| During the 1848 California Gold Rush, the first two hundred Chinese immigrants arrive on American soil. Two distinct civilizations and races meet head on. Each saw in the other a novel, alien culture and fear of the unknown; each appraised the other with negative and often self-serving criteria. Any mutual acceptance soon crumbled when Anglo-Americans perceived the Chinese immigrants as a job threat and a danger to economic prosperity. Anglo-Americans used science, legislation and journalism repeatedly and ruthlessly to create a damaging stereotype of all Chinese. This thesis proves that cultural and racial dissimilarities were in fact the bitter roots feeding a destructive image and that, for decades, this skewed image fostered racial discrimination. Both Americans and Chinese, however, amended their race relations whenever mutual interest demanded. Nearly a century elapsed before Anglo-Americans accepted Chinese immigrants, yet this adversarial atmosphere did not prohibit cross scientific knowledge exchange, particularly medical, from flowing regularly between China and the United States. Ever pragmatic, both sides saw the advantage of scientific exchange.; Woven throughout this intricate tapestry was the most important thread of all---the attitude of everyday people, however true or false. Clearly, this was the case as Chinese and Americans met. Almost immediately, Anglo-Americans concluded that Chinese immigrants were not assimilable and were dire economic competitors. From the beginning, Chinese immigrants, and later their American-born descendants, held themselves to be racially and culturally equal, if not superior, and fully assimilable. A one sided improvement was not possible in racial relations. The friction did not yield until WWII when a common enemy caused them to develop interdependent racial relations.; The first four chapters explore how biological and cultural differences played critical roles in the long-term racial struggle of Chinese immigrants in the United States. Ultimately the everyday thread of economic necessity combined with social, political and cultural factors combined to drive racial relations between Chinese immigrants and Americans. In the next three chapters, I examine the beneficial scientific knowledge transfer between China and America, a transfer that took place regardless of people's attitudes toward one another. |
