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The Gaddang are a linguistically-identified ethnic group resident for centuries in the watershed of the Cagayan River in Northern Luzon, Philippines. Gaddang speakers were recently reported to number as many as 30,000. This number may not include another 6,000 related Ga'dang speakers and other isolated linguistic-groups whose vocabulary is more than 75% identical.
The members of several proximate groups speaking mutually-intelligible dialects today are depicted as a single people in history and cultural literature, and in government documents. Distinctions often are asserted between the Christianized "lowlanders" of Isabela and Nueva Vizcaya, and the formerly non-Christian residents in the nearby Cordillera mountains. Such differences may be exaggerated by some sources, and completely ignored or glossed-over by others. The Gaddang have in the past also used a variety of social mechanisms to incorporate individuals born to linguistically-different peoples. The Gaddang identity is their place and their language.
The Gaddang are historically-indigenous to a compact geographic area smaller than a third of a million hectares. Collectively, they comprise less than one-twentieth of one percent of the Philippines' population.