Recently I have read the following book. Its main points are:
Book
title: Han, Eric. Rise of a Japanese
Chinatown: Yokohama, 1894-1972. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University
Asia Center, 2014
Main
points:
-ch. 5 –
(title: A town divided: the Cold War in Yokohama Chinatown, 1945-72) – Yokohama
Chinatown experienced enormous social, cultural, and economic transformations
in the three decades from the end of the Asia-pacific war to the normalization
of relation with PRC in 1972.(157)
- during these decades, the popularity of multi-cultural
gastronomy allowed Yokohama Chinese to join with administrator in Yokohama city
and Kanagawa prefecture to promote Chinatown’s restaurants as a premier tourist
attraction.(160)
- the localism emerged from an era that also saw the
universalization of the ethnic nation as an individual’s final identification.
The years after 1945 witnessed national identity surging after decolonization.
Japan lost is multiethnic empire and turned instead toward a mono-ethnic
national identity. (160)
Jus
sanguinis nationality laws continued to define formal
citizenship and enacted social closures according to shared descent – an ethnic
people (minzoku) in both popular
understanding and government policy. (160) For Chinese resident of Japan, this
historical transition meant their position within Japan would be ethnically
marked but socially accept resident aliens. But they were not alone in this
regard. (161)
- this chapter examines the way the Yokohama
Chinatown community mediated their national and local identities in the three
decades after the end of the Asia-pacific war. It deals first with the ideology
of Japanese mono-ethnicity, and its congruence with efforts by the two China
regimes to maintain Chinese patriotism in Yokohama. (162)
- in March 1946, the China mission in Tokyo
representing the ROC ordained the Yokohama Chinese Association as an official
node of its worldwide network of huaqiao
associations. As allied nationals, huaqiao
carried economic benefits. Advantages made the pre-1952 the economic ‘golden
years’ for the huaqiao in japan.
(163)
- after Chiang Kai-shek lost the Chinese civil war,
Japan continued to regard his regime as the legitimate government of China
until 1972. (164) During this period the ROC sought to quash leftist
inclination among Chinese in Japan through its dominance of huaqiao institutions. (168)
- in 1952, the Chinese Mission peremptorily installed
a new principal from Tokyo at a local Chinese school. Thus began the so-called
school incident that would bifurcate Yokohama Chinese institution into two
fractions. Teachers, students and parents object to the new principal as
interference by the state. In short, the desire for local autonomy was
prominent. (170) The movement opposing the China Mission went door-to-door to advocate
self-determination. (170)
-one could no longer passively remain in huaqiao society without taking a position
within the political map of the community, a situation that threatened to run
any collective activity into a political contest. (173)
- across Japan, huaqiao
status became an economic liability after May 1952, when the San Francisco
peace treaty came into effect and ended the Allied occupation of Japan. Chinese
in Japan lost their special advantages as allied nationals. (175)
- the Yokohama Chinese turned to their restaurant
for economic survival which proved to be the most resilient sector of the
Chinatown economy. (177) Chukagai became the accepted name for Chinatown,
replacing Nankinmachi. This change of
name dislodged the public’s long-held perception of Chinatown as filthy and dangerous.
(179) Chinatown- both its Chinese and Japanese residents – had in the 1950s
adopted a model of economic development focused on Chinese cuisine and tourism,
and by the 1960s yielding results. (180)
-in sum, the events following the normalization of
ties with the PRC suggested a continuation of self-destructive rivalry between
the two political foes; neither could claim credibly to be the representative
authority. (184) At the same time, cooperative commercial development was
legitimating a different conception of community. The YDA was eminently
positioned to represent this local community. (184) Since the 1970s the YDA
took a leadership role in the community. (185)
- amid the economic and institutional developments,
the meaning of Chinese identity in Yokohama began to shift once again. A Japanese
wide survey of huaqiao in 1966 confirmed
that an overwhelming majority showed deep concern for the homeland. (187)
Another survey of the 1960s suggested that the diasporic orientation Chinese
identity was gradually being superseded by what might be best described as a
minority orientation. (187)
- the widespread acculturation of the Chinese in Yokohama
meant that their commonly assumed Chinese was not the aggregation of cultural traits
shared, but was defined by markers of difference from the Japanese. A 1967 survey
of graduates of the pro-ROC school indicated that 61.7 percent of their
household, Japanese was the primary language. Most had also adopted Japanese-style
funerals, primarily ate Chinese food at home. (188)
- the integrity of the Yokohama community, therefore,
derived less from intrinsic Chinese-ness then their position of otherness
within Japanese society. In that sense, the Chinese ethnicity approached the ethnicity
of American usage, defined by marginality and otherness as well as people-hood.
(189)
Yokohama Chinatown now became more in common with
the Chinatowns of San Francisco and NY where scholars had noted that Chinese
minority identity had been determined more by ethnic discrimination form
outside than cultural unity or economic solidarity. The markers that mattered were not language
and ritual observances etc. as the preference toward Chinese food was one of
the clearest markers that distinguished the Chinese form the Japanese. (189)
- but more importantly, the status was entirely
local in scope. The pull of local society made these Chinese more ready to
identify as Yokohama-ites; this identification did not imply belonging to the
Japanese nation, as many still maintained Chinese nationality. (189)
- by the 1970s some zainichi Koreans were advocating identity that moved beyond
diaspora by rejecting homeland politics, emphasizing permanent settlement.
(190) At the end of the decade, the concept of a minority status for zainichi Koreans was given forceful,
controversial expression by the concept of a “third way” between diaspora and assimilation,
that is, “living as ethnic Koreans and, at the same time, as citizens of japan”.(190)
- the zainichi
Korean third way differed somewhat form Yokohama Chinese identity in both content
and effects. Zainichi Korean activism
possessed national clout (influence) as former colonial subject whereas Chines
in Yokohama found refuge in profitable economic niche. (190)
- chapter conclusion – Chinese-ness was thus
reconstituted not through substantive political, culture, or ethnic ties with
the homeland, but as a minority status defined in relation to the Japanese
majority. Chinese were no longer unified by political loyalty to a homeland.
Tie of blood were weakened, many children were Chinese-Japanese parentage.
(191) Naturalization did not necessarily reduce the
subjective sense of Chinese identity among Yokohama Chinese; many of the leaders
of the pro-ROC Chinese association had naturalized but keep separate business
cards for their Chinese and Japanese names. (192) Thus over time the objective determinant
of Chinese-ness became fewer in comparison to the many contextual and subjective
links with Japanese society. (191)-Yokohama Chinatown thus provided an example of how
Chinese culture could be construed as cultural foreignness from a national perspective
but simultaneously incorporated into Yokohama’s cosmopolitan local identity
(192) The local identity was more than a mere economic instrument since it
continued to encompass social, cultural and political dimensions. Yokohama Chinese
had become minority in Yokohama society. (192)
(to be continued)
