Tanka people

Tanka people

Regions with significant populations
China	Guangdong Guangxi Fujian Hainan Zhejiang
Languages
Tanka dialect of Cantonese, other Spoken Chinese dialects
Religion
Predominantly Mahayana Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, Traditional Chinese religion.

Tanka people
Chinese	1. 蜑家 2. 艇家 3. 水上人 4. 曲蹄
Literal meaning	1. vermin families 2. boat households 3. people on water 4. crooked hoof
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin 1. danjia 2. tingjia 3. shuishang ren Yue: Cantonese Jyutping 1. daan6 gaa1 2. teng5 gaa1 3. seui2 seung6 yan4 4. kuk1 tai4 Eastern Min Fuzhou BUC 4. Kuóh-dà̤

The Boat people or Tankas is an ethnic group in China that has traditionally lived on junks in coastal parts of Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian, Hainan, and Zhejiang provinces, as well as Hong Kong and Macau. Though many now live onshore, some members of the older generations still live on their narrow boats and pursue their traditional livelihood of fishing. Originally the Tankas were a non-Chinese ethnic group and were classified by the Qing government as "mean". The Yongzheng Emperor freed them and several other "mean" groups from this status in a series of edicts from 1723 to 1731. They mostly worked as fishermen and tended to gather at some bays. Some built markets or villages on the shore, while others continued to live on their junks or boats. The Tankas arrived in Hong Kong around the 7-9th century from the Malay Oceanic. As Hong Kong developed, some of the fishing grounds in Hong Kong became badly polluted or were reclaimed, and so became land. Those Tankas who only own small boats and cannot fish far out to sea are forced to stay inshore in bays, gathering together like floating villages.

A small number of Tankas also live in parts of Vietnam. There they are called Dan and classified as a subgroup of the Ngái ethnicity.

See also

• Pang uk
• Fuzhou Tanka