The Nanyang Chinese anti-Japanese and boycott movement, 1908-1928: a study of Nanyang Chinese nationalism

Abstract

No other ethnic minority group abroad is more subjected to over-simplified generalization concerning their demenor and behavior than the overseas Chinese in the Nanyang (South Seas). The Chinese in the region have been accused of being "the Jews of the East," of being indifferent to and uninterested in the politics of their motherland or of the country they have adopted, and of sitting on the fence. These charges have been hurled at the Nanyang Chinese, however, without much convincing evidence. Professor Lea F. Williams has published a pioneering study on overseas Chinese nationalism in Indonesia, and concluded that there was a genuine nationalism spread widely and strongly among the Indies-Chinese, especially among Peranakans, Chinese born in the archipelago. The purpose of this paper is to examine, first, through a study of the attitudes and reactions of the Nanyang Chinese to Japan's policy in China from 1908 to 1928, whether the accusations were unfounded or justified. Second, the paper seeks reasons why such clichés as mentioned above persist.