TheChinese in Hawaii constitute about 4.7% of the state's population, most of whom (75%) areCantonese people with ancestors fromZhongshan inGuangdong. This number does not include people of mixedChinese andHawaiian descent. If all people with Chinese ancestry inHawaii (including the Chinese-Hawaiians) are included, they form about 1/3 of Hawaii's entire population. AsUnited States citizens, they are a group ofChinese Americans. A minority of this group haveHakka ancestry.
Historical records indicated that the earliest presence of Chinese in Hawaii dates back to the late 18th century: a few sailors in 1778 with CaptainJames Cook's journey, more in 1788 withJohn Meares, and some in 1789 with American traderSimon Metcalfe, who reachedMaui fromMacau.[2] Visiting theSandwich Islands in 1794, CaptainGeorge Vancouver reported seeing one Chinese resident.[3]
Chinese immigrant family living in Honolulu in 1893.
Encouraged by KingKamehameha I, Hawaii exportedsandalwood to China from 1792 to around 1843.[3] As a result, Chinese people dubbed the Hawaiian Islands "Tan Heung Shan" (Chinese:檀香山), roughly "FragrantSandalwood Hills" in Cantonese.[4][5] Between 1852 and 1899, around 46,000 Chinese immigrated to Hawaii.[6] In 1900, the Chinese population in Hawaii was 25,767.[7] More of these migrants were fromFukien and spokeFukienese rather thanCantonese. An American missionary observing Maui in 1856 found that the primarily Cantonese shopkeepers and Fukienese laborers communicated in theHawaiian language.[8]
Although many came as laborers forsugar plantations in Hawaii, they concentrated on getting education for their children. When their contracts expired, many decided to remain in Hawaii and opened businesses in areas such asChinatown. By 1950 most Chinese American men in Hawaii were educated and held good jobs. Today 95% of Chinese Americans in Hawaii live in Honolulu.
A significant minority of early Chinese immigrants toHawaii, and even fewer to theContinental US, were Hakka, and much of the animosity between the Hakka andPunti Cantonese people carried over.[9] In the first half of the 1800s, around 30 percent of Chinese in Hawaii were of Hakka, while only about 3 percent in the West Coast were Hakka.[10] The largest surge of immigration in that century occurred after an 1876 treaty between the US andKingdom of Hawaii led to an increased need for labor.
The majority of marriages between Chinese men and European women in Hawaii were betweenCantonese men andPortuguese women.[11][12] Portuguese and other European women married Chinese men.[13][14] These unions between Cantonese men and Portuguese women resulted in children of mixed Cantonese-Portuguese parentage, called Cantonese-Portuguese. For two years to June 30, 1933, 38 of these children were born, they were classified as pure Chinese because their fathers were Chinese.[15] A large amount of mixing took place between Chinese and European, Chinese men married Portuguese, Spanish, Hawaiian, Caucasian-Hawaiian, etc.[16][17][18][19] Only one Chinese man was recorded marrying an American woman.[20][21] Chinese men in Hawaii also married Puerto Rican, Portuguese, Japanese, Greek, and half-white women.[22][23] There was a communal ban on intermarriages between the two groups for the first generation of migrants.[24] In the middle of the 19th century, Hakka immigrants in America were excluded from membership in the Chinese organizations.[25]
Prior to the arrival ofChristian missionaries in Hawaii, the early Chinese settlers were adherents ofBuddhism,Taoism, andConfucianism. Some even blended aspects of native Hawaiian beliefs into their own belief systems.
Today, due to the work of Christian missionaries in the late 19th century and the 20th century, many of the Chinese in Hawaii are adherents ofProtestant andRoman Catholic Christianity. Still, about 100 Buddhist and ancestral temples remain. The minority who adhere to traditional Chinese religions pay pilgrimage to their ancestors annually. However, no accurate statistics of adherents within the Chinese community in Hawaiʻi are available.
^Margaret M. Schwertfeger (1982). "Interethnic Marriage and Divorce in Hawaii A Panel Study of 1968 First Marriages".Marriage & Family Review.5. Kessinger Publishing:49–59.doi:10.1300/J002v05n01_05.
^United States Bureau of Education (1921).Bulletin, Issues 13-18. U.S. G.P.O. p. 27. Retrieved2010-07-14.
^United States. Office of Education (1920).Bulletin, Issue 16. U.S. Dept. of Health, Education, and Welfare, Office of Education. p. 27. Retrieved2010-07-14.
^American Genetic Association (1919).The Journal of heredity, Volume 10. American Genetic Association. p. 42. Retrieved2010-07-14.chinese marry portuguese.
^American Genetic Association (1919).J hered, Volume 10. American Genetic Association. p. 42. Retrieved2010-07-14.
^Alfred Emanuel Smith (1905).New Outlook, Volume 81. Outlook Publishing Company, Inc. p. 988. Retrieved2010-07-14.Intermarriages also took place between Chinese men and Porto Rican, Portuguese, Japanese, Greek women.
Takaki, Ronald (1998) [1989].Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans (2nd ed.). New York: Back Bay Books.ISBN978-0-316-83130-7.OCLC1074009567.
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