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Introduction: Contesting Chineseness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 May 2022

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Summary

Abstract

This chapter introduces the paradox of politics among ethnic Chinese. It provides a detailed exploration of global anxieties to China's ascent and the outflow of Chinese immigrants. The case study of Singapore is introduced as a mirror of the anxieties faced by cities with new flows of Chinese immigration. Both Singaporean-Chinese and new Chinese migrants’ stories are detailed to draw the audience into the cultural politics of being Chinese. The chapter explains the book's framework through critically engaging scholarship across various fields including migration and ethnic studies. A methodology section justifies the book's focus on Chinese subjects’ everyday lives which are shaped, though not necessarily determined, by global and state discourses. An overview of the chapters follows.

Keywords: social imaginaries, Chineseness, co-ethnicity, China's rise, anxieties, digital ethnography

In 2015, I was at Melbourne (Australia) Airport to board a flight bound for Singapore. As I was queuing to clear customs, a group of three Chinese tourists who were ahead of me tried to ask an Asian woman in Mandarin for help in tackling the customs declaration form. The Asian woman seemed to understand Mandarin but impatiently responded to them in English which baffled the Chinese tourists who could not understand her. What resulted was what is termed in Mandarin as “chicken and duck talk” (jitong yajiang). Neither seemed to understand the other. I decided to intervene and responded to the Chinese tourists’ questions in Mandarin. They were delighted to finally have their questions answered and heaped praise on me. They asked me where I was from (Singapore) and seemed surprised, “Your putonghua [Mandarin] is so fluent!” while shooting the other Asian woman dirty looks. I sensed their disbelief that an ethnic Chinese overseas such as myself could speak good Mandarin and felt rather flustered. Amidst the praise, I became defensive and told them in a manner that implied of course I can speak Mandarin, “my grandfather was from China”. A pang of regret hit me as soon as I uttered the words. Did the Asian/English-speaking woman hear me? My remark may have unwittingly increased her “crime” (of not speaking Mandarin) since her grandparents could be from China as well.

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Chapter
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Contesting Chineseness
Nationality, Class, Gender and New Chinese Migrants
, pp. 9 - 34
Publisher: Amsterdam University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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