Chinois, also referred to by the Réunion Creole name Sinwa or Sinoi, are ethnic Chinese residing in Réunion, a French overseas department in the Indian Ocean. As of 1999, roughly 25,000 lived on the island, making them one of Africa's larger Chinese communities along with Chinese South Africans, Chinese people in Madagascar, and Sino-Mauritians.
Despite their French citizenship, the Chinois form a group with origins distinct from the Chinese in m...
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Chinois, also referred to by the Réunion Creole name Sinwa or Sinoi, are ethnic Chinese residing in Réunion, a French overseas department in the Indian Ocean. As of 1999, roughly 25,000 lived on the island, making them one of Africa's larger Chinese communities along with Chinese South Africans, Chinese people in Madagascar, and Sino-Mauritians.
Despite their French citizenship, the Chinois form a group with origins distinct from the Chinese in metropolitan France. The first Chinese to arrive in Réunion came not directly from China, but rather were indentured labourers drawn from among the population of Chinese in Malaya, who arrived on the island in 1844 to work in grain production and levee-building. They violently resisted the slave-like manner in which they were treated, and as a result, the colonial government put a stop to the immigration of Chinese indentured labourers just two years later.
Beginning in the 1850s, Cantonese-speakers began to arrive from Mauritius. It was common...
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