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eBook details

• Title: Exile Between Two Continents: Ettie Chin's War Experience in China (1937-1944) (8H Paper) (Biography)
• Author : Chinese America: History and Perspectives
• Release Date : January 01, 2007
• Genre: Social Science,Books,Nonfiction,
• Pages : * pages
• Size : 225 KB

Description

Those who study Chinese American experiences in the early twentieth century often face the challenge of the paucity of written materials produced by ordinary Chinese Americans themselves. Ettie Len-Toy Chin [Hong] (1913-2005) is such a case in point. Having worked as an instructor of physical education in an American-founded missionary college in wartime China from 1937 to 1944, her experience as a second-generation Chinese American living in the old country would have shed light on the construction of Chinese American identity from a unique perspective. However, she left behind very little writing representing either her wartime experience in China or her continued efforts to develop exchange relationships between Chinese and American institutions of higher education after she returned to the United States in 1944. Therefore, the goal of my project is not just to retrieve some lost pieces of an individual life, but also to explore effective ways to examine Chinese American experiences where "authentic" written materials of their own creation are scarce or even nonexistent due to various historical circumstances. By situating the most extensive of the few available written accounts of Chin's experience in wartime China--a letter written by her, dated July 1938--in its particular historical and textual context, I hope to explore the means by which Chin negotiated her way through complex cultural forces and systems of knowledge at a critical moment in both Chinese and Chinese American histories. Sau-ling Wong has argued that second-generation ethnics have to contend with three cultural systems: "the 'ideal' Old World Values" as presented by their parents, "'real' Old World values" as actually mediated by these same parents, and "'real' New World values as seen from the vantage point of Americans by birth." (1) Chin's experience would add yet another layer to this already complex story. To paraphrase Wong's terminology, she also had to contend with the "real" Old World values as she wrestled with the challenge of living in her parents' native country during the war. Caught in the crossfire of Chinese and American cultural values, such as individualism versus collectivism, or filial obligations versus institutional allegiance, while carrying with her the burden of racial stereotypes, Chin encountered plenty of thorny situations in wartime China. In order to investigate how Chin interacted with the different cultural forces from her particular locale of wartime China, I will first provide a biographical sketch of Chin, then offer an institutional snapshot of Ginling College, the missionary college where Chin taught during the war years, and last examine her letter in light of both its historical and textual context.

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