Abstract: The Gelong people are a Li-Han hybrid community residing in the lower reaches of the Changhua River on Hainan Island.Officially classified as Han Chinese in China's ethnic identification system,they speak Cunhua (commonly referred to as "Village Language"),a language belonging to the Li branch of the Tai-Kadai family.This disjunction between official identity and linguistic-cultural practice underscores the socially constructed nature of their ethnicity.The Gelong emerged historically—from the Song and Yuan dynasties onward—as a product of Hainan Island's role as a "cultural contact zone", shaped by the triadic interplay of intermarriage between Han military colonists (juntun) and indigenous Li groups,sustained cultural fusion,and evolving state governance.Linguistically,Cunhua exhibits a stratified structure:a Li substratum overlaid with a Chinese superstratum.Kinship terminology further reflects this hybridity—patrilineal terms are sinicized,while matrilineal terms retain Li forms—corroborating historical patterns of asymmetric intermarriage.Marriage rituals creatively synthesize Han numerological divination (ren suan,"human calculation") and Li phenological omens (tian yan,"heavenly verification"),establishing a dual-track legitimization mechanism.Socially,the Nü'erfang ("Daughters' House",a cultural arena mediating between social freedom and ritual norms) evolved from the Li longgui ("communal youth dormitory") by incorporating Han ethical norms,thereby functioning as a cultural arena that mediates between indigenous social freedom and Confucian ritual discipline.Gelong ethnicity was thus forged through internal cultural integration and pragmatic identity strategies—presenting as Han in interactions with state authorities while maintaining Li affiliations in local contexts—culminating in their institutional classification as Han during modern ethnic identification.This case vividly illustrates the dynamic,processual nature of ethnic formation and provides both theoretical insight and empirical grounding for understanding how the Chinese nation's "unity in diversity" is locally realized through cultural negotiation and institutional adaptation.

Key words:

Gelong people, cultural fusion, ethnicity construction, unity in diversity