Rhade people
 |
|
| Total population | |
|---|---|
( Vietnam 331,194 (2009)) |
|
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Vietnam, Cambodia | |
| Languages | |
| Rade, Vietnamese | |
| Religion | |
| Christianity, Animism |
The Rade (also Ê Đê or Rhade) are an Austronesian ethnic group of southern Vietnam (population 270,348 in 1999).
The Rade language is one of the Chamic languages, a subfamily of the Malayo-Polynesian branch of the Austronesian language family. Other Cham languages are spoken in central Vietnam and in Aceh, Sumatra; The Cham are more distantly to related to the Malayic languages of Indonesia, Malaysia and Madagascar and to the Philippine languages.
The Cham developed a writing system developed on the basis of the Latin script in the 1920s.
The Rade practice matrilineal descent. Descent is traced through the female line, and family property is in the hands of and inherited from women. The basic kinship unit is the matrilineage; these are grouped into higher-level matrilineal sibs (matrisibs). The Rade are further divided into two phratries.
The women of a matrilineage and their spouses and children live together in a longhouse. The lineage holds corporate property such as paddy land, cattle, gongs, and jars; these are held by the senior female of the matrilineage. The lineage also engages in the farming of common lands and maintenance of the longhouse. The head of the longhouse itself is a man, with the position most commonly inherited by the spouse of the daughter or sister-in-law of the previous longhouse head.
Matrilineages and matrisibs are exogamous, with both sexual intercourse and marriage prohibited. The phratries also impose some restrictions on marriage. Couples violating these restrictions must sacrifice a buffalo, though violating phratry restrictions are generally not seen as being as serious, and require only the sacrifice of a pig. Residence is matrilocal.
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