Being Chinese, Becoming Chinese American

Being Chinese, Becoming Chinese American PDF Author: Shehong Chen
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 0252055187
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 172

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Book Description
The 1911 revolution in China sparked debates that politicized and divided Chinese communities in the United States. People in these communities affirmed traditional Chinese values and expressed their visions of a modern China, while nationalist feelings emboldened them to stand up for their rights as an integral part of American society. When Japan threatened the China's young republic, the Chinese response in the United States revealed the limits of Chinese nationalism and the emergence of a Chinese American identity. Shehong Chen investigates how Chinese immigrants to the United States transformed themselves into Chinese Americans during the crucial period between 1911 and 1927. Chen focuses on four essential elements of a distinct Chinese American identity: support for republicanism over the restoration of monarchy; a wish to preserve Confucianism and traditional Chinese culture; support for Christianity, despite a strong anti-Christian movement in China; and opposition to the Nationalist party's alliance with the Soviet Union and cooperation with the Chinese Communist Party. Sensitive and enlightening, Being Chinese, Becoming Chinese American documents how Chinese immigrants survived exclusion and discrimination, envisioned and maintained Chineseness, and adapted to American society.

Being Chinese, Becoming Chinese American

Being Chinese, Becoming Chinese American PDF Author: Shehong Chen
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 0252055187
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 172

Get Book

Book Description
The 1911 revolution in China sparked debates that politicized and divided Chinese communities in the United States. People in these communities affirmed traditional Chinese values and expressed their visions of a modern China, while nationalist feelings emboldened them to stand up for their rights as an integral part of American society. When Japan threatened the China's young republic, the Chinese response in the United States revealed the limits of Chinese nationalism and the emergence of a Chinese American identity. Shehong Chen investigates how Chinese immigrants to the United States transformed themselves into Chinese Americans during the crucial period between 1911 and 1927. Chen focuses on four essential elements of a distinct Chinese American identity: support for republicanism over the restoration of monarchy; a wish to preserve Confucianism and traditional Chinese culture; support for Christianity, despite a strong anti-Christian movement in China; and opposition to the Nationalist party's alliance with the Soviet Union and cooperation with the Chinese Communist Party. Sensitive and enlightening, Being Chinese, Becoming Chinese American documents how Chinese immigrants survived exclusion and discrimination, envisioned and maintained Chineseness, and adapted to American society.

Becoming Chinese American

Becoming Chinese American PDF Author: H. Mark Lai
Publisher: Rowman Altamira
ISBN: 9780759104587
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 424

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Book Description
Collection of essays by Chinese-American scholar Him Mark Lai; published in association with the Chinese Historical Society of San Francisco.

A Chinaman's Chance

A Chinaman's Chance PDF Author: Eric Liu
Publisher:
ISBN: 1610391942
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
But this narrative obscures too much: the Chinese Americans still left behind, the erosion of the American Dream in general, the emergence--perhaps--of a Chinese Dream, and how other Americans will look at their countrymen of Chinese descent if China and America ever become adversaries. As Chinese Americans reconcile competing beliefs about what constitutes success, virtue, power, and purpose, they hold a mirror up to their country in a time of deep flux. In searching, often personal essays that range from the meaning of Confucius to the role of Chinese Americans in shaping how we read the Constitution to why he hates the hyphen in "Chinese-American," Eric Liu pieces together a sense of the Chinese American identity in these auspicious years for both countries.

Chinese American Transnationalism

Chinese American Transnationalism PDF Author: Sucheng Chan
Publisher: Temple University Press
ISBN: 1592134351
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 313

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Book Description
Chinese American Transnationalism considers the many ways in which Chinese living in the United States during the exclusion era maintained ties with China through a constant interchange of people and economic resources, as well as political and cultural ideas. This book continues the exploration of the exclusion era begun in two previous volumes: Entry Denied, which examines the strategies that Chinese Americans used to protest, undermine, and circumvent the exclusion laws; and Claiming America, which traces the development of Chinese American ethnic identities. Taken together, the three volumes underscore the complexities of the Chinese immigrant experience and the ways in which its contexts changed over the sixty-one year period.

The Chinese Americans

The Chinese Americans PDF Author: Benson Tong
Publisher: Greenwood
ISBN: 9780313305443
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
The volume begins with an overview of China in the Late Qing period, setting the stage for the successive waves of Chinese immigration to the United States. Chinese Americans, like other immigrants, have come to seek their fortune, and each generation has newly negotiated their position in society and their ethnic identity as they try to support their families. Students, teachers, and interested readers will follow the progress of these immigrants as they become part of the American mosaic and learn about the problems they have encountered along the way and continue to encounter such as racism and job discrimination. Their contributions to building this country and shaping U.S. history are discussed in terms of a complex relationship with the larger community.

Envisioning America

Envisioning America PDF Author: Tritia Toyota
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804772827
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
Envisioning America is a groundbreaking and richly detailed study of how naturalized Chinese living in Southern California become highly involved civic and political actors. Like other immigrants to the United States, their individual life stories are of survival, becoming, and belonging. But unlike any other Asian immigrant group before them, they have the resources—Western-based educations, entrepreneurial strengths, and widely based social networks in Asia—to become fully accepted in their new homes. Nevertheless, Chinese Americans are finding that their social credentials can be a double-edged sword. Their complete incorporation as citizens is bounded both by mainstream discourse in the United States, which paints them racially as perpetual foreigners, and by an existing Asian-Pacific American community not always accepting of their economic achievements and transnational ties. Their attempts at inclusion are at the heart of a vigorous struggle for recognition and political empowerment. This book challenges the notion that Asian Americans are apathetic or apolitical about civic engagement, reminding us that political involvement would often have been a life-threatening act in their homeland. The voices of Chinese Americans who tell their stories in these pages uncover the ways in which these new citizens actively embrace their American citizenship and offer a unique perspective on how global identities transplanted across borders become rooted in the local.

Chinese American Transnational Politics

Chinese American Transnational Politics PDF Author: H. Mark Lai
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 0252077148
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 298

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Book Description
Born and raised in San Francisco, Lai was trained as an engineer but blazed a trail in the field of Asian American studies. Long before the field had any academic standing, he amassed an unparalleled body of source material on Chinese America and drew on his own transnational heritage and Chinese patriotism to explore the global Chinese experience. In Chinese American Transnational Politics, Lai traces the shadowy history of Chinese leftism and the role of the Kuomintang of China in influencing affairs in America. With precision and insight, Lai penetrates the overly politicized portrayals of a history shaped by global alliances and enmities and the hard intolerance of the Cold War era. The result is a nuanced and singular account of how Chinese politics, migration to the United States, and Sino-U.S. relations were shaped by Chinese and Chinese American groups and organizations. Lai revised and expanded his writings over more than thirty years as changing political climates allowed for greater acceptance of leftist activities and access to previously confidential documents. Drawing on Chinese- and English-language sources and echoing the strong loyalties and mobility of the activists and idealists he depicts, Lai delivers the most comprehensive treatment of Chinese transnational politics to date.

Learning to be Chinese American

Learning to be Chinese American PDF Author: Liang Du
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 0739138480
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 152

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Book Description
Learning to Be Chinese American aims at exploring the complicated identity production process among Chinese immigrants in the United States in relation to the rapidly changing global and local contexts. Based on original ethnographic material collected in an upper-middle class Chinese American community, the author argues for the need to move beyond the framework of traditional nation-state boundaries in order to examine the identity production process of contemporary Chinese Americans. In doing so, we can better understand how this particular group, in response to changing economic and social conditions, actively takes part in the production of their unique ethnic identities through local institutions such as community-based organizations and ethnic education. This book expands the scope of existing literature on identity production among immigrants of color in both empirical and methodological terms.

Being Chinese

Being Chinese PDF Author: Wei Djao
Publisher: University of Arizona Press
ISBN: 0816523029
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
Chinese have traveled the globe for centuries, and today people of Chinese ancestry live all over the world. They are the Huayi or "Chinese overseas" and can be found not only in the thriving Chinese communities of the United States, Canada, and Southeast, but also in enclaves as far-reaching as Cuba, Zimbabwe, and Peru. In this book, twenty-two Chinese living and working outside of ChinaÑordinary people from all walks of lifeÑtell us something about their lives and about what it means to be Chinese in non-Chinese societies. In these pages we meet a surgeon raised in Singapore but westernized in London who still believes in the value of Chinese medicine, which "revitalizes you in ways that Western medicine cannot understand." A member of the Chinese Canadian community who bridles at the insistence that you can't be Chinese unless you speak a Chinese dialect, because "Even though I do not have the Chinese language, I think my ability to manifest many things in Chinese culture to others in English is still very important." Individuals all loyal to their countries of citizenship who continue to observe the customs of their ancestral home to varying degrees, whether performing rites in memory of ancestors, practicing fengshui, wearing jade for good luck, or giving out red packets of lucky money for New Year. What emerges from many of these accounts is a selective adherence to Chinese values. One person cites a high regard for elders, for high achievement, and for the sense of togetherness fostered by his culture. Another, the bride in an arranged marriage to a transplanted Chinese man, speaks highly of her relationship: "It's the Chinese way to put in the effort and persevere." Several of the stories consider the difference between how Chinese women overseas actually live and the stereotypes of how they ought to live. One writes: "Coming from a traditional Chinese family, which placed value on sons and not on daughters, it was necessary for me to assert my own direction in life rather than to follow in the traditional paths of obedience." Bracketing the testimonies are an overview of the history of emigration from China and an assessment of the extent to which the Chinese overseas retain elements of Chinese culture in their lives. In compiling these personal accounts, Wei Djao, who was born in China and now lives near Seattle, undertook a quest that took her not only to many countries but also to the inner landscapes of the heart. Being Chinese is a highly personal book that bares the aspirations, despairs, and triumphs of real people as it makes an insightful and lasting contribution to Chinese diasporic studies.

My Journey to Becoming Chinese American

My Journey to Becoming Chinese American PDF Author: Shium Andrew Chen
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780991466597
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
In his memoir, Dr. Shium Andrew Chen recounts the fascinating story of his youth in pre-Communist China, his emigration to the United States, his significant contributions to the field of psychology, and his years of community service and activism on behalf of Chinese Americans and other ethnic minority groups. He also addresses the difficulty Chinese Americans have identifying with and blending their Chinese and American identities, and asserts that finding a balance of both backgrounds and cultures leads to finding community and compassion. Through his narrative and the story of his life's work, Dr. Chen makes a compelling case for supporting, promoting, and embracing ethnic diversity as a tenet of American values.