Chinese Diaspora

1
Chinese Diaspora

• History
• Canadian Chinese
• The Concubines Children
• (Double Happiness)
• (Happy Together)

2
Chinese Diaspora History

• Traditional Chinese emigrants since 16th C
• Three kinds Indentured workers, Free Artisans,
  Traders.
• Areas South-East Asia, Hawaii, North America ,
  the Caribbean, South America (Mexico, Peru)
• ???????????????

3
Chinese-Canadian History

• free entry (1858-84)
• 1880 and 1885 railroad workers
• restricted entry (1885-1923)
• 1904 -- 500-dollar head tax
• exclusion (1924-47)
• selective entry, 1948 to present liberation of
  China 1949 p. 68-
• recent Taiwanese, Hong Kongese and mainland
  Chinese immigrants
• Chinese diaspora flexible citizenship

4
Traditional Chinese Diaspora Characteristics

• Adaptable, resilient,
• a high level of family and clan solidarity
  close-knit (monetal) relationships
• invited by the colonizers
• Sojourners -- un-assimilable? quiet, wicked
  (CC. p. 62)
• and a human machine
• e.g. a Chinamans chance
• the yellow peril phobia

5
Contemporary Chinese Diaspora Characteristics

• All over the world hard to generalize and
  impossible to unite
• discriminated against still for their hard-earned
  wealth
• flexible citizenship
• sense of dual or multiple identity
• e.g. Imperialism of Syntax

6
Canadian Chinese during the Exclusion Period
Historical Phenomena

• China Town as a Bachelor Society
• 1921 census--sex ratio
• Vancouver 10/1(5,790 males and 585 females)
• Ottawa 30/1 (273 males and 9 females)
• Halifax 60/1 (138 males and 2 females)
• Racism v.s. Solidarity (Tang), Opium and Mah-jong
  (CC p. 62)
• Ways of Asserting Masculinity

7
Some photos

head taxes--50 in 1886, 100 in 1900, 500 in 1903
1923- Chinese Exclusion Act
8
Some photos (2)
9
The Concubines Children

• setting--
• Vancouvers Chinatown (mah-jonng parlour and tea
  house),
• Nanaimos,
• Prince George
• Chang Gar Bin (??)

10
The Concubines Children characters
Chan Sam

Wife no. 0 2 daughters
Wife no. 1
May-yin
Chow Guen
Yuen
Ping Nan
Leonard (adopted)
Winnie
John Chong
Denise Cheong
11
The Concubines Children Chronology (present
1987)

• 1848 -- Chan Sam leaves his family
• 1922 -- arrives in North America p. 61
• 1924 -- May-yings arrival
• 1929 -- return to China p. 63
• 1930 -- back to Canada, Winnies birth
• 1935 -- second return
• 1940 -- Chow Guen (Nan died in 1942)
• 1948 -- Winnie left Chinatown
• 1987 -- Winnies trip

12
The Concubines Children Issues (1)

• A family broken into two and linked together by
  the daughters trip back to China.
• the image of the coat p. 59
• the photo of the two girls

13
The Concubines Children Issues (2) Family
relationships

• The Influences of Institutionalized Racism on
  Family Relationships
• A. Gender -- Chan-Sam and May-Yin
• The Canton House (????)
• in Nanaimo's Chinatown
• years after
• May-ying worked there

14
The Concubines Children Issues (2) Family
relationships

• their marriage a hunting knife under his side of
  the mattress (63)
• May-ying as a waitress (63)
• May-ying as a Concubine (63)
• Wife No. 1 -- p. 64 dutiful and submissive

15
The Concubines Children Issues (2) Family
relationships

• B. Parenting
• Chan-Sam the house 65 p. 71

16
The Concubines Children Issues (2) Family
relationships

• B. Parenting
• Chan-Sam
• --being fatherly from afar (69 71)
• -- does not belong in Nanaimo, missing home 58-59
• --sacrifice the famly in Canada for the sake of
  the family in China

17
The Concubines Children Issues (2)

• May-ying --scary strong woman "cutting and
  curling her hair to look older to conform to the
  illegally purchased birth certificate (62) (p.
  63)

18
May-ying

• Dressing Winnie as a boy
• p. 55

Leave her husband 63 65 66
19
May-ying

• claimed back the rites of love (67)
• gamble her love on Chow Guen, get a son Leonard
• about the death of Nan 68
• Her later years (73-74)

20
The Concubines Children Issues (3)

• Family -- and a daughters sense of identity
• May-yings influence on Winnie
• the family photo (p. 60)
• Winnie neglected Strictly disciplined 66-67
  like a checked baggage, 68 dressed as a son 65
• Winnies bruises, shame p. 67

21
The Concubines Children Issues (3) Family --
and a daughters sense of identity

• Winnie's rebellion
• diligent work at school
• decides to quit school and get married p. 69
• the grandfathers money to buy a house 69
• the father and then the mother live with them a
  while
• final brokeup 70 75

22
The Concubines Children Issues (3) Many kinds
of family

• Paper daughter 69
• Ping 77 --"I don't deserve this I was not born
  here."
• Winnie no more shame (p. 61) immigration--liberat
  ion 77

May-ying newborn Ping.