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Concept
Amis people
Summary
The Amis (Amis, Ami, Pangcah; Muqami), also known as the Pangcah, are an indigenous Austronesian ethnic group native to Taiwan. They speak the Amis language (Caciyaw no Pangcah; Minuqamian), an Austronesian language, and are one of the sixteen officially recognized Taiwanese indigenous peoples. The traditional territory of the Amis includes the long, narrow valley between the Central Mountains and the Coastal Mountains (Huadong Valley), the Pacific coastal plain eastern to the Coastal Mountains and the Hengchun Peninsula.
In 2014, the Amis numbered 200,604. This was approximately 37.1% of Taiwan's total indigenous population, making them the largest indigenous group. The Amis are primarily fishermen due to their coastal location. They traditionally had a matrilineal kinship system, by which inheritance and property pass through the maternal line, and children are considered born to the mother's people.
Traditional Amis villages were relatively large for Taiwanese indigenous communities, typically holding between 500 and 1,000 people. In today's Taiwan, the Amis also comprise the majority of "urban indigenous people" and have developed many urban communities all around the island. In recent decades, Amis have also married exogamously to the Han as well as other indigenous peoples.
The Amis people refer to themselves by two different ethnonyms. While those living in the East Rift Valley and Hualien County generally identify as Pangcah, which means "human" or "people of our kind," Amis living in coastal Taitung County employ the term Amis. Perhaps because of the official name, in 21st-century Taiwan, the term Amis is much more frequently used. This name comes from the word 'amis, meaning "north." There is still no consensus in the academic circle as to how "'Amis" came to be used to address the Pangcah. It may originally have been a term used by the Puyuma to refer to the Pangcah, who lived to the north of them. Another theory is that those who lived in the Taitung Plain called themselves "'Amis" because their ancestors had come from the north.
Official source
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