The Graveyard of Huang Xiulang: Early Twentieth Century Perspectives on the Role of the Overseas Chinese in Chinese Modernization

Abstract

For more than a century, the importance of the economic and human capital generated in ethnic Chinese economies abroad to the modernization of China has been a subject of interest to political leaders, intellectuals and Overseas Chinese alike. This paper uses a collection of documents commemorating the construction of a distinctive cemetery by a prominent Overseas Chinese from Fujian to explore the early twentieth century discourse on the nature and significance of Overseas Chinese contributions to modernization efforts. This discourse is characterized by tensions about the appropriate basis for Chinese modernity, the appropriate role for the Overseas Chinese in the modernity project, and the need to domesticate the transnationalism of the Overseas Chinese to enable them to play that role.