- Words and visions around/about Chinese transnational mobilities 流动
- Edited by Valentina Pedone, Miriam Castorina
Journey to a foreign land: imagining migration in Sinophone Literature from Thailand
- Rebecca Ehrenwirth
- © 2023 Author(s) |
- CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.36253/979-12-215-0068-4.13
Sima Gong and Zeng Xin are two of the most prominent contemporary Sinophone writers in Thailand. Although they were born in Thailand, they frequently write about migration. In this chapter I want to ask why the motive of migration is so prominent in their works and how they write about it. I argue that their ancestors’ quest from China to Thailand is indeed not the focus of attention but the wandering between these two places. Although they did not physically migrate from China to Thailand, these authors use literature as a means to travel mentally between the two countries, and “re-live” the migratory experience through their texts. Analyzing these selected texts offers a unique insight into the authors’ floating identity, one that is constantly migrating between China and Thailand.
- Keywords:
- Migration,
- Sinophone,
- Thailand,
- Identity,
- Literature,
SDI Munich, Germany
- Anderson, Benedict. (1983) 2006. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Revised ed. London: Verso.
- Baker, Chris, and Pasuk Phongpaichit. 2009. A History of Thailand. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9781139194877
- Baker, Chris, and Pasuk Phongpaichit. 2022. A History of Thailand. 4th ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Bao, Jiemin. 2005. Marital Acts: Gender, Sexuality, and Identity among the Chinese Thai Diaspora. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.
- Bernards, Brian. 2015. Writing the South Seas: Imagining the Nanyang in Chinese and Southeast Asian Postcolonial Literature. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
- Chansiri, Disaphol. 2008. The Chinese Émigrés of Thailand in the Twentieth Century. Youngstown, N.Y.: Cambria Press.
- Coughlin, Richard. 1960. Double Identity: The Chinese in Modern Thailand. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press.
- Fernquest, Jon. 2016. “New Wave of Chinese coming to life in Thailand.” Bangkok Post, September 23, 2016. http://www.bangkokpost.com/learning/advanced/1093148/new-wave-of-chinese-coming-to-live-in-thailand.
- Li, Minghuan. 2004. “Myths of Creation and the Creation of Myths: Interrogating Chinese Diaspora.” Chinese America: History & Perspective 1: 1-6.
- Li, Peter S., and Eva Xiaoling Li. 2013. “The Chinese Overseas population.” In The Routledge Handbook of the Chinese Diaspora, edited by Tan Chee-Beng, 15-28. London: Routledge.
- Liu, Qingshan 劉青山. 2006. “Chaoshan Banshanke huaqiao huaren 潮汕半山客华侨华人.” [Chaoshan Hakka huaqiao huaren]. In Taiguo Huaqiao huaren yanjiu 泰国华侨华人研究 [Studies on the Chinese Diaspora in Thailand], edited by Hong Lin洪林, and Lai Daogang 黎道綱, 38-51. Hong Kong: Xianggang shehui kexue chubanshe.
- Mackie, Jamie. 2003. “Thinking about the Chinese Overseas.” American Asian Review 21, no. 4 (Winter): 1-44.
- Morita, Liang. 2003. “Language Shift in the Thai Chinese Community.” Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 24 (6): 485–95. DOI: 10.1080/01434630308666512
- Sima, Gong 司马攻. 2008. Sima Gong weixing xiaoshuo zixuanji 司马攻微型小说自选集. [Selected Short-stories by Sima Gong]. Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi chubanshe.
- Sima, Gong 司马攻. 2012. Xin you lingxi 心有靈犀. [Heartbeat in Unison]. Bangkok: Taihua wenxue chubanshe.
- Sng, Jeffrey, and Pimphraphai Bisalputra. 2015. A History of the Thai-Chinese. Singapore: Editions Didier Millet.
- Skinner, G. William. 1957. Chinese Society in Thailand: An Analytical History. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
- Sun, Shuyan 孫淑彥, and Zhang Fangzhi 張芳芝. 2004. “Chaoshan Shuibu de miaoyong 潮汕水布的妙用.” [The Wonder of the Watercloth of Chaoshan]. https://kknews.cc/news/j32pemy.html
- Suryadinata, Leo. 2015. The Making of Southeast Asian Nations: State, Ethnicity, Indigenism and Citizenship. New Jersey: World Scientific. DOI: 10.1142/9218
- Van Roy, Edward. 2017. Siamese Melting Pot: Ethnic Minorities in the Making of Bangkok. Singapore: Silkworm Books.
- Wang, Gungwu. 1995. “Greater China and the Chinese Overseas.” In Greater China: The Next Superpower?, edited by David Shambaugh, 274-296. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Wang, Gungwu. 2003. Don't Leave Home: Migration and the Chinese. Singapore: Eastern University Press.
- Wang, Yanhua 王燕华, and Liu Tingting 刘婷婷. 2021. “Qiaopi wangshi: Yifeng shu ji wan zhong shan 侨批往事：一封书寄万重山.” [Overseas Chinese Writing about the Past: A Letter Sent to Ten Thousand Mountains]. http://www.chinaql.org/n1/2021/0915/c420278-32227679.html.
- Wilkinson, Endymion. 2015. Chinese History: A New Manual. 4th ed. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
- Yen, Ching-hwang. 2013. “Chinese coolie emigration, 1845-74.” In Routledge Handbook of the Chinese Diaspora, edited by Tan Chee-Beng, 73-88. London: Routledge.
- Zeng, Xin 曾心. 2002. Lan yanjing 蓝眼睛. [Blue Eyes]. Bangkok: Shidai luantan chubanshe.
- Zeng, Xin 曾心. 2006. Liangting 凉亭. [Pavilion]. Bangkok: Liuzhong daxue chubanshe.
- Zeng, Xin 曾心. 2005. Gei Taihua wenxue bamai 给泰华文学把脉. [Feel the pulse of Sinophone literature in Thailand]. Xiamen: Xiamen daxue chubanshe.
Chapter Information
Chapter Title
Journey to a foreign land: imagining migration in Sinophone Literature from Thailand
Authors
Rebecca Ehrenwirth
Language
English
DOI
10.36253/979-12-215-0068-4.13
Peer Reviewed
Publication Year
2023
Copyright Information
© 2023 Author(s)
Content License
Metadata License
Bibliographic Information
Book Title
Words and visions around/about Chinese transnational mobilities 流动
Editors
Valentina Pedone, Miriam Castorina
Peer Reviewed
Number of Pages
204
Publication Year
2023
Copyright Information
© 2023 Author(s)
Content License
Metadata License
Publisher Name
Firenze University Press
DOI
10.36253/979-12-215-0068-4
ISBN Print
979-12-215-0067-7
eISBN (pdf)
979-12-215-0068-4
eISBN (epub)
979-12-215-0069-1
Series Title
Studi e saggi
Series ISSN
2704-6478
Series E-ISSN
2704-5919