The Hakka (English transliteration of the Hakka Chinese pronunciation of the Chinese characters, 客家), sometimes Hakka Han, people are Han Chinese people who speak the Hakka Chinese language and have links to the provincial areas of Guangdong, Jiangxi, Guangxi, Sichuan, Hunan and Fujian in China. Though the majority of the Hakka live in Guangdong, they have a distinct identity from the Cantonese people. The Chinese characters for Hakka (客家) literally mean “guest families”. The Hakka’s ancestors were often said to have arrived from what is today’s central China centuries ago and north China a thousand years ago. The Hakkas are thought to originate from the lands bordering the Yellow River (i.e., the modern northern Chinese provinces of Shanxi, Henan, and Hubei). In a series of migrations, the Hakkas moved, settled in their present locations in south China, and then often migrated overseas to various countries throughout the world. The worldwide population of Hakkas is about 80 million, though the number of Hakka language speakers is fewer. Hakka people have had a significant influence on the course of Chinese and world history; in particular, they have been a source of many revolutionary, government and military leaders. Their mass migrations and pioneering spirit caused them to be nicknamed as the “Jews of Asia”.
