To celebrate the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, a photography exhibition entitled “The Joy Happy Family - the journey taken by China’s 56 Chinese ethnic groups in past years” was held recently in Beijing.

The photo show was jointly organized by the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles (CFLAC) and China Photographers Association with support by China Photo Press, Nationality Pictorial, China Pictorial, and Wangfujing Area Construction and Management Office.

The following photos, selected from the exhibition, are portraits of people from the Dongxiang ethnic group.

People of the Dongxiang ethnic minority live in the part of the Linxia Hui Autonomous Prefecture situated south of the Yellow River and southwest of Lanzhou, capital city of the northwest province of Gansu. Half of them dwell in the Dongxiang Autonomous County, and the rest are scattered in Hezheng and Linxia counties, the city of Lanzhou, the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and some other places.

The Dongxiang ethnic minority received its name from the place it lives -- Dongxiang. However, this ethnic group was not recognized as a minority prior to the founding of the People's Republic in 1949. The Dongxiangs were then called "Dongxiang Huis" or "Mongolian Huis." The Dongxiang language is basically similar to Mongolian, both belonging to the Mongolian branch of the Altaic language family. It contains quite a number of words borrowed from the Han Chinese language. Most of the Dongxiang people also speak Chinese, which is accepted as their common written language. Quite a few of them can use Arabic alphabet to spell out and write Dongxiang or Chinese words.

The Dongxiangs are an agricultural people who grow potatoes, wheat, maize and broad beans as well as hemp, rapeseed and other industrial crops.