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The ethnic
groups that constitute Cambodian society possess a number of
economic and demographic commonalities â for example, Chinese
merchants live mainly in urban centers and play middlemen in many
economic cycles, but they also preserve differences in their social
and cultural institutions. They are concentrated mostly in central
and in southeastern Cambodia. The major differences among these
groups lie in social organization, language, and religion. The
majority of the inhabitants of Cambodia are settled in fairly
permanent villages near the major bodies of water in the Tonle
Sap Basin-Mekong Lowlands region. The Khmer
Loeu live in widely scattered villages that are abandoned when
the cultivated land in the vicinity is exhausted. The permanently
settled Khmer and Cham
villages usually are located on or near the banks of a river or
other bodies of water. Cham villages usually are made up almost entirely of Cham,
but Khmer villages, especially in central and in southeastern
Cambodia, typically include sizable Chinese communities.
THE CHAM
The Cham
people in Cambodia descend from refugees of the Kingdom of Champa,
which once ruled much of Vietnam between Gao
Ha in the north and Bien
Hoa in the south. The Cambodian Chams
are divided into two groups based on their religious practices,
the orthodox and the traditional. The orthodox group, which makes up
about one-third or the total number of Chams in the country, are
located mainly in the Phnom Penh â Oudong area and in the
provinces of Takeo and Kampot. The traditional Chams
are scattered throughout the midsection of the country in the
provinces of Battambang, Kampong Thom, Kampong Cham,
and Pursat. The Chams
of both groups typically live in villages inhabited only by other Chams.
The villages may be along the shores of water courses, or they may
be inland. The inhabitants of the river villages engage in fishing
and in growing vegetables. They trade fish to local Khmer for rice.
The women in these villages earn money by weaving. The Chams
who live inland support themselves by various means, depending on
the villages. Some villages specialize in metalworking; others raise
fruit trees or vegetables. The Chams
also often serve as butchers of cattle for their Khmer Buddhist
neighbors and are, in some areas, regarded as skillful water buffalo
and ram breeders.
THE KHMER
LOEU
The Khmer
Loeu are the non-Khmer highland tribes in Cambodia. The Khmer
Loeu are found mainly in the northeastern provinces of Ratanakiri,
Steung Treng, Mondulkiri and Kratie. Most Khmer Loeu live
in scattered temporary villages that have only a few hundred
inhabitants. These villages usually are governed by a council of
local elders or by a village headman. The Khmer Loeu
cultivate a wide variety of plants, but the main crop is dry or
upland rice grown by the slash-and-burn method. Hunting, fishing,
and gathering supplement the cultivated vegetable foods in the Khmer
Loeu diet. Houses vary from huge multi-family longhouses to
small single-family structures. They may be built close to the
ground or on stilts. The major Khmer Loeu groups in Cambodia
are the Kuy, Phnong, Stieng, Brao, Pear, Jarai, and Rade.
All but the last two speak Mon-Khmer languages. About 160,000
Kuy currently live in the northern Cambodia provinces of
Kampong Thom, Preah Vihea, and Steung Treng as well as in adjacent
Thailand.
THE CHINESE
The Chinese in
Cambodia formed the countryâs largest ethnic minority. Sixty
percent of the Chinese are urban dwellers engaged mainly in
commerce; the other 40% are rural residents working as shopkeepers,
as buyers and processors of rice, palm sugar, fruit, and fish, and
as money lenders. The Chinese in Cambodia represented five major
linguistic groups, the largest of which is the Teochiu
(accounting for about 60%), followed by the Cantonese
(accounting for about 20%), the Hokkien
(accounting for about 7%), and the Hakka
and the Hainanese (each
accounting for about 4%). Those belonging to certain Chinese
linguistic groups in Cambodia tend to gravitate to certain
occupations. The Teochiu, who
make up about 90% of the rural Chinese population, run village
stores, control rural credit and rice-marketing facilities, and grow
vegetables. In urban areas they are often engaged in such
enterprises as the import-export business, the sale of
pharmaceuticals, and street peddling. The Cantonese,
who are the majority Chinese group before the Teochiu
migrations began in the late 1930s, lived mainly in the city.
Typically, the Cantonese for
the most part are mechanics or carpenters. The Hokkien
community is involved in import-export and in banking, and it
includes some of the countryâs richest Chinese. The Hainanese
started out as pepper growers in Kampot
province, where they continued to dominate that business. Many
moved to Phnom Penh, where, in the late 1960s, they reportedly had a
virtual monopoly on the hotel and restaurant business. They also
often operate tailor shops. In Phnom Penh, the newly arrived Hakka
are typically folk dentists, sellers of traditional Chinese
medicines, and shoemakers.
THE
VIETNAMESE
The Vietnamese
community is scattered throughout southeastern and central Cambodia.
They are concentrated in Phnom Penh, and in Kandal,
Prey Veng, and Kampong
Cham provinces. No close cultural or religious ties exist
between Cambodia and Vietnam. The Vietnamese fall within the Chinese
culture sphere, rather than within the India, where the Thai and the
Khmer belong. The Vietnamese differs from the Khmer in mode of
dress, in kinship organization, and in many other ways â for
example the Vietnamese are Mahayana
Buddhists while most of the Khmers are Theravada
Buddhists. Although Vietnamese live in urban centers such as
Phnom Penh, a substantial number live along the lower Mekong and Bassac
rivers as well as on the shores of the Tonle
Sap, where they engage in fishing.
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