Italian and Chinese Immigration in the USA - A Comparison

by

 Roland Schuknecht

Contents

I. INTRODUCTION 3

II. THE CHINESE EXPERIENCE 4

III. THE ITALIAN EXPERIENCE IN COMPARISON 6

III. CONCLUSION 11

BIBLIOGRAPHY 13

I. Introduction

If one examines the vast bulk of literature on the subject of immigration it is astonishing that the term ′assimilation′ appears with such regularity. The question when, how, and why immigrants actually became integrated into American society and culture, and what turned them into ′Americans′ reveals its complexity if we consider the simple fact that between 1870 and 1910 the United States experienced the influx of more than 20 million immigrants. The ′newcomers′, divided into a multitude of different ethnic, social, national, and religious groups were not simply abandoning the world they had left behind to become Americans nor did they assimilate to a static concept of ′America′ which probably did not exist. In the way they adjusted to a new environment and developed distinctive patterns of defining their own identity they constantly modified and re-shaped the idea of America whose true essence was (and presumably still is) hard to define.

The purpose of this essay is to discuss and compare the experience of two immigrant groups between 1870 and 1914: the Chinese and the Italians. Soon it will become obvious that even these (national or ethnic) categories represent rather abstract generalizations of far more complex patterns.

The problem of identity and perception is crucial in examining the Chinese and Italian immigrant experience. How useful is it to refer to immigrants as ′Italians′ or ′Italian Americans′, ′Chinese′ or ′Chinese Americans′? How did they perceive themselves within the new environment and how did they come to be perceived by it? In which way did the experiences of both groups differ and how can we account for it? In order to emphasize the distinctive characteristics of the Chinese and Italian communities I shall try to stress differences rather that common features examining patterns of settlement, employment, the emergence and function of social, religious and economic institutions as well as the perception of the immigrants by ′outsiders′. The nativist view on the immigrant communities is particularly important with regard to the Chinese as they were to become the first to be formally excluded from further immigration.

II. The Chinese experience

The most striking difference between Chinese and Italian immigration appears in time and numbers. Whereas the majority of Chinese immigrants entered the United States between 1850 and 1882, Italian immigration reached its peak at the turn of the century. Until the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 approximately 300,000 Chinese came to America and settled primarily in California and the western states, but in 1900 there were only 90,000 Chinese living in the US. Thus we face one of the major characteristics of Chinese immigration - the high number of returnees.

The total number of Chinese immigrants was easily outnumbered by the Italians, who were the most numerous group among the ′New Immigrants′ arriving between 1890 and 1914. In the 1910s alone more than two million arrived. But even among Italians the number of returnees was extremely high, averaging 38 per cent between 1907 and 1914. . Many of the newcomers did not intend to stay in America. They were ′sojourners′, migrating temporarily only to return after a certain amount of time. Thus many did not even feel the necessity to adopt American values and to leave the old world behind. As with most of the immigrants they were not seeking the fulfilment of an American Dream but simply economic gain.

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