The Hoanya (Chinese: 洪雅族; pinyin: Hóngyǎzú) are a Taiwanese Aboriginal people who live primarily in Changhua County, Chiayi City, Nantou County, and near Tainan City.
Their language, Hoanya, is now extinct.[1]
The Lloa people and Arikun people are generally considered to be a part of the Hoanya people.
Scholar like Kaim Ang suggests the name of the people, "Hoanya", come from Taiwanese Hokkien Chinese: 番仔; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Hoan-iá; lit. 'foreigner', originally from the perspective of ethnic Chinese referring to non-Chinese, especially historically natives of Taiwan and Southeast Asia.[2][3] The name of the people group retained the obsolete diminutive suffix, 仔; (iá), in Hokkien, which originally came from a weak form of 囝; (kiáⁿ, káⁿ) and today survives in Hokkien as the diminutive suffix, 仔; (á). "番仔; Huán-nià" is attested in the Dictionario Hispanico Sinicum (1604)[4] and use of the obsolete 仔; (iá) suffix is also recorded in Medhurst (1832).[5] The modern form of the same aforementioned word in Taiwanese Hokkien is 番仔; Hoan-á, which over the centuries took on a derogatory connotation in Taiwan in reference to Taiwanese aboriginal groups in general or to any unreasonable persons, although the same word, Huan-a, means differently in other Hokkien-speaking communities, such as in Fujian (Mainland China), the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, etc.