This week’s edition of Diverse Collections features the book, Chinese on the American Frontier by Arif Dirlik and Malcolm Yeung.
According to the authors, “Chinese immigrants played a dynamic role in frontier America, yet scholars of Asian America have focused for the most part only on the Pacific Coast, especially California. This reader fills that gap by collecting memoirs, documents, and historical analyses from the other Western states - from the Cascades to the Great Plains - to provide a comprehensive overview of the Chinese in nineteenth-century America.”
“Selecting among a wealth of primary and secondary material, Dirlik has chosen works that enlarge our understanding of the Chinese presence in the West and the development of Chinese cultural formations on the frontier. Providing insights not only into frontier society in the United States, but also into U.S.-Chinese relations of this time, this volume will be invaluable for all readers interested in China, Western history, and the history of Asian America.”