Letters live: examine Chinese migrant families through migrants’ letters from the 1900s to the 1940s

Abstract

Chinese migrant letters, also known as qiaopi, were letters written home by Chinese emigrants with a remittance. Chinese migrant letters were vital in maintaining familial ties across the Pacific. They vividly portray the lives of Chinese migrants and their descendants, capturing their hopes, fears, and daily activities in business, labor, leisure, kinship, and fellowship within overseas Chinese communities and emigrant communities in South China. Unlike official documents and elite observations, these letters offer a rich blend of intimacy and practicality, depicting individuals and communities on society's margins. They are among the liveliest records of China's modernization, valued for their honesty and lack of rhetorical embellishments. China's qiaopi historians argue that these letters are a unique and non-renewable cultural resource.This dissertation demonstrates how migration has influenced the relationships and structures of migrant families through the study of Chinese migrant letters. I argue that Chinese migration to the United States significantly challenged migrant family structures and relationships. Chinese migration was a strategy aimed at improving the socioeconomic status of families. This strategy involved a division of labor: husbands left home to earn money overseas, while wives stayed home to care for the remaining family members. This strategy did not initially intend to change the original family relationships and structures. The prolonged separation, however, across the Pacific due to the Chinese Exclusion Act severely challenged the family relationships and structures. After migration, the roles of husbands and wives also changed significantly. Husbands became the primary earners, participating in family affairs only through letters, while wives became the actual managers of the household. They managed family income and assets but faced the burdens of raising children alone, navigating complex in-law relationships, and dealing with family debts. While migration increased family income to some extent, the shift in family roles negatively impacted family relationships, revealing weaknesses in the patrilineal family system. Simultaneously, revolutionary movements and ideologies in China profoundly impacted Chinese migrant families. These impacts entered migrant families in two main ways. First, experiences of racial discrimination in the United States made Chinese migrants keenly aware of the need for a strong China to protect their interests, leading many to embrace revolutionary ideas aimed at modernizing China. Ideas of the family revolution, such as supporting children's autonomy in marriage, were conveyed through migrant letters to their families in China. Second, revolutionary ideas also entered migrant families through education. In the 1910s and 1920s, many Chinese migrants donated to build modern schools in their hometowns, reflecting their practical efforts to change their homeland and China. They encouraged their children to receive school educations, through which modern revolutionary ideas infiltrated migrant families. Educated younger generations used vernacular Chinese in their writings to foster closer relationships between spouses and between children and parents, attempting to establish more equal and loving family dynamics. Furthermore, this dissertation also investigates the transformative impact of Chinese migration on the Siyi area in the Pearl River Delta from the 1870s to the 1940s, focusing on the role of remittances and migrant letters. The study explores how remittances sent by migrating husbands significantly improved their families' financial situations and reshaped their hometowns' economic structures. This infusion of money not only stimulated local economic development and funded modern educational institutions but also brought about unintended negative consequences, such as economic imbalance and heightened vulnerability to global economic downturns. Overall, this dissertation comprehensively examines the multifaceted effects of Chinese migration on family structures, economic development, and social dynamics in the Siyi area. It highlights the dual-edged nature of remittances, the critical role of letters in maintaining family cohesion, and the evolving agency of women within migrant families. Through meticulous archival research and a close reading of personal letters, this study contributes to the broader historiography of Chinese migration. It offers valuable insights into the lived experiences of migrant families from 1900 to 1950, a period of profound change.