ABSTRACT
This chapter draws attention to the specific features that have shaped the identity of Taiwan’s Plains Indigenous People. Unlike their lowland and mountains Indigenous brethren, the Plains Indigenous Peoples did not receive official government recognition in the mid-1990s and still lack such recognition today. This chapter examines the history of the Plains Indigenous Peoples as well as their struggle to obtain formal recognition from the government. In addition, this chapter considers issues of wider indigenous development in Taiwan. One section looks specifically at the efforts of the Siraya people, the Plains Indigenous People who met the Dutch in Tainan, to gain recognition in modern Taiwan. Thus, this chapter brings to the fore on the issue of identity for Taiwan’s first peoples.
