| Total population | |
|---|---|
| 3,984 (2011 census) | |
| Languages | |
| English · Hakka Chinese · Cantonese · Mandarin | |
| Religion | |
| Christianity, Chinese folk religion (including Chinese philosophy, Confucianism and Taoism), Buddhism | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Han Chinese · Hakka people · Cantonese people · Chinese Caribbeans |
Chinese Trinidadians and Tobagonians (sometimes Sino-Trinidadians and Tobagonians or Chinese Trinbagonians) are Trinidadians and Tobagonians of Han Chinese ancestry. The group includes people from Mainland China, Hong Kong, and Overseas Chinese who have immigrated to Trinidad and Tobago and their descendants, including those who have emigrated to other countries. The term is usually applied both to people of mixed and unmixed Chinese ancestry, although the former usually appear as mixed race in census figures. Chinese settlement began in 1806. Between 1853 and 1866 2,645 Chinese immigrants arrived in Trinidad as indentured labour for the sugar and cacao plantations. Immigration peaked in the first half of the twentieth century, but was dramatically lowered after the Chinese Communist Revolution in 1949. After peaking at 8,361 in 1960, the unmixed Chinese population in Trinidad declined to 3,800 in 2000, however slightly increased to 3,984 in 2011.
The Chinese Trinidadian and Tobagonian community is a diverse mixture that includes first-generation immigrants from China, Trinidadians whose ancestors have lived in Trinidad for many generations and diasporan Trinidadians and Tobagonians. Most Trinidadian Chinese originate from Guangdong Province, especially among the Hakka Han people and Cantonese Han people. [1]
The Chinese community in Trinidad and Tobago traces its origin to the 12 October 1806 arrival of the ship Fortitude carrying a group of Chinese men recruited in Macau, Penang and Calcutta. [1] This was the first organised settlement of Chinese people in the Caribbean, preceding the importation of Chinese indentured labour by over 40 years. [2] It was intended to be the first step in a plan to establish a settlement of free labourers and peasant farmers in what was then a newly acquired British colony. [3] Royal Navy Captain William Layman suggested that it would be cheaper to establish new sugar plantations using free Chinese labour than it would with African slaves. At the same time, British officials concerned in the aftermath of the Haitian Revolution suggested that the settlement of Chinese immigrants in Trinidad would provide a buffer between the enslaved Africans and the whites. [1]
In December 1805, a Portuguese captain recruited 141 Chinese men in Macau and shipped them to Penang where six more men were recruited. Another 53 men were recruited in Calcutta, bringing the total to 200. The survivors of this group arrived in Trinidad eight months later. [3] Kim Johnson reports that 194 men survived the journey, [3] while Walton Look Lai reports that there were 192 men. [1] The group settled at Surveillance Estate in Cocorite, on the western edge of Port of Spain, the capital. Given the lack of farmland near the city, the group requested permission to hire themselves out as labourers. Fifteen were hired to work as seine fishers, and one worked as a shoemaker. After one year in Trinidad, 17 of the migrants had died. Sixty-one of them departed with the Fortitude in July 1807. By 1810 only 22 of them remained in Trinidad, and only seven remained in 1834, the last time that the community was mentioned. [3]
The 1833 abolition of slavery in the British Empire led to labour shortages in Trinidad. Indentured labourers were imported from various parts of the world including India and Madeira. Between 1853 and 1866 2,645 Chinese immigrants arrived in Trinidad – 2,336 men, 309 women and 4 children – on eight ships. These immigrants constituted the second wave of Chinese immigration to Trinidad. [3] The third wave began after the Chinese revolution in 1911 and continued until the Chinese Revolution of 1949. Most of these immigrants were brought to Trinidad and Tobago through the efforts of earlier immigrants. The fourth wave of immigration began in the late 1970s and continues. [4]
Additional immigrants settled in Trinidad after initially migrating to other parts of the Caribbean, especially British Guiana which received 13,593 indentured immigrants from China between 1853 and 1884. [3]
This article is about the demography of the population of Trinidad and Tobago including population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population.
Coolie is a pejorative term used for low-wage labourers, typically those of Indian or Chinese descent.
Indo-Caribbeans or Indian-Caribbeans are people in the Caribbean who are descendants of the Jahaji indentured laborers from India and the wider subcontinent, who were brought by the British, Dutch, and French during the colonial era from the mid-19th century to the early 20th century. A minority of them are descendants from people who immigrated as entrepreneurs, businesspeople, merchants, engineers, doctors, religious leaders and other professional occupations beginning in the mid-20th century.
Indo-Trinidadians and Tobagonians or Indian-Trinidadians and Tobagonians are people of Indian origin who are nationals of Trinidad and Tobago whose ancestors came from India and the wider subcontinent beginning in 1845 during the period of colonization.
Afro-Trinidadians and Tobagonians are people from Trinidad and Tobago who are of Sub-Saharan African descent, mostly from West Africa. Social interpretations of race in Trinidad and Tobago are often used to dictate who is of West African descent. Mulatto-Creole, Dougla, Blasian, Zambo, Maroon, Pardo, Quadroon, Octoroon or Hexadecaroon (Quintroon) were all racial terms used to measure the amount of West African ancestry someone possessed in Trinidad and Tobago and throughout North American, Latin American and Caribbean history.
Rudranath Capildeo was a Trinidadian and Tobagonian politician, mathematician and barrister. He was a member of the prominent Hindu Indo-Trinidadian Capildeo family. Capildeo was the leader of the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) from 1960 to 1969 and the first Leader of the Opposition in the Parliament of the independent Trinidad and Tobago from 1962 to 1967. He was also a faculty member at the University of London, eventually holding the position of Reader of Mathematics. He was awarded the Trinity Cross, the nation's highest award, in 1969.
Trinidadian English Creole is an English-based creole language commonly spoken throughout the island of Trinidad in Trinidad and Tobago. It is distinct from Tobagonian Creole – particularly at the basilectal level – and from other Lesser Antillean English creoles.
Trinidad and Tobago, officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, is the southernmost island country in the Caribbean. Consisting of the main islands Trinidad and Tobago and numerous much smaller islands, it is situated 11 kilometres off the coast of northeastern Venezuela and 130 kilometres south of Grenada. It shares maritime boundaries with Barbados to the east, Grenada to the northwest and Venezuela to the south and west. Trinidad and Tobago is generally considered to be part of the West Indies. The island country's capital is Port of Spain, while its largest and most populous city is San Fernando.
Chinese Jamaicans are Jamaicans of Chinese ancestry, which include descendants of migrants from China to Jamaica. Early migrants came in the 19th century; there was another moment of migration in the 1980s and 1990s. Many of the descendants of early migrants have moved abroad, primarily to Canada and the United States. Most Chinese Jamaicans are Hakka and many can trace their origin to the indentured Chinese laborers who came to Jamaica in the mid-19th to early 20th centuries.
Caribbean Hindustani is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by Indo-Caribbeans and the Indo-Caribbean diaspora. It is a koiné language mainly based on the Bhojpuri and Awadhi dialects. These Hindustani dialects were the most spoken dialects by the Indians who came as immigrants to the Caribbean from India as indentured laborers. It is closely related to Fiji Hindi and the Bhojpuri-Hindustani spoken in Mauritius and South Africa.
The Indian indenture system was a system of indentured servitude, by which more than 1.6 million workers from British India were transported to labour in European colonies, as a substitute for slave labor, following the abolition of the trade in the early 19th century. The system expanded after the abolition of slavery in the British Empire in 1833, in the French colonies in 1848, and in the Dutch Empire in 1863. British Indian indentureship lasted till the 1920s. This resulted in the development of a large South Asian diaspora in the Caribbean, Natal, East Africa, Réunion, Mauritius, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Myanmar, and Fiji, as well as the growth of Indo-Caribbean, Indo-African, Indo-Mauritian, Indo-Fijian, Indo-Malaysian, and Indo-Singaporean populations.
Trinidadian and Tobagonian Americans are people with Trinidadian and Tobagonian ancestry or immigrants who were born in Trinidad and Tobago. Trinidad and Tobago is home to people of many different national, ethnic and religious origins. As a result, people of Trinidadian and Tobagonian descent do not equate their nationality with ethnicity. The largest proportion of Trinidadians lives in the New York metropolitan area, with other large communities located in South Florida, Central Florida, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Texas, Minnesota, Georgia, and Massachusetts. There are more than 223,639 Trinbagonian Americans living in the United States.
Chinese Caribbeans are people who are predominantly of Han Chinese ethnic origin living in the Caribbean. There are small but significant populations of Chinese and their descendants in all countries of the Greater Antilles. They are all part of the large Chinese diaspora known as Overseas Chinese.
The first numbers of Chinese arrived in British Guiana in 1853, forming an important minority of the indentured workforce. After their indenture, many who stayed on in Guyana came to be known as successful retailers, with considerable integration with the local culture. The most notable person of Chinese ancestry was the Former Guyana President Arthur Chung, was independent Guyana's first President from 1970 to 1980, and the first Chinese head of state of a non-Asian country.
The bilateral relations between the Republic of India and the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago have considerably expanded in recent years with both nations building strategic and commercial ties. Both nations formally established diplomatic relations in 1962. Indo-Trinidadian and Tobagonians form the largest ethnic group in the country at 37.6% of the total population.
White Trinidadians and Tobagonians are Trinidadians of European descent. However, while the term "White Trinidadian" is used to refer collectively to all Caucasians who are Trinidadian, whether by birth or naturalization, the term "local-white" is used to refer more specifically to Trinidad-born Caucasians and, in particular, those who trace their roots back to Trinidad's early settlers.
Trinidadians and Tobagonians, colloquially known as Trinis or Trinbagonians, are the people who are identified with the country of Trinidad and Tobago. The country is home to people of many different national, ethnic and religious origins. As a result, Trinidadians do not equate their nationality with race and ethnicity, but with citizenship, identification with the islands as whole, or either Trinidad or Tobago specifically. Although citizens make up the majority of Trinidadians, there is a substantial number of Trinidadian expatriates, dual citizens and descendants living worldwide, chiefly elsewhere in the Anglosphere.
Faris Al-Rawi is a Trinidadian and Tobagonian politician. He was the former Attorney General of Trinidad and Tobago from 2015 to 2022. He is also a Member of the House of Representatives for the constituency of San Fernando West.
The Temple in the Sea, officially known as the Sewdass Sadhu Shiva Mandir, is a Hindu mandir in Waterloo, Carapichaima, Couva–Tabaquite–Talparo, Trinidad and Tobago. Sewdass Sadhu, an indentured laborer from India, constructed the original temple in the Gulf of Paria in 1952. The temple was reconstructed by Randolph Rampersad and reopened in 1995.
Fortitude was launched at Calcutta in 1804. In 1806 she carried Chinese labourers to Trinidad for the British East India Company; she was seized in Trinidad, sold, and sailed to England. From 1808 on she was a West Indiaman. She was lost circa 1812.
