The Chinese who came to America in the late nineteenth century were mostly poor peasants and laborers who had to struggle to survive in the miserable conditions of their time. The well-to-do Chinese nobles – scientists, officials, and landowners – constituted the elite of Chinese society and did not need to leave their ancestral homes to mine for gold or work on railroad brigades in a distant country. But whether they were poor or rich, the Chinese rarely left their homeland in search of another. When they went abroad, it was often the wife and children who stayed behind. Almost all emigrants hoped to return, having accumulated a fortune by trade or labor in a foreign country. In America, a Chinese worker who managed to save a few hundred dollars would have considered this a small fortune and usually retired to his native village in Guangdong Province. He could expect to spend his declining years surrounded by his respectful sons and grandchildren, and when he died, to be buried among the honorable dead descendants of the long line. This “situation-centered” Chinese culture, as cultural anthropologist Francis L.C. Xu has called it, is very different from “individual-centered” American culture. This cultural chasm has been the source of much subsequent friction between Chinese immigrants and white Americans.
CUISINE
Chinese tea was a popular drink in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century America. Since the 1960s, Chinese food has also become an integral part of the American diet. Chinese restaurants can be found in small towns and large cities in the United States. Basic ingredients for authentic Chinese dishes can now be found in all chain supermarkets, and Chinese cooking classes are regularly shown on national television. Chinese takeout, catering and chain restaurants have become commonplace in major cities, and Chinese dim sum, salads and pasta can be found in cocktail bars, exclusive clubs and resorts. Gone are pre-1960 dishes such as chop suey, chow mein, egg fuyun and barbecue pork ribs. In fact, many Americans mastered the use of chopsticks and acquired a taste for fine Chinese regional cuisines such as Cantonese, Keqia (Hakka), Sichuan (Sichuan), Shandong, Hunan, Chinese (Peking), Taiwanese (Minnan), Chaozhou. (Teo-chihu) and Shanghai. American households now commonly use Chinese ingredients such as soy sauce, ginger, and hoisin sauce in their food; use Chinese cooking techniques such as stir-frying; and incorporate Chinese cooking utensils such as woks and cleavers in their kitchens.
TRADITIONAL COSTUMES.
Very few Chinese Americans now wear traditional Chinese clothing. On special occasions, some traditional costumes are worn. For example, on her wedding day, a bride might wear a Western wedding dress for the wedding ceremony and then change into a traditional Chinese wedding dress, called a gua, for the tea ceremony and banquet. In some traditional families, elders sometimes wear traditional Chinese formal attire to greet guests on Chinese New Year’s Day. Sometimes young Chinese American women wear tight-fitting chengsam ( cheongsam ) or qipao. for formal parties or banquets. Occasionally Chinese style finds its way into American high fashion and Hollywood movies.
DANCES AND SONGS
Chinese opera and folk songs are performed and sung in the Chinese-American community. Cantonese opera, once very popular in Chinatown, is performed for older audiences, and there are small opera singing clubs in large Chinese neighborhoods in North America. Performances of Peking opera are rarer. Among well-educated Chinese, concerts performing Chinese folk songs and art songs are well attended, and amateur groups performing this type of music can be found in most cities with significant Chinese-American populations. Likewise, both classical and folk dances continue to find fans among Chinese Americans. The Chinese Folk Dance Association of San Francisco is one of several groups promoting this activity. However, most are new immigrants from China and young American-born people,
CANICULES
Most Chinese Americans today celebrate the major holidays of the Chinese lunar calendar ( yin li ). Today, Chinese calendars usually provide both solar ( yang li ) and lunar calendars, and Chinese daily newspapers provide both types of dates. The most important holiday is the Chinese New Year or Spring Festival ( chun jie ), which is also a school holiday in San Francisco.