The village of humble worship: Religion and ethnicity in a Hakka Protestant community in Hong Kong

This dissertation is based on twelve months of field work in Shung Him Tong Village, a Hakka Protestant community in the New Territories of Hong Kong. In the dissertation I examine the way in which Christianity has allowed Hakka to escape the stigma of their ethnic identity and yet maintain the identity itself. By selecting positive images of Hakka history and origins--often drawing from the views of European missionaries and Hakka historians--Hakka Christians reinforced and reconstructed their own meaning of Hakka identity. Drawing on a "cultural interpretation of descent" (Keyes 1981:5), Hakka Christians claim that although they are Christian, they are also Han Chinese. On a more theoretical level I argue that the case of Hakka Christians provides insights into the strengths and limitations of anthropological "instrumentalist" approaches to the study of ethnicity. While instrumental motives may be a central feature of Hakka ethnic groupings in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, they are of limited relevance to the contemporary significance of Hakka identity in Shung Him Tong Village.; Chapter one covers various anthropological approaches to the study of ethnicity and evaluates their relevance to the case of Hakka Christians. Chapter two deals with the numerous debates over the origins of the Hakka, the role of the Hakka in the Taiping rebellion, and the growing interest in the Hakka among missionaries and historians at the turn of this century. Chapter three describes the early period of the founding of Shung Him Tong Village and addresses the political, economic and religious factors which enabled Hakka Christians to establish themselves in an area which was dominated by members of a powerful Punti lineage. Chapter four focuses on syncretism, secularization and the compartmentalization of Chinese and Christian religious beliefs and practices. Life cycle rituals and festivals provide insights into how Hakka Christians have reconciled their Christian and Chinese identities. In the sixth chapter I examine variations in the personal and situational significance of Hakka identity. Hakka history, character, women and language have all become important symbols of Hakka identity--all of which are juxtaposed to Hakka images of who they are not.