuang ethnic group has a long history. Archaeological findings of primitive cultural sites in Zhuang-inhabited areas such as Liujiang and Laibin prove that human habitation existed in this region as early as the late Paleolithic era. Ancient records indicate that the earliest tribes to inhabit what is now Guangxi included the "Baiyue" group, such as the "Xiwou" and "Luoyue" tribes. Today's Zhuang people are descendants of these tribes. The Zhuang people have multiple self-designations, including "Buzhuang," "Bunong," and more than twenty others. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, they were uniformly referred to as "Tong," which was later changed to "Zhuang."