Paper Sons And Daughters

Ufrieda Ho’s compelling memoir describes with intimate detail what it was like to come of age in the marginalized Chinese community of Johannesburg during the apartheid era of the 1970s and 1980s. The Chinese were mostly ignored, as Ho describes it, relegated to certain neighborhoods and certain jobs, living in a kind of gray zone between the blacks and the whites. As long as they adhered to these rules, they were left alone. Ho describes the separate journeys her parents took before they knew one another, each leaving China and Hong Kong around the early 1960s, arriving in South Africa as illegal immigrants. Her father eventually became a so-called “fahfee man,” running a small-time numbers game in the black townships, one of the few opportunities available to him at that time. In loving detail, Ho describes her father’s work habits: the often mysterious selection of numbers at the kitchen table, the carefully-kept account ledgers, and especially the daily drives into the townships, where he conducted business on street corners from the seat of his car. Sometimes Ufrieda accompanied him on these township visits, offering her an illuminating perspective into a stratified society. Poignantly, it was on such a visit that her father—who is very much a central figure in Ho’s memoir—met with a tragic end. In many ways, life for the Chinese in South Africa was self-contained. Working hard, minding the rules, and avoiding confrontations, they were able to follow traditional Chinese ways. But for Ufrieda, who was born in South Africa, influences from the surrounding culture crept into her life, as did a political awakening. Paper Sons and Daughters is a wonderfully told family history that will resonate with anyone having an interest in the experiences of Chinese immigrants, or perhaps any immigrants, the world over.

Winner of the Autumn House Nonfiction Contest, selected by Alison Hawthorne Deming (2017) Set in a public housing project in San Francisco, Lam's memoir explores his transformation from a teenage graffiti writer to a high school teacher working with troubled youth while navigating the secret violence in his immigrant's family's past.

Chin's story speaks for the many Chinese who worked in urban laundries and restaurants, but it also introduces an unusually articulate man's perspective on becoming a Chinese American."--BOOK JACKET.

Past and present collide in a Chinese-American teen's search for identity amid family secrets.

Spanning more than six decades, Passage to Promise Land is a revealing study of Chinese immigration to Canada from the end of the Second World War to the present day. Tracing the evolution of immigration policy through the stories of Chinese immigrant women, Vivienne Poy captures the social, political, and ethnic tensions of the period. Although the narratives included here represent women of all ages and educational backgrounds, they share a common sense of determination and spirited resilience in the face of hardship. Through their stories we learn about Chinese settlement experience, how the Chinese community developed alongside changes in immigration regulations, and why the immigration of Chinese families to Canada became commonplace in the 1970s. The women address experiences of patriarchy and discrimination in both China and Canada, revive memories of the turbulent years in China at the end of the Pacific War, and speak of their uncertainties about the return of Hong Kong's sovereignty from the United Kingdom to China in 1997. From the very first mention of Chinese women's immigration in Canada's Parliament in 1879, to the end of the twentieth century - when a Chinese woman was appointed Governor General - the road to equality has been long and arduous. Passage to Promise Land details the important events along the way through the voices of the women themselves.

Winner of the American Library Association's 2021 Asian/Pacific American Award for Best Picture Book! An inspiring picture-book biography of animator Tyrus Wong, the Chinese American immigrant responsible for bringing Disney's Bambi to life. Before he became an artist named Tyrus Wong, he was a boy named Wong Geng Yeo. He traveled across a vast ocean from China to America with only a suitcase and a few papers. Not papers for drawing--which he loved to do--but immigration papers to start a new life. Once in America, Tyrus seized every opportunity to make art, eventually enrolling at an art institute in Los Angeles. Working as a janitor at night, his mop twirled like a paintbrush in his hands. Eventually, he was given the opportunity of a lifetime--and using sparse brushstrokes and soft watercolors, Tyrus created the iconic backgrounds of Bambi. Julie Leung and Chris Sasaki perfectly capture the beautiful life and work of a painter who came to this country with dreams and talent--and who changed the world of animation forever.

Brave Paper Son is a story about a young Chinese boy who travels to America in the 1930's. The boy embarks on a long boat journey, leaving China behind, and arriving at Angel Island, the immigration station in San Francisco, California. As a young child he is interrogated with intense scrutiny from immigration officers. When the child is released, he learns to navigate his new life in America. Paper Sons & Daughters are a part of American history rooted from the Chinese Exclusion Act 1882. This practice continued until the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1943. Paper Sons & Daughters played a significant role in the history of Chinese immigration and their stories are an important part of American history. The voice of the story is told by the daughter honoring her father's journey to America. Brave Paper Son is based on a true story.

The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 made the Chinese the first immigrant group officially excluded from the United States. In Paper Families, Estelle T. Lau demonstrates how exclusion affected Chinese American communities and initiated the development of restrictive U.S. immigration policies and practices. Through the enforcement of the Exclusion Act and subsequent legislation, the U.S. immigration service developed new forms of record keeping and identification practices. Meanwhile, Chinese Americans took advantage of the system’s loophole: children of U.S. citizens were granted automatic eligibility for immigration. The result was an elaborate system of “paper families,” in which U.S. citizens of Chinese descent claimed fictive, or “paper,” children who could then use their kinship status as a basis for entry into the United States. This subterfuge necessitated the creation of “crib sheets” outlining genealogies and providing village maps and other information that could be used during immigration processing. Drawing on these documents as well as immigration case files, legislative materials, and transcripts of interviews and court proceedings, Lau reveals immigration as an interactive process. Chinese immigrants and their U.S. families were subject to regulation and surveillance, but they also manipulated and thwarted those regulations, forcing the U.S. government to adapt its practices and policies. Lau points out that the Exclusion Acts and the pseudo-familial structures that emerged in response have had lasting effects on Chinese American identity. She concludes with a look at exclusion’s legacy, including the Confession Program of the 1960s that coerced people into divulging the names of paper family members and efforts made by Chinese American communities to recover their lost family histories.