Editing Chinese culture (section)

== Identity ==
As early as the Zhou dynasty, the Chinese government divided Chinese people into [[Four occupations|four classes]]: [[gentry]], [[farmer]], [[Artisan|craftsman]], and [[merchant]]. Gentry and farmers constituted the two major classes, while merchant and craftsmen were collected into the two minor. Theoretically, except for the position of the Emperor, nothing was hereditary.{{Citation needed|date=July 2007}}

China's majority ethnic group, the [[Han Chinese]], are an [[East Asian people|East Asian]] [[ethnic group]] and [[nation]]. They constitute approximately 92% of the population of China, 95% of [[Taiwan]] ([[Han Taiwanese]]),<ref name="Yearbook2015">{{cite book |url=http://yearbook.multimedia.ey.gov.tw/enebook/2016yearbook/index.html |title=The Republic of China Yearbook 2016 |year=2016 |author=Executive Yuan, Taiwan |access-date=8 September 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170918120556/http://yearbook.multimedia.ey.gov.tw/enebook/2016yearbook/index.html |archive-date=18 September 2017 }}</ref> 76% of [[Chinese Singaporean|Singapore]],<ref>{{cite report |url=http://www.nptd.gov.sg/Portals/0/Homepage/Highlights/population-in-brief-2015.pdf |title=Population in brief 2015 |publisher=National Population and Talent Division |access-date=14 February 2016 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160216110141/http://www.nptd.gov.sg/Portals/0/Homepage/Highlights/population-in-brief-2015.pdf |archive-date=16 February 2016}}</ref> 23% of [[Chinese Malaysian|Malaysia]], and about 17% of the [[World population|global population]], making them the [[List of contemporary ethnic groups|world's largest ethnic group]], numbering over 1.3 billion people.

In modern China, there are 56 officially labelled [[List of ethnic groups in China|ethnic groups]].<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0e8vXvXhZgMC&pg=PR7 |author=Guo Rongxing |year=2011 |title=China's Multicultural Economies: Social and Economic Indicators |publisher=Springer |page=vii |access-date=26 November 2013 |isbn=978-1-4614-5860-9 |archive-date=22 October 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231022223031/https://books.google.com/books?id=0e8vXvXhZgMC&pg=PR7#v=onepage&q&f=false |url-status=live }}</ref> Throughout Chinese history, many non-Han foreigners like the Indo-Iranians became Han Chinese through assimilation, other groups retained their distinct ethnic identities, or faded away.<ref>{{cite web| url=http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/CHIN-01-100114.html| access-date=23 September 2015| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140110131435/http://atimes.com/atimes/China/CHIN-01-100114.html| url-status=usurped| archive-date=10 January 2014| title=Common traits bind Jews and Chinese| publisher=Asia Times Online| date=10 January 2014}}</ref> At the same time, the Han Chinese majority has maintained distinct linguistic and regional cultural traditions throughout the ages. The term ''[[Zhonghua minzu]]'' ({{lang-zh|s=中华民族|t=中華民族}}) has been used to describe the notion of [[Chinese nationalism]] in general. Much of the traditional identity within the community has to do with distinguishing the [[Chinese surname|family name]].