Sangley
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sangley (Sangleye, Sangley Mestizo, Mestisong Sangley, Mestizo de Sangley or Chinese mestizo; plural: "Sangleys/es") , is an archaic term used to describe a person of mixed Chinese and Indio ancestry. (Indio during the Spanish colonial period was the term used for Filipinos.) It was widely used in the 15th to 19th century Philippines to differentiate them from other types of mestizos (such as those of mixed Indio and Spanish-Filipino ancestry).
Today, ‘Tsinito’ (lit. "little chinese man"; Spanish: Chinito) is liberally used to describe a Sangley, but it also usually includes Filipinos of other East Asian ancestries (Japanese, Korean, etc.) that possess these prominent physical features. ‘Tsinoy’, on the other hand, is used to refer to Filipinos of pure ethnic Chinese background. Among Spanish-Chinese mestizos, many simply use and prefer the generic term ‘mestizo’ to describe themselves.
This term comes from the Hokkien Chinese word seng-li, meaning, 'business'.
