Introduction
What is it like to be caught between two worlds; to be suspended between two cultures without having any true hold to either and without fitting in into either place? This is the dilemma that Chinese Americans find themselves in today, given the fact that they may have lived in the United States for generations, yet because of the very strong Chinese traditional culture, they still feel a pull to their Chinese roots.
The authors Tong and Brownstone try to shed some light on Chinese Americans today by looking at their colorful history that can be traced back to the early 1800s. There are differences between the narrations of the two writers that arise partly, other than the fact that they are two individual human beings and cannot have identical perspectives, from the fact that one is a Chinese American writer and the other is a non-Chinese American author. By critically analyzing the two works, it can be determined on what points the two authors agree on the history of Chinese Americans and on what issues their points of view differ and to what extent.
A brief history of the Chinese Americans
It was during the California gold rush when the Chinese began migrating into the United States in large numbers. It is estimated that in the four years between 1820 and 1824, a whopping twenty five thousand young, male Chinese immigrants found their way to the hills of California. These young men were normally semi-literate or illiterate and worked as menial laborers. Between 1885 and 1943, the US government put a complete ban on the immigration of people of Chinese descent into the country, backed by the Chinese Exclusion Act. The restrictions were lifted afterwards but it was not until 1965 that the Chinese people started coming into America again and that trend has continued to date (Kane, 1881).
The Chinese have strong ties to traditional practices, most of which, even from Chinese Americans who are thousands of miles away from their homeland and generations away from it as well, have been well preserved and are still practiced. Because of this some Chinese traditions have become embedded in American culture. The most outstanding of these is Chinese cuisine. Chinese food has become everyday fare with Chinese restaurants popular with most people no matter what their ethnic background (Tong, 10).
Synopsis of the book ‘The Chinese America’ by Benson Tong
The book by Benson Tong ‘The Chinese Americans’ is a short but comprehensive look at the history Chinese Americans going way back to the early 1800s and snaking its way to the present time and date. The book is all rounded in that it tries to narrate all aspects of Chinese American living: social, cultural, economic and political, as well as to look at the diverse challenges that they face as a minority group.
Tong also tries to analyze the dilemma of ethnic identification that Chinese Americans have to grapple with; are they American or are they Chinese? Benson Tong also presents the challenges that have been faced by Chinese Americans over the years that they have been in the country, from hostility, outright discrimination by government and citizens alike, being ostracized and cast into stereotypes as well as undergoing a cultural identity crisis.
Synopsis of the book ‘Chinese American Heritage’ by David Brownstone
Brownstone relays the history of the Chinese Americans from way back in the 1800s to the present day. His focus is on the cultural heritage of this minority group, and how their strong traditional Chinese orientation has compounded integration into the larger American society. Brownstone casts the Chinese Americans as a people caught between two worlds without truly belonging to either. He shows how Chinese Americans have adapted over the years to the changing American culture as well as to their changing position in American society, from sidelined menial laborers to mainstreaming Americans with jobs, position and prestige, just like any other American. He also takes a look at the integration effort of Chinese Americans as well as those who choose to preserve their Chinese culture, living inside the American society but not being a part of it.
In-depth comparative analysis of the two books
In the telling of the story of the Chinese American people, the two authors share the common element of presenting a similar timeline. This has to be so because historical facts remain just that: facts and these cannot be changed. What differs is opinion- why events occurred as they did, or what spurred people to act as they did, how harmful or helpful were the ramifications of these action, and so on.
As both authors point out, the reason why the first Chinese found their way to America was to try and make their fortune in the gold rush of California in the 1820s. When the rush ended, most of these people opted to stay on in America, getting work as casual laborers and wielding the advantage of being willing to accept lesser pay than white workers. They were also recognized to be diligent in their work (Brownstone 11, Tong 24).
Since Chinese workers were willing to be paid lower wages, it created tensions between them and Caucasian laborers. The result was the passing of discriminatory laws, culminating in the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 which prohibited the immigration of Chinese into America (Brownstone 14). This act was reverted in 1945 simply because America had become China’s ally during the Second World War. But it was more a token than a true reversal of the Act because it permitted was one hundred and five only. It was not until two decades later that Chinese immigration would start again into the country. The second wave of immigrants coming into America between the sixties and eighties, unlike the immigrants in the 1800s, were mostly academics and professionals fleeing Taiwan after the fall of the Nationalist government in China (Chan, 30).
Brownstone, in the telling of the Chinese American story, aims for an objective tone- being the fair historian to present facts as they happened. He is simply relaying the facts as they occurred. Tong, on the other hand, is more inclined to let emotion take over.
Tong tries to address all aspects of Chinese American history whether cultural, political and economic. Chinese Americans started in small businesses such as laundries, dry goods stores and restaurants (pg 33). They were also taken on to do manual labor on projects such as building of railways in Louisiana, Florida and Mississippi (pg33). They took the place of the black slaves who had been emancipated but their work had to somehow get done.
Inevitably, people who have been uprooted from one cultural setting to another one where the cultural practices are different should undergo a cultural crisis. This is especially true if said people are still strongly attached to the practices of their original cultural background. Chinese Americans have not had an easy time as a minority group trying to segue into the American lifestyle. According to Tong (pg. 180), at one point or the other, most Chinese Americans undergo an identity crisis because they cannot fully identify with the American culture while on the other hand the Chinese cultures and tradition do not answer fully to their cultural needs.
Some Chinese Americans try to hold themselves separate from these traditional practices in a bid to free themselves from the ‘box’ in which they have been fit and labeled. It is an attempt to show that they are more than just the label of ‘Chinese’. This can be doubly disastrous because the individual may be rejected by those within his/her ethnic group for rejecting them and at the same time he/she may not be accepted by the majority because to them, he/she is still Chinese (Tong, 194).
Tong also explains the position of women in Chinese American society which is different from the position of women in the greater American society. With the cry and hue that has marked the female liberal movement which swept America through the sixties onwards, it would be expected that women in America enjoy a modicum of ‘freedom’. Tong points out that it is slightly different within Chinese American societies.
Gender roles within traditional Chinese societies were very well defined with the men being more dominant and the women a mere presence. This is one of the aspects that have not changed much with the Chinese Americans especially in the domestic setting where the man remains the head of the house. Women rarely give their opinion and defer to whatever the men folk say. Chinese American women, especially first generation migrants may have a tough time because even when they need assistance, they may not know who to go to for assistance (Tong, 183).
When talking about the position of women in Chinese American communities, this is one of the areas where Tong’s cultural heritage works to his advantage over Brownstone. Tong fully appreciates the nature of the relationship of the sexes within this setting. He neither castigates nor excuses how women are held in the Chinese American societies. It is not a foreign concept to him and because he has seen how it works, he does not react to the concept of women as being the dominated sex with hostility.
Brownstone on the other hand, is of the mind that how women are held in Chinese American communities could be changed because it does not hold up to the current trends of gender roles and gender positioning (pg 58).
Chinese Americans have faced discrimination at all levels over the years. At first it was as manual laborers working on railway lines, in mines and on farms. At some point it got so intense that the Chinese Exclusion Act was formulated in 1882 to bar Chinese immigration (Shan, 66). Though open discrimination has declined, there are still derogatory terms that are applied to people of Chinese descent and attitudes towards them that reflect racism. Both Brownstone and Tong agree that discrimination is not a thing of the past; it has just evolved to become more subtle. For example Tong points out that in several cases, Chinese Americans are held in the view of not being aggressive enough to be put in leadership positions in their workplace (pg. 109)
Chinese Americans are given the title of being the ‘model minority’ as Tong explains, because they are the ones who, as compared to other minority group, they are the most financially successful as well as have lower records of social misdemeanors such as teenage delinquency, spousal battering and drug and alcohol abuse (pg 109).
Thus, it can be said that the main differences between the accounts of Chinese American history given by Benson Tong and David Brownstone are perspective. The recounting of historical facts such as dates numbers and places are greatly similar. What sets the two writers apart is their intentions of writing. While Brownstone simply narrates about the history and culture of the Chinese Americans as an ethnic minority, Tong sets out to make people understand and relate to the Chinese American experience. He attempts to make the reader see and feel the Chinese American experience through the eyes and skin who has lived that experience.
What sets Tong and Brownstone apart is the same quality that sets most Chinese American writers writing about their experience from that of non-Chinese American writers, that while the former has lived out the experience and can then relate it, the latter relate it from other people’s accounts.
Conclusion
Tong and Brownstone tell the same story- that of people of Chinese descent living in America today. The difference comes in that their narrations are colored by their own past experiences. While Brownstone relays the facts of Chinese American history as nothing more than a consummate historian, Benson Tong brings in the emotional aspect of someone who has lived that history. Brownstone may have relied on written accounts, personal narratives, visiting Chinese American neighborhoods and other encounters with people from this ethnic minority to tell his tale while Tong, on the other hand is a fabric and a thread of the story.
It might be argued that since Brownstone is more removed from the Chinese American history his point of view should be more objective. In the case of a minority group with such a rich history, it might be to the advantage of the reader to get it from a source closer to home. This is because a writer like Tong fully understands all the dynamics and nuances of Chinese American living and will explain to the reader reactions to situations and attitudes that would have otherwise remained obscure. On the whole, the books by Benson Tong and David Brownstone are very resourceful as a guide to understanding Chinese American history and culture as it has evolved over the years.
Works Cited
Brownstone, David. The Chinese-American Heritage. Facts on File, 1988. Web.
Chan, Suchen. Chinese American Transnationalism: the Flow of People, Resources and Ideas. Philadelphia: Tmeple University Press, 2006. Web.
Kane, Henry. “American Opium Smokers.” Harper’s Weekly. 1881: 646. Print.
Tong, Benson. The Chinese Americans – Google Books. Michigan: Greenwood Press, 2000. Web.