On the Terminology of Racism and its Origins

Early in San Francisco's history (the early 1850s), the Chinese community was highly regarded as moral, hard-working, thrifty, and dependable, a source of stability with a relatively low crime rate. In an era when skin color was destiny, the Chinese were nearly considered white men, and superior to some white men (e.g. the Irish). They were thought to represent a new partnership that would civilize the west, merging Christian and non-Christian forever. It is not by accident that Chinatown occupies the same neighborhood where San Francisco was founded, around Portsmouth Square.

Times change.

Since most Chinese immigrants were sojourners, intending to go home once they made their pile, they had little incentive to integrate, learn English, or change their mode of dress and ponytail. Self-contained communities are often thus. Look how Europeans behaved in Shanghai. This engendered a sort of suspicion, which encouraged racism and led to resentment and hostility. Before long the Chinese were considered a threat to "real" Americans' wages, their efficiency an affront to white ambition, their misunderstood culture a threat to common decency. Populist politicians and newspapers grabbed the mob by these sensitive short hairs, and bad laws and bad times followed.

I'm interested in the earliest days, when a hopeful light shone on a young community. Temporary good times are always interesting. They contrast sharply with the popularly-held image, and then lead to the drama of the down-slide; which in San Francisco's case was long and dark. Chinese remained in a second-class status well into the 1900s.

"Chinee" is considered a racist term. I'm not sure it should be, not in terms of its origin. I have heard a Chinese person say "Chinee". This is because the Chinese languages often de-emphasize closing consonants. In those many words that end in "ng", for example, the "ng" is heard much less when spoken by an Asian than by an American. While in Shanghai I tried to learn some Chinese and one of my greatest difficulties was in hearing those subtle word-endings. I wanted it spelled out in my alphabet so I could know how to form my mouth properly: Is that syllable "muh", or "mung"? My ears couldn't tell me.

And so when an American in 1853 heard a Chinese man say "Chinese", he heard him say "Chinee", and no doubt thought it both humorous and a useful sort of shorthand to mimic what he heard when referring to men from China. Not strictly very polite by modern standards, but not evidence of a pernicious racism either. Using it today would be taken as such, of course.

Same goes for "Chinaman", I suppose. It doesn't offend me at all. You wouldn't expect it to, but "Dutchman" is more or less the same when referring to us Germanics, and I simply don't mind. Indeed, the only person I know who ever says "Chinaman" is 3rd-generation, straight from Guangdong through Angel Island. Of course, he's a Bay Area kid and not subject to strange racial insecurities.

What I don't entirely get is why "Oriental" is taken as offensive. "We're not Oriental, we're Asian." Well, yes, if you must be accurate. It's true that "Oriental" means "eastern" hence reduces a people to being of a geographic aberration. Taken that way, I can see the problem. But it's a minor one, if you take our current civilization as being an outgrowth of both ends of the Eurasian continent. We only got here by different means: You by orienting yourselves to the Golden Mountain, and us more or less by occident.