Alien Nation: Chinese Migration in the Americas from the Coolie Era Through World War IIIn this sweeping work, Elliott Young traces the pivotal century of Chinese migration to the Americas, beginning with the 1840s at the start of the "coolie" trade and ending during World War II. The Chinese came as laborers, streaming across borders legally and illegally and working jobs few others wanted, from constructing railroads in California to harvesting sugar cane in Cuba. Though nations were built in part from their labor, Young argues that they were the first group of migrants to bear the stigma of being "alien." Being neither black nor white and existing outside of the nineteenth century Western norms of sexuality and gender, the Chinese were viewed as permanent outsiders, culturally and legally. It was their presence that hastened the creation of immigration bureaucracies charged with capture, imprisonment, and deportation. This book is the first transnational history of Chinese migration to the Americas. By focusing on the fluidity and complexity of border crossings throughout the Western Hemisphere, Young shows us how Chinese migrants constructed alternative communities and identities through these transnational pathways. |
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anti-Chinese movement AREM argued arrived Asian Baja California border Braun British Columbia Bureau of Immigration California Canada Canadian certificates China Chinatown Chinese community Chinese coolies Chinese Cubans Chinese immigration Chinese in Mexico Chinese laborers Chinese Mexican Chinese migrants Chinese population Chinese Smuggling chinos Commissioner Consul contract laborers coolie trade courts cross Cuba Cuba and Peru ejemplo de Sonora Elías emigrants enforcement enter the United entry 9 Espinoza folder foreign free labor Golden Venture governor gration Havana Hong Kong Ibid illegal alien immi Immigrant Inspector Immigration Bureau Latin America Macao Mexi Mexican women Mexico City mutinies NARA nationalist nese networks newspaper nineteenth century number of Chinese officials Overseas Chinese Pacific passengers percent Peru ports race racial recruiters regulations restrictions Romero Salina Cruz San Francisco slavery slaves smugglers Spanish tion tongs Torreón Tráfico transnational U.S. citizens U.S. immigration U.S. South University Press Wong York