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Ethnic Diversity within Asian Americans in California:
Japanese and South Asian Immigrants
California has a history of being one of the most ethnically diverse states
in the US. This began early in the state's history: ever since the U.S. took
over the territory from Mexico, California has served as a destination to
innumerable migrants. The moderate climate and the hope of economic
opportunities have attracted many. Migrants came from across the Pacific,
from Mexico and Central America, and from across the United States. Angel
Island in the San Francisco Bay became the Ellis Island of the Pacific,
serving as a point of entry to immigrants from all over Asia. These
immigrants have played a crucial role in California history, though that
fact is often overlooked. When Asian immigrants are mentioned, they are
often referred to as a group, which obscures the true ethnic diversity among
Asian immigrants. Examples of this diversity can be seen by examining the
experiences of Japanese and South Asian migrant peoples in California.
There were several challenges I faced in writing this paper. For one, I am a
white woman, and I did not grow up in close contact with Japanese American
nor South Asian American communities. Since the resources I was able to draw
on in writing this paper were scarce, given my personal background I had to
hope that I was not misinterpreting the histories that I read, by
diminishing important points or distorting small ones. This scarcity of
information was a challenge in other ways as well. Information on South
Asian American women in particular was hard to come by, and at one point I
had to rely on fiction by Chitra Divakaruni, an author who was born in India
and now lives in California. While it was easier to find information on
Japanese American women, this was not exactly easy either. Most of what I
found focused on farming communities, which means that I don't have much in
my paper on the vibrant urban Japanese communities that flourished in many
cities in California. At the same time, I was surprised to find as much
information as I actually did on both groups, as they are not groups
commonly written about or discussed. I hope that this paper may serve as a
resource to other students, at least by having gathered together the
references I found!
Migrants from both Japan and South Asia have been a part of the California
social landscape since the turn of the century when European Americans, who
considered this new land theirs, perceived them as the second and third
waves of the 'Yellow Peril' (the Chinese were the first to be considered a
threat). Despite this hostility, many migrants settled here and worked to
develop their lives and economic opportunities as 'outsiders' . It wasn't
until after World War Two that people of Japanese and South Asian descent
were able to claim California as their rightful home. Post World War II is a
crucial time period in the experiences of both Japanese and South Asian
immigrants. However, each group had a specific context at the close of the
war, and it is important to understand this context in order to understand
the experiences of each ethnic group.
Why Japanese and South Asian immigrants came to California
Japanese immigrants first came to the United States as laborers, looking for
work where they could make some money and return home. In the early years of
immigration, mostly men came, and most were employed in migrant labor such
as agriculture and railroads, concentrated in California . Japanese women
soon followed the men as they began to settle; some joined their husbands in
the new land, but many arrived as 'picture brides,' entering into an
arranged marriage facilitated by an exchange of photographs . Japanese women
agreed to enter these marriages that lead them across the ocean with hopes
for a new beginning in America, attracted by the same dreams of material
comfort that drew many immigrants.
South Asian patterns of immigration were quite different from the Japanese.
They did not come to California in the same numbers as the Japanese, and at
first they mainly came through Canada. South Asian men had come to North
America looking for better economic opportunities, and as British Subjects
they could freely enter British Columbia. When they were met with hostility
there they began to look to the United States for refuge, invited by a
country that formally endorsed freedom and equality. The relatively close
location, warm climate, and available work in California drew the migrants
south. Many of the men had wives and families in their country of origin.
Most came from the Punjab region, where they had been farmers and land
owners. They were largely from the middle classes, as those at the top of
the Indian hierarchy had no desire to migrate, while those at the bottom of
the hierarchy did not have the funds.
California Ethnic Communities
Unlike the Japanese, South Asian women did not come to the U.S. until long
after the first wave of migrants. They did not come independently, and by
the time the men were ready to settle, South Asian immigration to the U.S.
had been barred (as was Japanese and all other Asian immigration), and it
was not opened again until 1946. Consequently the Punjabi communities in
California at the end of World War II were overwhelmingly male. They had
entered agricultural work as it offered the most opportunities to them, and
had settled in pocket communities, largely in rural areas. As they settled,
many acquired their own farms, either leasing or buying land in the
Sacramento and Imperial Valleys. Unable to marry women of their own culture
and prohibited from marrying white women (barred by immigration and
miscegenation laws respectively), many South Asian men married Mexican
women, and developed ties to Mexican immigrant communities.
Having come to California in greater numbers, many Japanese immigrants
settled in urban areas, forming Japantowns. A great many also entered rural
agricultural work, leasing or buying farms and settling in family units and
sometimes as whole communities. In both urban and rural settings, Japanese
American communities developed a strong ethnic solidarity with a common
identity as Japanese and common cultural values. This facilitated the
formation of an ethnic economy, which in turn supported the cohesiveness of
the community. Part of the strength of this ethnic solidarity developed in
response to racist hostility. The Japanese communities had turned to
self-reliance in the face of exclusion and prejudice: many Euro-American
workers in California had campaigned to keep Japanese out of the labor
market, and racist sentiments and attacks were common.
Pre-War Experiences of Racism
Japanese migrants entered an already hostile environment when they came to
California. In many ways they inherited the resentment and prejudice that
had been directed at the Chinese; many whites could not distinguish between
the two groups and Japanese migrants were sometimes called 'Chinks' (a
derogatory term referring to Chinese people). As the numbers of Japanese in
California surpassed the numbers of Chinese, they were viewed more as a
distinct group. In the streets they were assaulted with racist curses,
rocks, and spittle. They were refused admittance to theaters, turned away
from housing, and found themselves the victims of arson and vandalism.
Japanese women inherited many of the racist stereotypes that had been
developed about Chinese women as well. Many Chinese women had been forced
into prostitution , and soon were stereotyped to be subservient erotic
objects. In addition, Euro-Americans, with cultures that promoted an ideal
of romantic love, misunderstood the practice of arranged marriages. These
misunderstandings further fed the prejudices against Japanese women.
Compounding this were the stories of 'disgraceful' women who abandoned their
arranged marriages. Many Japanese women were unhappy in their arranged
marriages; their husbands may have misrepresented themselves in age or
socio-economic status, and many worked from dawn to dusk out of an economic
necessity that they had not anticipated. Marital scandals developed when
women left their husbands, reportedly with other men. These women were
condemned as immoral, compounding the stereotyping even further.
Prejudice against the Japanese immigrants was particularly evident among
workers and labor unions. White workers campaigned to keep Japanese workers
out of work, and when Japanese and Mexican workers together formed a
successful labor union, the American Federation of Labor refused to
recognize a non-white union. This type of exclusion manifested again in
California's Alien Land Law in 1913, which excluded any non-citizen to own
or lease land. The law did not specify Japanese, but they targeted the
growing numbers of Japanese farmers who were engaged in turning barren
California land into viable farmland. Lawmakers also hoped that by cutting
off the opportunities for immigrants to settle in California, that it would
be a less attractive destination.
Anti-Japanese sentiment heightened during World War II, after Japan bombed
Pearl Harbor in 1941. Fear and suspicion developed as there was speculation
about the possibility of sabotage from within by the Japanese population on
the mainland. Newspapers called for a mass execution , and hostility
mounted. On February 19, 1942, President Roosevelt signed executive order
9066 designed to "protect the nation against espionage and sabotage". This
led to the incarceration of thousands of Japanese Americans, regardless of
age, sex, or citizenship. Many of those incarcerated were actually children
of Japanese immigrants, born in the United States and thus U.S. citizens.
Because of their ancestry, almost 100,000 residents of California were
detained and denied the freedoms supposedly guaranteed under the U.S.
Constitution.
While the hostility towards South Asians in California never reached the
point of mass imprisonment, they also have experienced prejudice and racism.
Though they entered the United States with hopes for freedom and equality,
they were met with hostility and antagonism. They were driven from working
in the railroad and lumber industries by violent white workers, and faced
insults and assaults in the streets. There was some debate about their
official status as immigrants; as dark-skinned 'Caucasians', there were
questions about whether they were eligible for citizenship. In response to
the pressures of groups such as the Asiatic Exclusion League and newspaper
articles portraying South Asians as immodest, dirty, and a threat to white
men, South Asia was added to the list of Asiatic 'barred zones' in 1917.
This halted immigration from South Asia, which led to California bachelor
communities of South Asian men.
South Asians were also affected by the Alien Land Law; because they were
ineligible for citizenship, many South Asians who had worked to establish
their own farms in California were forced to make other arrangements. South
Asians and Japanese farmers found ways to circumvent the laws by finding
citizens who were willing to 'own' the land on paper. Japanese farmers often
accomplished this through their American-born children, but South Asian men
did not have that option unless they had married and had children with
Mexican women. Although many South Asian men explained these cross-cultural
marriages by saying that South Asians and Mexicans had similar cultural
values and family systems, many of these marriages were in fact turbulent
and ended in divorce. In their divorce petitions, both Mexican women and
South Asian men indicated that their spouse did not behave as they had
expected them to, suggesting cultural differences in gender roles. It may be
that the similarities in the two cultures had been exaggerated by men cut
off from their own families and discriminated against by the community at
large, looking for a home like the ones they had been accustomed to.
After the War
After World War Two, the dominant American culture began to espouse more
egalitarian ideologies of race and ethnicity. However, this did not come
right away. When Japanese Americans were released from internment camps and
began to resettle in California, there was a great amount of hostility to
their return. The surrounding communities, having been whipped into an
anti-Japanese frenzy during the war, were suspicious of their returning
neighbors. Resettling Japanese were subject to hate crimes ranging from
verbal abuse to gunshots fired into their homes. They also faced economic
hardship and housing issues. Except for the few who had been able to arrange
stewardships of their property, most had lost their homes and lands during
the war. Less than 300 Japanese Americans left the camps to return to a
familiar place. This time period in the Japanese American experience is
characterized by struggle, hardship, and dramatic changes.
During internment, the leadership of the Japanese American communities had
largely transferred to the second generation (referred to as the 'Nisei').
Non-citizens (the first generation, or 'Issei') were not permitted to
organize or hold political positions in the internment camps, so Nisei
stepped into those roles. Nisei sons also became the official
representatives of the family to camp authorities, largely because of their
better knowledge of the English language . This trend continued on
resettlement. Issei were aging, and many of their children were adults by
the end of the war. These adult children now took roles of responsibility in
their families previously occupied by their parents.
This transition of leadership in Japanese American communities brought
significant social changes. Having grown up in the United States, Nisei
synthesized Japanese and American culture. They spoke English as their
primary language, and many took Americanized names. Furthermore, Nisei
adults engaged in mainstream American social activities such as dancing,
bowling, and bridge. Representing a significant change, they adopted
different gender roles than had their parents.
Traditionally, it was the duty of Japanese women to marry and become a
mother. On marriage, she would go to live in her husband's family's home,
where she deferred to her mother-in-law in all decisions, and had to ask her
permission to go out of the house. Everything in a woman's life was expected
to be subordinated to life in the home. In Japan's strictly hierarchical
society, a daughter-in-law had the lowest status in the family. Issei women
came to the United States with these cultural values imbued in them.
However, as immigrants in an unfavorable economic climate, they could not
afford to restrict themselves to the home. Many Issei women worked a double
shift of work in the family business or farm, and house work. Among the
early Japanese families in rural California, there was a sexual division of
labor domestically, with both sexes working on the farm, and women and girls
doing all of the house work. Issei mothers had the primary responsibility of
socializing their children; Issei fathers were formal, aloof figures.
Additionally, in these first generation immigrant families, the parameters
for acceptable behavior were much wider for the boys than for the girls.
Gender roles in Japanese American families had changed significantly by the
end of the war. Nisei women had come of age in internment camps, where the
social influence of the family had been surpassed by the influence of peers
. Women in the interment camps had more time to socialize with each other,
and even had the opportunities to take adult education classes. At the same
time, men in the camps were faced with a loss of authority. The state
provided food, clothing, and shelter, and there was nothing the men could do
to better their family situation. In the context of the camps, each family
member became a free agent, with increased independence. Once they returned
to free life in California, Nisei women continued to exercise this
independence. It was assumed that women would work outside of the home, and
many brought in wages from domestic service and farm work. Women were still
expected to do most of the housework, and this was a source of tension.
Nisei men did participate in some tasks that their fathers had left to the
women, mostly having to do with household maintenance. In this, the domestic
division of labor among Japanese American households mirrored the mainstream
American roles of the time.
Another significant social change was the adoption of the ideals of love and
romance by Nisei. Many of them avoided their parent's attempts at arranged
marriages, choosing instead peers that they met either in the internment
camps or in work settings. While they had adopted mainstream American values
in personally choosing their partners, most Nisei continued to express
Japanese values as well, with a strong sense of commitment and family duty.
Nisei couples largely followed the tradition of the wife moving in with her
husband's family. However, mirroring the shifting gender roles in Japanese
American communities, their households reflected relative egalitarianism,
shared decision-making, and companionship between husband and wife.
The period following World War two was a period of great change in South
Asian communities as well. In this case, the change was largely brought
about due to changes in immigration legislation. The Immigration Act of 1946
legalized immigration from South Asia (limited to a quota of 100 per year),
and legalized naturalization. This opened up the opportunities for South
Asian women to come, and many of the South Asian men in California either
sent for their families, or arranged marriages to bring a wife to the United
States. The pocket communities that had formed around agricultural centers
served as a magnet, drawing migrants from other parts of the state and from
South Asia. As South Asian communities grew, they evolved extensive kinship
networks, developing familial and community solidarity dedicated to
advancing the economic interests of the ethnic community and maintaining the
traditions of their culture. These kinship networks were also a key part of
South Asian settlement patterns, since new immigrants from South Asia
depended on their relatives to help them establish themselves in California.
For South Asians who settled in rural areas farm work was the main form of
employment available. For many of the immigrants, coming from middle-class
backgrounds in their country of origin, there were several psychological
adjustments to be made in relation to work. For one, financial necessity
forced women to work outside of the home. As most of the immigrants came
from rural, culturally conservative areas of South Asia such as the Punjab,
for a woman to work outside of the home was considered a shameful situation
for them and their families. In addition, men who had owned their own farms
had to adjust to working for others, a position that they had previously
associated with lower castes. For some the distress caused by seeing
themselves in this position was ameliorated by the ability to use their
laborer positions to move into landowning status. Within a few years, most
South Asian migrants in California found their lives established and, by
living frugally, they were able to save money. They would then use this
savings to go into partnership with village-mates or relatives, and drawing
on loans from families in their communities who were already established,
they were able to finance ventures into business, home, and land ownership.
This was such an effective mode of community success that by 1980, Punjabi
farmers owned a little more than half of the peach acreage in the Sacramento
Valley, plus some prune, almond, and walnut orchards.
The adjustments discussed above were not the only changes that happened
within South Asian communities. Another significant change is that most
South Asians in the U.S. tend to live in single-family dwellings, or at the
most a household might include aging parents and a young couple. This is
quite a change from the pattern in South Asia, where a household might
include the families of several siblings as well as the siblings' older
parents. The residence pattern in most of South Asia is patrilocal, meaning
that a new bride moves into her husband's father's dwelling, along with the
rest of the family there. This had implications beyond residence patterns:
there were very specific roles in the family, which these customs supported.
Women married a family, more than marrying a specific man, and their primary
relationship was with their mother-in-law. With the new residence patterns
in the U.S., a new bride and her husband might live with his parents for
some time, but rather than raising their families in that household, they
are much more likely to move into their own house. This has the potential of
breaking down the networks that women had relied upon in their countries of
origin, but it seems that within rural communities, South Asian kinship
networks and community solidarity has remained quite strong, despite the
nuclear family housing situations. However in urban environments this is not
always the case.
Along with these changes in the family residence patterns and structures,
gender roles within the families have changed as well. In traditional
families, women had been the keepers of a family's honor, and men were the
providers. In "The Maid Servant's Story", Chitra Divakaruni describes a
young woman in India facing a decision: "Youngest in the household and a
girl besides, she'd always had people making decisions for her, or at least
telling her what to do, praising her for being tractable and obedient, which
as everyone knew were the cardinal virtues of womanhood." This is indicative
of the gendered division of labor in traditional South Asian families; men
made the decisions, owned the property, and provided food. Women looked
after the men and the household. In the United States, it has become
customary for women to work outside of the home. With the change in family
structures and women's ability to bring income into the household, it seems
likely that women have developed increased independence and decision-making
powers in the household. While I did not find any studies examining gender
roles in South Asian American communities, Chitra Divakaruni's short stories
of South Asian immigrant women in the United States do reflect changes along
these lines.
In 1965 the Immigration and Naturalization act eliminated the quota
limitations on immigration based on national origin. This opened up the
opportunity for many more immigrants to enter the United States, and began a
process of chain migration that swelled the number of South Asian Americans:
In 1965 the total number of Asian Indians in the United States was about
50,000 and by 1990 that number had increased to 815,500. Many South Asians
entered under the occupational and investor categories of the 1965
Immigration Act, and once family networks developed many entered under the
family reunification categories were used as well. These immigrants have
mostly been professionals, reflected in the statistic that Japanese
Americans and Asian Indian Americans are the only groups in the U.S. with
median incomes per worker higher than the general population. Contrary to
the earlier patterns of migration, many of these immigrants were from urban
centers and thus sought out the larger cities once they arrived in
California, swelling the South Asian populations in Sacramento, San Jose,
the Bay Area, and the Los Angeles - Long Beach - Anaheim area. However, the
pocket communities in rural areas continued to attract migrants as well and
in 1980 the number of Punjabis in one small Sacramento Valley agricultural
town was over six thousand.
The 1965 act had a limited impact on Japanese migration patterns. After
Japanese immigration was legalized in 1952 a small, steady flow of migrants
entering the United States began, and the elimination of immigration quotas
did not affect the immigration rates of Japanese very much. This is probably
due to two factors: the steady economic growth and relatively stable
political system that Japan has enjoyed after World War II, and the
continuing shadow of Japanese internment during the war. The memory of
internment tends to discourage sentimentality about the benefits of living
in the United States, and not many Japanese choose to emigrate. Most people
of Japanese ancestry living in the U.S. today are American born. Of those
who do immigrate, they are twice as likely to be women. About 70% of these
are young women, possibly drawn to emigrate by what they perceive women's
social standing to be in the States.
Fortunately the status of Japanese Americans has improved since World War
Two - to some extent as a part of the general adoption of an ideology
supporting equality, but largely because of activism and political
involvement by Japanese Americans. In the late 60's, Asian Americans began
to be involved in campaigning for civil rights as an overall group. Students
campaigned for Asian American studies to be taught in universities, and the
first classes on Japanese American History were included in public
universities. There was also political activism in regards to the aftermath
of the World War Two internment. Japanese Americans and their supporters
called for redress to survivors of the camps, leading to the creation of a
"Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians" by President
Jimmy Carter. The Commission gave a report in 1983 recommending that
Congress recognize the 'grave injustices', offer an apology, and issue
monetary compensation to those excluded from their place of residence during
the war. Several proposals went through Congress on redress, culminating in
the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, offering redress to Japanese Americans.
South Asians have also been involved in campaigning for rights, though they
have gone through a different process. South Asian immigrants were commonly
shocked to encounter racial hostility directed at them in the United States.
Many came from upper castes in their countries of origin, where purity of
breeding (as evidenced by skin color and 'Caucasian features') was an
essential part of the social hierarchy, and they had been accustomed to
being among the privileged. When South Asians were confronted with the
implications of the color of their skin to mainstream America, many
responded in protest. This response was characterized in early years of
South Asian immigration by trying to prove their right to civil rights based
on the argument that they were Caucasian, and thus deserved all the rights
of a white person in the US. This type of response is continued today in the
form of arguments for "mainstreaming" and "changing the Asian Indian image".
However another response to discrimination has been to organize and
politicize South Asians, such as the 1975 campaign for separate category
listings in the 1980 census. Before this time, Asian Indians, Pakistanis,
Malayans, Thais, and Sri Lankans were categorized as "other white". More
recently some South Asian Americans have worked within umbrella
organizations such as the Asian American Democratic Congress, but as of
1989, these types of alliances were not firmly established and seemed
tentative.
The Asian American movement and resulting coalition building among the
different ethnic groups and has been effective in promoting solidarity and
campaigning for civil rights. However, this solidarity across ethnicities is
often perceived by mainstream America as evidence of Asian American
homogeneity. In reality, the category of Asian American encompasses people
of many ethnicities. This is especially true in the last few decades since
immigrants from South-East Asia have come to the United States in increasing
numbers, many settling in California. Positioned at the western edge of the
continent, California continues to be a main point of entry for immigrants
from Asia. These immigrant communities continue to be a vital part of the
state, just as the Japanese and South Asian communities have been.
Works Cited
Bingham, Marjorie W. and Susan H. Gross Women in Japan from Ancient Times to
the Present. St. Lois Park, MN: Glenhurst Publications, Inc. 1987.
Divakaruni, Chitra Banerji. Arranged Marriage. New York: Anchor Books, 1995.
Gibson, Margaret A. Accomodation without Assimilation: Sikh Immigrants in an
American High School Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1988.
Glenn, Evelyn Nakano. Issei, Nisei, War Bride. Philedelphia: Temple
University Press, 1986.
Hess, Gary R. "The Asian Indian Immigrants In The United States: The Early
Phase, 1900-65" In From India to America. Ed. S. Chandrasekhar. La Jolla,
CA: Population Review, 1982.
Hing, Bill Ong. Making and Remaking Asian America Through Immigration
Policy, 1850 - 1990. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1993.
Ichioka, Yuji. "The Japanese Immigrant Family, 1900's-1920's". In Peoples of
Color in the American West. Ed. Sucheng Chan, Douglas Henry Daniels, Mario
T. Garcia, Terry P. Lexington, MA: Wilson. DC Heath and Co, 1994, pp. 199 -
207.
Liddle, Joanna, & Rama Joshi. Daughters of Independence: Gender, Caste and
Class in India. London: Zed Books, 1986.
Mazumdar, Sucheta, "Race and Racism: South Asians in the United States". In
Frontiers of Asian American Studies, Ed. Gail M. Nomura et al. Pullman, WA :
Washington State University Press, 1989.
Matsumoto, Valerie J. Farming the Home Place: A Japanese American Community
in California. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993.
NJAHS (National Japanese American Historical Society). Due Process:
Americans of Japanese Ancestry and the United States Constitution. San
Francisco: NJAHS, 1995.
Takaki, Ronald Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian
Americans. Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1989.
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