Ethnic Identification and Social Changes of the Rukai People, the Aborigines in Taiwan

The Rukai people are the aborigines of Taiwan who have lived in the Central Mountains for generations. They moved out of the foothills from the Japanese colonial rule and gradually integrated into modern society. In the classification and identification of ethnic groups, based on the ethnological studies of the Rukai by Japanese scholars Tadao Kano, Torii Ryūzō, and Nenozō Utsurikawa, the Rukai was once belonged to the branch of the Paiwan ethnic group, which is also the source of the difference between the “seven tribes” and the “nine tribes” in the classification of the ethnic groups in Taiwan. In the social history of Taiwan for nearly a hundred years, the traditional customs and culture of the Rukai people have been dispelled and reconstructed. With the rise of Taiwan’s “indigenous awareness” and “indigenous movement”, as well as the Taiwan authorities’ construction of view on “indigenous history” and “multiculturalism”, the tradition of the Rukai people has been revitalized, being also a tool for political games on the island of Taiwan.