Memories of a Future Home (Conclu & Epilogue)

In mid-2000 the author attended the Chinese Millennium Fair in Panama, which marked a sharp departure in how dominant Panamanian society perceived Chineseness, interacting with the Chinese community and understanding the place of diasporic Chinese in Panama. The Fair was not only a celebaration of Chineseness but clearly an effort to bring Chineseness into Panamanian cultural and social life.

At one point the author was amazed at how drastic the perception of Chineseness had changed in such a short period of time, and wondered whether this  was the beginning of a new relationship or a temporary romance fated to turn sour. Then she recalled Mainland China’s recent promise of 30 billion in new investments in Latin American and reflected the general terend of increasing economic nteraction. As long as these relations persist, she believed that Panamanians, along with other Latin Americans, may well continue to turn their attention toward China and Chineseness may become a more central and valued part of Latin America.

 

Memories of a Future Home (Chapter 6)

Chapter 6 examines a dramatic shift in popular constructions of Chineseness in 1997 and situates it at the convergence of several geopolitical events: U.S. demilitarization and return of the Canal, the Hong Kong handover, and Panama’s privatization efforts. Linking these events together, she shows how they jointly produced the circumstances for an unexpected increase of  Chinese economic and political presence — from both mainland China and Taiwan — in Panama. This in turn ignited not only national curiosity about all things Chinese but also a reevaluation of Chinese belonging in the nation. Meanwhile, diasporic Chinese thmelseves were concerned with another set of discussions; for them, the unfolding of the China-Taiwan conflict in Panama renewed old antagonisms and inspired divergent formulations of what it means to be Chinese in diaspora.

By the end of 1997, Panama had struck a perfect compromise: it would maintain official relations with Taiwan while allowing the PRC to establish a commercial office in Panama. Though the decision settles the issue temporarily, the struggle is far from being over, for as long as the China-Taiwan conflict continues, so will the struggle for official relations with Panama.

 

Memories of a Future Home (Chapter 5)

Chapter 5 discusses the new migration of Chinese to Panama in the 1980s, a trend that doubled the Chinese population in less than five year and sparked fresh debates about Chinese belonging in Panama. In looking at the challenges faced by diasporic Chinese in post-U.S.-invasion Panama, this chapter examines not only the cultural and social factors that divided the new immigrants and the established Panamanian Chinese, but also the political imperatives that brought them together. It argues that debates of belonging among diasporic Chinese are intertwined with their collective struggle for national belonging.

The newcomers were situated in an economically disadvantaged position relative to the Panamanian Chinese. While these newcomers accused the Panamanian Chinese of not treating them as compatriots, and thereby claiming that they have become “Panamanian,” the Panamanian Chinese evoked ethnic constructions of Hakka alterity to separate themselves from the newcomers. These contests of belonging within the local Chinese community are intertwined with a collective struggle to claim belonging to the national Panamanian community. This is an important dimsension of diasporic citizenship, as it underscores the tension between local and national negotiations of belonging and illuminates the contrasting and converging positions of the two cohorts within the Chinese community.

 

Memories of a Future Home (Chapter 4)

Chapter 4 is inspired by several interviews that the author conducted with older diasporic Chinese, and revisits a particular historical juncture in the 1940s during which the lives and worldviews of diasporic Chinese took a sudden dramatic turn. WhilePanama’s nationalist policy of “prohibited roots” disenfranchised diasporic Chinese, and the Chinese communist revolutions closed the possibility of return to China, the expansion of U.S. military base in Panama provided a place of refuge for the doubly displaced Chinese.

The chapter conveys the precarious situation that confronted this generation of Chinese, who had been multiply displaced and excluded and whose ideas of belogning and home were now necessarily suspended somewhere between Panama, China and the U.S. “Home” was no longer safeguarded in a distant place and neither could they simply assume automatic belonging in Panama. It became more an open-ended question than an assumption. Its contingency inspired a variety of responses. They began reworking their ideas of where home is and will be, developing new strategies of sociopolitical integraiton in Panama, and turning toward the U.S. to acquire what they perceive to be the necessary cultural capital to ensure security and mobility.

 

China’s defense

China blames mislabelling for Panama drug deaths

Thu May 31, 2007 6:03am EDT

BEIJING, May 31 (Reuters) – China said on Thursday that two Chinese companies had mislabelled a toxic chemical as a medical ingredient that killed at least 100 people in Panama last year, but added direct responsibility rested with Panamanian traders.

A Chinese company shipped 11,349 kg of “TD” glycerine to Spain in 2003, where it was then sold on to Panama, said Wei Chuanzhong, deputy head of the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine.

But that product actually contained 15 percent diethylene glycol — an industrial solvent used in paint and antifreeze — he added.

Glycerine is a similar but more expensive compound frequently used as syrup in medicines and in toothpaste.

Once in Panama, the product was renamed by Panamanian merchants as “pure glycerine” and they also tweaked the expiry date to indicate it would be valid for an extra three years, and sold it on, Wei added.

“By the time the Panama drug manufacturer used the chemical, it had been expired for two years,” he said.

Panama says the chemical was used to make cough syrup, which then killed at least 100 people.

 

Memories of a Future Home (Chapter 3)

Chapter 3 of Siu’s book focuses on four migration stories of Panamanian Chinese and explore the theme of serial migration — both as social experience and as narrative strategy of “normalizing” ruptures — in their articulation of identity, home and belonging. While each migration story maps a different itinerary between China and Panama and across different sites in the Americas, all four stories show the significance of serial migraiton in shaping notions of home and cultural identity. By connecting the various sites where they and their ancestors have migrated, diasporic Chinese affirm their ties to these places, allowing their identification to emerge not only with China and Panama but also with the Americas in general. Moreover, to the extent that their stories recall repeated uprootings across generations, she suggests that their narratives of serial migration help transform these disruptions into common events. Through reiteration, the narratives help normalize serial migraiton, making it into a an ordinary aspect of living in diaspora.

Among the four immigrants interviewed, the first one strives to explore all the potential facets of his identity and extensive travel actually enhances his sense of diapsoric belonging; the second immigrant’s high-profile family and his own set of migraitons have left him feeling alienated; the third asserts his belonging by actively participating in community activities; the last one holds herself aloof form the Chinese community since she feels it does not accept her. Therefore, juxtaposing their migration stories offsets reductionist tropes that homogenize the Chinese epxierience in diaspora.

 

Memories of a Future Home (Chapter 2)

Chapter 2 of Siu’s book situates Panamanian Chinese in the larger Chinese diaspora of Central America and explores the politics of belonging among this group. When controversy erupted over who should win in the 1996 beauty contest hosted by the Convention of Chinese Associations in Central America and Panama, she realized that relations among diasporic Chinese in the region were not without tension or struggle. Accordingly, she uses gender as an analytical lens to explore how debates of who should be queen illustrate the shared goals as well as the differences and power assymmetries among diasporic Chinese.

Initially established as a political and economic organization, the Federcion de Asociaciones Chinas de Centroamerica y Panama quickly incorporated an annual beauty contest to encourage multigenerational attendance at its annual convention and sociocultural intereaction across the region. Building on established diasporic associatons whose membership is determined by patrilineal descent, this organization reinforces androcentric biases toward male participation amd male dominance in formal sphere of diasporic politics. The contest nonetheless offers an opportunity for women to articulate and negotiate the tensions and contraditictions within the diaspora. Disguised as a seemingly harmless competition of bauty and femininity, the contest therefore incites and facilitates passionate and highly politicized debates about belonging and the meaning of diasporic Chinesenessness.

 

Memories of a Future Home (Chapter 1)

Chapter 1 of Siu’s book, “Prohibited Race/ Ideal Citizens: The Social History and Background of the Chinese in Panama,” provides historical background on Panama and outlines the general social history of the Chinese there. It discusses Chinese migration patterns and their social institutions, religious affiliations, and linguistic diversity, as well as their occupational pursuits and national and transnational political participation. Siu’s treatment of each of these categories is necessarily brief, as the chapter is meant to offer only a general overview of both Panama and Panamanian Chinese.

To sum up, Siu describes how over the past 150 years, the Chinese have developed a form of belonging in Panama thoroughly embedded within webs of transnational relations. Local integration goes hand in hand with maintaining tansnational links with Mainland China/ Taiwan, the United States and other Chinese communities dispersed elsewhere in the Americas, and these dual processes are intimately woven together in their everyday lives.  

 

Memories of a Future Home (Preface & Intro)

Rarely does one find a substantial and fruitful study of Chinese in Panama, and Lok C.D. Siu’s book Memories of a Future Home: Diasporic Citizenship of Chinese in Panama is very valuable. Written by an Assistant (now Associate) Professor of Anthropology and Asian/Pacific/ American Studies at New York University, and published by Stanford University Press in 2005, it began with a trip to Nicarugua, where the author’s father was connected; though she decided not to conduct her research in this country, the questions of how diasporic Chinese create “ome” and experience belonging and nonbelonging in this part of the world continued to stay with her and motivated her exploration into the politics of diasporic belonging for Chinese in Latin America.

Siu points out that between 1992 and 2000, the Chinese population in Latin America grew from 1 million to 3.5 million, and Mainland Chinese President recently announced more than 30 billion in new Chinese investments in the area. In her experience of traveling throughout Latin America, the Chinese in Panama definitely stood out as the most vibrant of all such communities. Within Panama city alone, there are two “Chinatowns,” and Chinese restaurants of various sizes, styles and scales are found throughout the city.

There are  four important questions and concerns of our time which form the framework of her book. First, the particular configuration of relationships between Panama, the United States, the People’s Republic of China and Taiwan offers a unique context in which to examine diasporic belonging. Second, the case of Chinese in Panama highlights the interwoven relationship between the Chinese homeland state (Taiwan) and its diasporic subjects.  Third, the focus of her project provides a different perspective on globalization, one that involves the diminishing role of the United States and the increasing interaction between two globally Southern nations, Panama and China. Fourth, the study contributes to the rethinking of area studies, and brings into conversation Latin American, Asian American and Chinese diaspora studies.

It was the dynamism and warmth of the poeple and country that held her attention and fed her imagination. In view of the lack of pubolished literature on Chinese in Panama, she relied heavily on live narratives and semi-structured interviews to provide situated histories, elaborate on specific themes and reconstruct a skeletal outline of their collective experience.

The preface alone makes me want to take a trip to Panama, and trace the 1/4 of my identity!!!

 

Folktales & their Background Information 1

Are you still lost at how to interpret the two Panamanian folktales cited previously? Bierhorst’s preface sums up the whole picture in a rather succinct way:

The stories in this book represent the folktale tradition of Spanish-speaking America set within a frame of American Indian lore. As the scheme suggests, Latino folklore is two things at once. For the most part it is distinctly Old World, preserving medieval and even ancient story types. And yet in part it is new. That is, it has been embraced by Indo-America, which retains its own distinctive traditions while contributing a new, mixed lore of European and native elements….p. xi.

Though the two Panamanian stories are among the 100+ stories collected in Bierhorst’s book, they can be interpreted as “two things at once,” the result of a synergy between the old and the new.