Chinese Americans

As the oldest and largest Asian ethnic group in the United States, Chinese Americans have survived a long history of legal exclusion, institutionalized discrimination, and racialized stereotyping. Since the Immigration Act of 1965, when legal barriers were lifted, the Chinese American population has increased tenfold, to 2,879,636, according to the 2000 census. The rapid influx of Chinese immigrants was accompanied by unparalleled diversity fueled by separate quotas for the main “sending” countries of Chinese: the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Instead of the 20,000 allotment set by the 1965 act, the current quota for Chinese from these areas totals 60,000; immediate family members of U.S. citizens are considered nonquota admits.

Since 1965, Chinese immigration has been driven by admission standards that permit both family-sponsored and employment-based immigration. Consequently, Chinese in the United States vary widely by nativity, citizenship, linguistic origin, regional ties, educational attainment, socioeconomic class, occupational niches, length of time in the United States, and immigration status.

These factors led to the formation of distinct Chinese American communities, some that are highly organized and structured by a physical center—traditional or new “Chinatowns”—and others more loosely connected. How these communities are constructed or imagined and whether these divergent communities of Chinese Americans interact is discussed in this entry. Although pre-1965 Chinese American enclaves contained more homogeneous subgroups, current Chinese Americans are much more widely dispersed, locally and regionally. They may build communities “beyond Chinatown,” in nontraditional settings or through new satellite centers. Maintaining transnational linkages may be independent of living or working in an ethnic enclave. Chinese American professionals may never identify with a “Chinatown” and choose to develop community through educational, homeland, occupational, or special-interest networks. Reviewing traditional and transitional communities, [Page 286]this entry examines the range of Chinese American residential and community patterns