Lebanese people
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Lebanese are defined as Arabs, with ancestry in the country of Lebanon. One curious fact about the Lebanese people is that most of them do not live in Lebanon. There are 4 million people in Lebanon and 15 million people of Lebanese descent elsewhere in the world, the majority of them in Brazil.[1]
| Lebanese people | |||||||||||||||
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     · Ralph Nader · Tony Shalhoub · Carlos Slim Helu · Joseph Barbera · Hassan Nasrallah · |
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| Total population | |||||||||||||||
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2.3-3 million in Lebanon and 15 million elsewhere in the world.[2] |
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| Regions with significant populations | |||||||||||||||
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| Languages | |||||||||||||||
| Portuguese, French, Spanish and English in the diaspora. | |||||||||||||||
| Religions | |||||||||||||||
| Predominantly Maronite Christianity, Shi'a Islam, Sunni Islam and Greek Orthodox Christianity.
Small numbers of Protestant Christians, Druze and non-religious (including atheists and agnostics). |
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| Related ethnic groups | |||||||||||||||
| Other Arabs, Assyrians and other Semites, other Middle Easterners |
Contents |
[edit] History
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[edit] Number in Lebanon
There are approximately 4 million people in Lebanon. However, this figure excludes about 1 million foreign workers and about 400 000 Palestinian refugees.
[edit] Identity
[edit] Phoenicianism
More information: Phoenicianism
Many Lebanese, mainly Christians, see themselves as ethnically Phoenician, rather than Arab. They argue that Arabization was caused by speaking of the Arabic language and conversion to Islam rather than any actual ethnic change, and thus the Arabs of Syria, Lebanon, Sudan, Tunisia, Iraq, etc. are all different peoples.[citation needed]
[edit] Arabism
More information: Pan-Arabism, Phoenicianism#Criticism_of_Phoenicianism
Many disagree with Phoenicianism, and say that it disregards the Lebanese Arab heritage. Some Lebanese regard themselves as Arabs.
[edit] Diaspora
The Lebanese diaspora consists of approximately 14 million (including those of Lebanese decent). There are around 10 million Lebanese in Brazil alone, there are also smaller communities in Australia, Africa, South America, the USA, Canada and Europe. The majority of the Lebanese diaspora are Christians, an estimate figure show that they represent about 75% of the Lebanese in total.
