Ethnic identity and ethnic boundaries: the Sino-Vietnamese in Victoria, British Columbia

Ethnic identity and ethnic boundaries : the Sino-Vietnamese in Victoria, British Columbia

Y U E N - F O N G W O O N University of Victoria*

A partir de donnies amassies en questionnant trente mknages sino-vietnamiens de Victoria, ainsi que leurs parrains, cette 6tude veut montrer que les approches primor- dialiste et circonstantialiste devraient Ptre combinkes, afin de donner une image plus exacte de I’identitP ethnique et des frontiPres de groupe des immigrants en Amirique du Nord. Ce sont des besoins instrumentaux qui expliquent pourquoi les Sino-Vietnamiens ont utilisP divers attributs culturels afin de developper des liens privilegiis avec les Chinois de Victoria et les Vietnamiens d’origine. Par contre, ce sont des besoins Pmotifs qui expliquent la retention, par les Sino-Vietnamiens, de leurs liens primordiaux et leur dissocia- tion de tous les &rangers qui ne sont pas de la mPme origine rkgionale ou ethnique qu‘eux.

Using data collected from thirty Sino-Vietnamese households and their sponsors in Vic- toria, this study suggests that both primordialist and circumstantialist approaches should be combined to give a more accurate picture of ethnic identity and group boundary maintenance among immigrant groups in North America. While instrumental needs best explain why Sino-Vietnamese used various cultural attributes as charters to cultivate links with the local Chinese and the ethnic Vietnamese, emotional needs best explain why the Sino-Vietnamese still retained their former, narrower primordial ties, dissociating themselves on a primary level from all outsiders who were not of the same regional or ethnic origin.

T H E R E S E A R C H P R O B L E M

Despres, in his conclusion to Ethnicity and Resource Competition in a Plural Society (1975: 189), remarks that ‘one is tempted to consider ethnicstudies B.B. or A.B. (i.e. Before or After Barth) ... ’ To him, as well as to numerous social scientists, it was Barth‘s formulation of the concept of ’ethnic group boundary’ that provided the starting point for more theoretically interesting work on ethnicity throughout the world. Barth (1970: 13-16) regards an ethnic boundary as a cognitive and social boundary that separates members of one group from all outsiders. As long as all members of the group consider themselves to be members and frequently interact with other group members on a primary level, while

’ This article was received 23 July 1984 and accepted zz January 1985.

Rev. canad. SOC. ik Anth. / Canad. Rev. SOC. ik Anth. 22(4) 1985

535 E T H N I C IDENTITY A N D E T H N I C B O U N D A R I E S

keeping the rest of the society at arm’s length, the ethnic boundary is maintained. The study of ethnic boundaries therefore entails two levels of investigation: first, that of subjective identification of the members themselves - individuals belong to a certain ethnic group not because of definition by others but because of consider- ing themselves as such; second, that of patterns of social interaction on a primary level among members. Here the focus of study is the friendship circles, residential patterns, and voluntary mutual aid organizations of the members.

Not all social scientists agree with Barth. Cohen (1974: xiii), for example, believes that tracing of the subjective consciousness of individuals in order to study ethnic relations is a very sterile approach. Van den Berghe (1975: 75) attacks Barth’s approach as ’extreme subjectivism’ and insists that ethnicity is both an objective and a subjective phenomenon. He believes that ethnic groups should be defined both by their objective cultural attributes such as religion, language, and cultural tradition, and by the subjective view of the group members themselves.

However, it is difficult to follow Van den Berghe’s suggestion and define an ethnic group by using a number of objective criteria, because these criteria are themselves imprecise and overlapping. Moreover, what is defined as an ethnic group by an outsider may not coincide with the actual cognitive orientation or the actual pattern of interaction of the group members themselves. Nagata (1974: 331- jo; 1979: 173-81) and Anderson and Frideres (1981 : 38,46-8) point out, for example, that there is a great deal of discrepancy between the subjective identification of the population in question and the ’objective’ criteria that government officials, census collectors, and social scientists use to define it. This is true whether or not the data collector has an axe to grind.

In view of the inherent problems associated with the objective definition of ethnicity, I agree with Barth (1970: 13-16), Gordon (1964: 26-7), and Patterson (1975: 309) that ethnicity can best be defined subjectively - that an ethnic group only exists if the members consider themselves to belong to such a group; all members of the same ethnic group must have a common feeling of belonging, a ‘consciousness of kind. ’

Theoretical and empirical literature shows that social scientists tend to take either the ‘circumstantialist‘ approach or the ’primordialist’ approach to explain the origin and persistence of the ’consciousness of kind’ among members of a same ethnic group (Glazer and Moynihan, 1975: 19). The primordialist approach uses historical and psychological explanations to interpret the phenomenon of ethnic identity and ethnic group boundary maintenance. Social scientists taking this approach (Geertz, 1963; Naroll, 1964; Issacs, 1975; Mitchell, 1956,1970; Epstein, 1958, 1978; Anikpo, 1979; Schwartz, 1984; Kirkland, 1982) believe that primordial ties such as kinship, descent, place of birth, ancestral origin, race, religion, and language call forth a certain emotional attachment from the members that forms the basis of their ‘consciousness of kind. ’ Individuals acquire certain physical, cultural, and social traits at birth, making them permanently different from members of other groups. The group than becomes the emotional anchor - giving a sense of belonging, and self-esteem. The individual, particularly at times of stress, tends to identify with members of the group even when there is no comparative advantage to be gained, and sometimes even when it is against all rational interests.

536 Y U E N - F O N G W O O N

In contradistinction to the primordialists, the circumstantialists (Barth, 1970; Leach, 1954; Cohen, 1969; Hechter, 1976; Wallerstein, 1972; Patterson, 1975; Keyes, 1979; Holloman, 1975; Schildkrout, 1978; Layng, 1983; De Vos and Romanucci-Ross, 1975; Moerman, 1968) concentrate on the prevailing ecological, social, economic, and political conditions to structurally explain the origin and persistence of ethnic identity and ethnic group boundary maintenance. They hold that past history and psychological attachment explain little in the development of the ’consciousness of kind’ among group members because an ethnic group is purely an interest group. Membership is not involuntary or ascribed. The members may not even share any similar cultural, racial, or social attributes. Neither is the individual permanently attached to any ethnic group. Membership in one group is only for the sake of obtaining comparative advantage vis-l-vis members in another. Group affiliation may change when circumstances change. For the same reason, ethnic groups themselves are not permanent entities. They come into existence only to provide members with a structural opposition to another group. An ethnic group may even pass out of existence when changing circumstances obliterate the conditions for structural opposition.

Several social scientists try to occupy the middle ground between these two very different approaches to the study of ethnic group boundaries. Nagata (1974,1979, 1981), for example, holds that some ascribed primordial attributes might have actually bound members of an ethnic group together in the past or these attributes may have been fabricated by the members. But the important point about ethnicity is that, depending on the circumstances, one or two of these primordial attributes are actually utilized as charters for joint action by a group of people. In other words, some perception of shared culture by the members is what distinguishes ethnic groups from other interest groups.

Bell (1975) believes that an ethnic group is not simply an interest group - it is an interest group with an affective tie. He holds that in any plural society, there is a great variety of such interest groups, some being cohesive because of primordial affective ties, others because they are created out of adversary conflicts. Pre- industrial and ascriptive criteria such as kinship and communal ties are sometimes utilized in order to obtain visible gains. At other times, the sense of ethnic pride and the attachment to people with the same cultural attributes serve as solace and emotional support for the individual living in a rational, impersonal, and over- bureaucratized society.

Except for Bell’s work, research material used for the foregoing theoretical discussion of ethnic identity and ethnic group boundary maintenance comes predominantly from studying societies outside of North America. Ethnic identities and group boundaries in these societies, whether in the pre-colonial, colonial, or post-colonial eras, tend to be more noticeable than those in North America. Ethnic cleavage seems deeper because people there have had a much longer history. Moreover, in the post-colonial era, heterogeneous groups of local inhabitants, in throwing off the colonial yoke, tend to be more assertive culturally (Keyes, 1981: 12-13; Nagata, 1981: 89-90). This is particularly true in countries such as Malaysia, where everything in the political, social, or economic realm is spelled out in ethnic terms. Individuals tend to use their various primordial attributes as charters to gain comparative advantage vis-8-vis other groups (Nagata, 1974: 332-47).

537 E T H N I C I D E N T I T Y A N D E T H N I C B O U N D A R I E S

In North America, similar tactics are used by groups whose status has been written into the fundamental laws of the land, for example, the French in Canada and the native peoples of the United States and Canada (Sawchuk, 1978; Porter, 1975). Later immigrant groups do not have similar legal status. For them, up until the rnid-i96os, ethnic identity did not confer any visible political, social or economic advantage. The legal infrastructure only guaranteed individual freedom and rights; the selection of talent was supposedly governed by universalistic principles based on individual achievements; the education system, open to all citizens, was supposed to provide equality of opportunity for everyone (Nagata, 1979: 178; Porter, 1975: 293). However, after the mid-i960s, there was a realization that universalistic principles and selection according to merit cannot provide equal opportunity for the individual or result in social equity. Pressure was brought to bear on the governments to undertake more affirmative action. Ethnicity was revived: cultural attributes were utilized by individuals as charters to push for preferential immigration quotas and for preferential hiring, as well as for other special legislation. People also used ethnic charters to claim membership in voluntary associations in order to obtain certain community services, or to establish business connections; politicians utilized ethnic claims to solicit votes (Glazer and Moynihan, 1975: 22-5; Porter, 1975: 295-301). In the 1980s, however, with economic retrenchment in North America, it is questionable whether such pressure groups, using ethnic charters, can gain any comparative advantage. It is in this economic and socio-cultural milieu that I propose to examine the ethnic identity and group boundary of one of Canada’s latest immigrant groups, the ’Indo- Chinese refugees.’

A word of explanation is in order. ‘Indo-Chinese Refugees’ (or ‘Boat People’) is a composite term which is used by outsiders to refer to numerous groups of people from the three countries of former French Indo-China - Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. These peoples are very diverse in terms of language, style of life, ancestral origin, and religion. They also had very different subjective ethnic identities and ethnic group boundaries and a long history of rivalry with one another while in their homeland (Tepper, 1980).

This study deals with only one group of Indo-Chinese - the Sino-Vietnamese - who were resettled in Victoria between 1979-80. They are Chinese by language and ancestry but Vietnamese by national origin, and so they have been categorized together with the ethnic Vietnamese as ’Vietnamese refugees’ by immigration officers in refugee camps in Southeast Asia, and by government bureaucrats and resettlement agents in the countries of resettlement. This designation meant little socially to the Sino-Vietnamese while they were in their home country, as historically they were only a small but distinct minority group in Vietnam, one periodically persecuted politically and economically by members of the dominant society - the ethnic Vietnamese (Willmott, 1980: 69-80).

However, circumstances have changed. Ethnic Vietnamese and Sino- Vietnamese are no longer placed in structural opposition to one another once they have left their home country. They are now fellow refugees with the common experience of perilous escape and the trauma of refugee camps. They have both been classified as ‘Vietnamese refugees’ and accepted into Canada as a result of affirmative actions on the part of the Canadian government. They came to Canada under a special quota. Special arrangements were made to help them with resettle-


ment problems; sympathetic Canadians willingly served as sponsors and volunteers (Adelman, Le Blanc and ThPrien, 1980; Adelman, 1982). Would all these similarities in treatment result in developing a ’consciousness of kind’ between the Sino-Vietnamese and the ethnic Vietnamese? Would they attempt to present a unified community image to the dominant society so as to obtain comparative advantages as predicted by some scholars taking the circumstantialist approach? Or alternatively, would the Sino-Vietnamese fraternize with the well-established local Chinese community to improve their chances of getting jobs, housing and services in Victoria? Or would they still keep to their original ethnic identity and ethnic group boundary for emotional solace and self-esteem in the impersonal and over-bureaucratized society of North America, as the primordialists would pre- dict? How do economic recession and the current lessening of public sympathy with Indo-Chinese refugees affect their ethnic identity and their ethnic group boundary in Victoria?

R E V I E W OF E X I S T I N G L I T E R A T U R E

To date, only one article (Skinner and Hendricks, 1979: 25-41) in the existing literature deals with the changing ethnic identity of the ‘Indo-Chinese refugees’ in North America. That study shows that various peoples from Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam initially accepted the label ‘Indo-Chinese refugees’ because it enabled them to obtain help from the government, voluntary agencies, and sponsors. They then took up the label ‘Asian American ethnic minority’ so as to be included in the Minority Students Support Program for special counselling and financial assistance at the university level.

Among the scholars who study the newcomers from Vietnam, only a few (Sweeney, 1980: 90; Nguyen, Xuan Ky, 1980: 103; Skinner and Hendricks, 1979: 31; Social Planning Council of Metropolitan Toronto, 1981: 84) comment briefly on the intra-group differences among those who are officially defined as ‘Viet- namese.‘ Indra (1979: 159; 1980: 174-81) and Buchignani (1980: 202) are the only scholars who spell out these internal differences clearly. According to them, the term ’Vietnamese refugees’ incorporates people of different regional and ethnis origins. In terms of regional differences, those from North Vietnam, whether ethnic Vietnamese or Sino-Vietnamese, were the most remote from Western culture and institutions while in their home country. Consequently, they tend to be the most isolated in North America. In terms of ethnic differences, ethnic Vietnamese are by and large ‘political refugees’ or what Kunz (1981: 42-51) called ‘majority-identified refugees.’ They have a strong national identity and a strong orientation to their home country, and they are not interested in establishing themselves in North America. Among the Sino-Vietnamese, attachment towards Vietnam is not as strong, because they were merely an ethnic minority in their home country. However, among members of this group, regional differences also determine their attitude towards their homeland, mainly due to the different treatment received in North Vietnam as opposed to South Vietnam in the post- colonial era. In North Vietnam since 1954, although they still had their own neighbourhoods and voluntary associations, the Sino-Vietnamese participated fully in public institutions and the education system on equal terms with the ethnic


Vietnamese. They did not suffer from persecution until 1978-79, when they left the country as a result of the changing regional and international balance of power. Even after resettlement in North America, they are still emotionally attached to their country of origin, although they may not have been friendly with the ethnic Vietnamese there. In South Vietnam, by contrast, the Sino-Vietnamese domin- ated the economy, but were not allowed to participate in the civil service or other public institutions on equal terms with the ethnic Vietnamese. They had been the targets of periodic attacks from the 1950s onwards. They left the country due to the last, probably the most serious, wave of economic persecution in 1978-9. Thus, they have very weak emotional attachment to Vietnam after resettlement in North America. They are 'economic refugees' or what Kunz terms the 'event-alienated refugees. '

Most existing literature on the relationship between the Chinese community in North America and the Sino-Vietnamese newcomers documents the supportive role played by the local Chinese. Only Adelman (1982: 131-7) seeks to explain why they are not prominent as sponsors. According to him, this is because the Chinese in North America remain poor and they are more concerned with their own families and relatives than with outsiders. Some even oppose refugee intake from Indo-China because it might slow down acceptance of their own relatives or provoke anti-Chinese backlash in North America.

It is obvious then that while problems associated with ethnic boundary of the Indo-Chinese newcomers have been mentioned occasionally in the existing literature, actual details concerning their subjective identity and patterns of social interaction have not been examined comprehensively.

THE S A M P L E

Between 1979 and 1980,640 'Indo-Chinese refugees' were resettled in Victoria. Of these, 600 came from Vietnam. They were sponsored by both the government and private sector. The data for this paper were collected between 1982 and 1984. It includes members of 30 privately sponsored Sino-Vietnamese households. While the unit of investigation is the household, the data in fact included a total of 68 Sino-Vietnamese adults: 46 from South Vietnam and 22 from North Vietnam. In-depth interviews of these Sino-Vietnamese are complemented by information given by their former sponsors, who, as participant-observers over a sustained period of time, could provide insight into behaviour patterns and attitudes of which the Sino-Vietnamese are either unaware or unwilling to discuss. To obtain a more complete picture, the writer also interviewed the director of the former Refuge Aid Centre and the former secretary of the now inactive Vietnamese Association of Greater Victoria.

Several studies in North America (Kelly, 1977: 198-200; Montero, 1979: 40, 54; Pisarowicz, 1982: 76-7; Nguyen, 1980: 98; Starr and Roberts, 1982: 606-9; Stein, 1981: 325; Buchignani, 1980: 202) have demonstrated the significance of socio-economic class background on the psychological, social, and economic adaptation of newcomers from Vietnam. Taking this into account, this study attempted to include subjects from different socio-economic backgrounds.

Of the twenty Sino-Vetnamese households from South Vietnam discussed in


this paper, ten were from upper socio-economic class origins and ten were from lower socio-economic class origins. In the former group, members of households managed businesses or industries employing more than five people when they were in South Vietnam. They ran ‘modern’ concerns such as television and radio shops, printing companies, papermaking factories, soft drink factories, and gar- ment factories. Others were professional and high-ranking salaried employees in Western concerns. At least one member of each household had formal English training in high school or university. The households had once owned property and cars, black-and-white televisions, and had servants in South Vietnam. Mem- bers of the Sino-Vietnamese households from lower-class origins, by contrast, either ran small service-oriented family businesses such as silversmiths, shoe repair shops, or small grocery stores, or had menial jobs in coastal cities in South Vietnam. Their education level was low, and none had any formal knowledge of English. They lacked luxury items that the more affluent Sino-Vietnamese households enjoyed.

The Sino-Vietnamese households who came from North Vietnam have not been divided according to socio-economic class origin for discussion in this paper, since too few refugees of this category have resettled in Victoria to make it feasible. Moreover, since 1954, when the socialist regime took over North Vietnam, social class differences have been consistently minimized. None of the ten households interviewed had had Western education, cars, televisions, or servants while in North Vietnam. While some ran their small service-oriented family businesses, others worked in factories set up by the government.

To establish the ethnic boundary of the Sino-Vietnamese, this paper will: 11 trace their experience as ‘sponsored refugees’ during their first year‘s stay in Victoria; 21 give an account of their subjectively held ethnic identity after the period of sponsorship; 31 examine their patterns of social interaction at work and at their place of residence; 41 establish their informal friendship network; and 51 give an account of their degree of participation in their national association in Victoria.

S P O N S O R S A N D I N T E R P R E T E R S

In the absence of a pre-existing Sino-Vietnamese community in Victoria before 1979, the local Chinese community was the de facto ’life-line’ of the Sino- Vietnamese in their initial period of resettlement. Being products of an ’acute refugee movement’ (Kunz, 1973 : 132-3), the Sino-Vietnamese, with the experience of escape and the extremely poor conditions of the refugee camps, arrived in Canada confused and utterly dependent upon the predominantly Cantonese- speaking Chinese community to act as mediators and interpreters between them and society at large. Did the local Chinese fraternize with these refugees with whom they shared a common ancestry and a common language?

Research on the Chinese in Canada does not agree with Adelman’s observation (1982: 131-7) that the local Chinese are still poor. Although most came as labourers and indentured workers in the pre-War period, today’s Chinese community, which accounts for less than 3 per cent of the total population of Greater Victoria (1981 Census), differs greatly in social composition. From the mid-1960s onwards, many Chinese immigrants actually entered Canada as wealthy business-


men and professionals from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia. In addition, many Canadian-born Chinese have achieved middle-class status in the post-1947 period (Johnson, 1979: 358-71; 1983 : 393-411).

It can be argued that the new image of the Chinese minority in Victoria has had a beneficial effect on the Sino-Vietnamese in the city. Many Caucasian sponsors interviewed favoured helping the Sino-Vietnamese and tolerated their culture because they likened the Sino-Vietnamese to the members of the local Chinese community (Woon, 1984). The availability of bilingual Chinese interpreters and professionals provided added incentives for bringing Sino-Vietnamese instead of ethnic Vietnamese into the city.

As well, having achieved their own wealth and status, a significant number of the affluent local Chinese had the time and financial resources to help the Sino- Vietnamese. Of the thirty sponsorship groups included in this study, five had Chinese participants. Although they did not act as group leaders, it was they who suggested bringing in Sino-Vietnamese instead of ethnic Vietnamese. They also served as mediators and translators between Caucasian sponsors and the refugee households. Besides being sponsors, the local Chinese also offered other services to the Sino-Vietnamese refugees. For example, some Chinese doctors and dentists registered themselves with the Refugee Aid Centre and various churches to offer free services to the Sino-Vietnamese. A group of Hong Kong Chinese students a t the University of Victoria offered free English classes to the refugees during summer holidays. Numerous Chinese in Victoria acted as volunteer interpreters and mediators, helping Sino-Vietnamese talk to landlords, employers, sponsors, government agencies, and medical practitioners. The Chinese religious ministers were particularly energetic. They gave public talks arousing sympathy towards the Sino-Vietnamese refugees, provided information about the private sponsorship program and Sino-Vietnamese culture, accompanied sponsors to meet refugee households at the airport, taught refugees what to expect in Canada and from the sponsors, introduced them to their neighbours, and gave moral support as well as instrumental help.

Thus, the more affluent and socially conscious sector of the Chinese community in Victoria contributed valuable services to the Sino-Vietnamese, in the spirit of helping fellow overseas Chinese in need. Their middlemen functions were much needed even by the Sino-Vietnamese with Western education, for they too wanted to avoid misunderstandings with their Caucasian sponsors. Moreover, it was in their cultural tradition to seek a go-between when discussing sensitive issues with the sponsors.

However, this does not mean that the local Chinese developed genuine friendship with the Sino-Vietnamese newcomers. First, not all the local Chinese were sympathetic to the plight of the ‘boat people.’ As one sponsor reports:

Of all the people 1 encounter, the local Chinese are the most hostile and resentful to the presence of the boat people. W h e n I tried to get help f r o m some Chinese in Chinatown, they absolutely refused, saying that these people have reaped a big profit out of Vie tnam, w h y should they be helped in Canada? Second, the affluence of most local Chinese helpers and sponsors meant that a status gap existed between them and the desperate and penniless refugees. Many


Caucasian sponsors in my sample, for example, remarked that the local Chinese in their sponsorship groups tended to be authoritarian. They did not consult the refugees when major decisions were being made; their relationships with the refugees were formal rather than emotional:

The Chinese in our sponsorship group tuld the refugee household in a very business-like fashion w h a t the sponsors would or would not do for t h e m and what the financial limits were, all within a f e w minutes of their arrival. From then o n there was no more discussion on the subject.

Third, in their eagerness to identify with Canadian society, affluent local Chinese tended to be more assimilationist in their outlook than the Caucasian sponsors. The following two sponsors’ reports best illustrate this tendency.

In the first case, the leader of a sponsorship group was a devout Seventh Day Adventist. The group brought in a Sino-Vietnamese family who originally came from North Vietnam. As the refugees spoke no English and had no knowledge of Western life, the Refugee Aid Centre provided an interpreter. This Chinese interpreter told the refugees to attend the sponsor’s church diligently and to observe the strict diet of the sponsor - that they should only eat natural foods and should not smoke. As a result, the refugees became extremely uncomfortable when they were with the sponsor. The sponsor was upset, as she had never intended to convert the refugees to her religion and her ways of life.

In the second case, a Sino-Vietnamese household from North Vietnam was sponsored to Victoria through the auspices of the Inter-cultural Association of Greater Victoria. The major contributors were the Chinese Consolidated Benevo- lent Association, the Chinese Presbyterian Church, and the Hungarian Society. Below is a report by the group leader showing the relationship between the various sponsors and the refugee household concerned:

Most of the orientation and direct assistance was given by the Cantonese sponsors for the first f e w months . But as t ime went o n , w e discovered that members of the refugee household were much mure at home dealing wi th non-Chinese sponsors who did not speak their language, even if they had to go through a n interpreter ... This m a y have been in connection with the pressure to attend the Chinese Presbyterian Church - the Cantonese sponsors were taking t h e m there against their wishes. It is true that the language barrier prevented some sponsors f r o m getting closer to the refugees o n a personal level, but they definitely did not want to f o r m a close bond wi th those w h o spoke their language. The Cantonese sponsors regarded t h e m as a peasantish peopIe and the refugees did not like the snobbery they encountered ...

Thus, according to this Caucasian sponsor, the local Chinese sponsors could not get along with the Sino-Vietnamese because the former were too class conscious to fraternize with the Sino-Vietnamese and they were too keen on religious conver- sion. In addition to these factors, one can also speculate that any refugees who, for the sake of self-protection, intended to hide facts about their background in Vietnam or the way they spent their allowance in Victoria would have found it much more difficult to do so with Chinese sponsors who spoke their language.


E T H N I C IDENTITY

Privately sponsored refugees were legally on their own a t the end of a year, even though some generous sponsors did support them beyond that, while others helped them out occasionally. Unfortunately, just as they were becoming ’independent,’ there was a downturn in the Canadian economy. Affirmative action and preferential treatment, which characterized their initial period of resettlement in 1979-80, suddenly ended. According to the director of the former Refugee Aid Centre, the last few months of 1980 marked a massive lay-off of Indo-Chinese workers in Victoria. People in the community were also getting less enthusiastic in helping the refugees. There were no more spontaneous job offers, and people who donated material goods and voluntary services to the Refugee Aid Centre were few and far between. The Refugee Aid Centre was phased out in September of 1982 after three years of operation. It was then incorporated with the Immigrant Services of the Inter-cultural Association of Greater Victoria, which helps not only refugees but all new immigrants.

Under the circumstances, it is not surprising that only seven out of sixty-eight Sino-Vietnamese in my sample identified themselves as ’Vietnamese refugees’ when the following question was posed to them in 1983 :

W h e n y o u meet a stranger, would y o u introduce yourself as 11 a Vietnamese refugee; z / a Vietnamese; 31 a Nor th lSouth Vietnamese; 4 i a Sino-Vietnamese; 5 / a Canadian-Chinese and 6/ a Canadian citizen?

Significantly, even though all of the Sino-Vietnamese interviewed can speak both Chinese and Vietnamese, those from North Vietnam tended to identify themselves as ’Vietnamese’; while those from South Vietnam did so as ‘Sino- Vietnamese. ’ This finding correlates almost perfectly with the answers to another question: Do y o u intend to go back to Vie tnam if political conditions there improve? W h y ?

Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam typically replied affirmatively: ‘If political conditions there improve, I intend to go back to Vietnam because it is my home country’ or ’Yes, I want to return because I don’t feel comfortable living in Canada.’ By contrast, Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam, particularly those of upper class origin, indicated that they would not return even if political conditions improved a t home, as they would have to return to the bottom of the economic scale; their property and businesses had been confiscated when they left the country. They would rather stay in Canada, hoping eventually to go back to school for upgrading or to start a small business. Thus, unlike the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam, they did not identify themselves as ’Vietnamese’ but as ’Sino- Vietnamese’ - Chinese who happened to be from Vietnam.

However, the surprising fact remains that though they had been exposed to Western culture in Vietnam and had decided to settle in Canada, my sample’s Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam did not choose to identify themselves as ‘Canadian Chinese’ or as ‘Canadian citizens.’ Why?

After examining other data, my theory is that the Sino-Vietnamese, including those with a Western education, are still eager to retain in Canada some aspects of


their former pattern of life. Although some have anglicized their names and believe that they should learn from Canadians such external behaviour traits as frankness and independence, as well as Western etiquette and manners, they emphatically hope that they and their descendants retain such Confucian family virtues as respect for parents and the elderly and being good parents, raising good children: I don't like the way Canadians raise their children. M y children should retain their mother tongue as well as such Sino-Vietnamese behaviour as respect towards old people, because their parents are Sino-Vietnamese. I don't like m y children to behave like Canadian children ... Anyway, they are not Canadians, why should they act like them?

Convictions such as these cut across regional and socio-economic class origins. While the emphasis on extended family values can be interpreted to reflect ingrained Confucian cultural preferences among the Sino-Vietnamese, conditions of life in North America have made this cultural preference an economic and psychological necessity. The Sino-Vietnamese face many problems associated with chronic unemployment. Those who are currently employed receive very low pay and constantly fear losing their jobs. They need to stay together as an extended or a joint family to cut the cost of rent and utilities and to offer mutual help to one another. Those who speak no English and lacked knowledge of Western institutions prior to leaving Vietnam suffer additionally from psychological insecurity. They need their children, who receive Canadian education, to act as middlemen concerning the wider society. Until such time as they have found a steady job and are more used to life in North America, the maintenance of an extended or a joint family, with the associated Confucian family virtues kept intact, is very functional.

To ensure their children's retention of such family virtues as respect for parents and the elderly, all m y subjects favoured a Sino-Vietnamese school in Victoria. However, most did not favour sending their children to the local Chinese school in downtown Victoria, inspite of the realization that, as a small community whose members are still poor, a private Sino-Vietnamese school in Victoria would almost be an impossibility. Of the thirty Sino-Vietnamese households in the sample, only four have either enrolled their children in the Chinese school or intend to do so in the near future. The rest gave a negative reply:

The Chinese school is for the local Chinese only. It has little to offer by way of Sino-Vietnamese culture. The Chinese here are like the Canadians in the way they raise their children. W e don't want to learn from them.

EMPLOYERS A N D C O - W O R K E R S

On a per capita basis, the local Chinese, compared to the non-Chinese, have provided more jobs to the Sino-Vietnamese. Of the 126 jobs held at any one time by the 68 Sino-Vietnamese in my sample, 31 (or 24 per cent) have been provided by members of the local Chinese community, which accounts for only 3 per cent of the total population in Greater Victoria. Most jobs with Chinese employers have not been advertised. Sino-Vietnamese were hired as fellow overseas Chinese. Reports by two sponsors illustrate this tendency:


The first job obtained b y m y refugee is to be a general labourer dismantling greenhouses f o r some Chinese. He has heard about the job f r o m the Chinese communi ty . H e was hired unseen. The fact that he speaks Cantonese and the employer is Cantonese helped h i m get the job. Both brothers in m y refugee household worked as truck drivers and delivery m e n f o r a vegetable wholesalelretail outlet. Somebody f r o m the church phoned up suggesting that it was a Chinese g u y w h o owns the concern and just culturally he might be interested in hiring, so w e went down and m e t h i m and he said he’ll give the Chinese refugee a shot . A f ter a week , he was quite impressed, so w e just asked casually, ’what about his brother?’ and he went for that too.

From conversations with both sponsors and the Sino-Vietnamese, discrimina- tion and exploitation is very prevalent in the job market. This was particularly true after the first year, when the Sino-Vietnamese could no longer count on sponsors’ assistance and mediation, and when there was a downturn in the Canadian economy. The Sino-Vietnamese in my sample were often exploited through not giving them holiday pay and overtime to which they were entitled and the assignment of extra work without extra pay.

Getting jobs through ’ethnic’ links does not necessarily lead to less job exploitation. Compared to Caucasian employers, Chinese bosses were seen by Sino- Vietnamese as far more exploitative and less sociable. In addition, Chinese employers displayed more blatant forms of exploitation. A number of Sino- Vietnamese, for example, were hired by the local Chinese on a half-time shift work basis at less than the minimum wage. In one case, a Sino-Vietnamese lady traveled forty-five minutes to her place of work, worked for one-and-a-half hours, and was sent home, only to repeat the same duration of shift in the afternoon. In another case, a Sino-Vietnamese was told to do three months ‘voluntary’ dishwashing before a Chinese restaurant owner would even consider hiring her, at less than the minimum wage.

My data show that newcomers from Vietnam, whether ethnic Vietnamese or Sino-Vietnamese, usually worked for the same employers. One reason was that, initially, private sponsors, Refugee Aid Centre staff, and Manpower officials usually tried to place applicants with employers who had already hired at least one newcomer from Vietnam. As well, after the sponsorship period, members of the privately sponsored households usually relied on other Sino-Vietnamese and ethnic Vietnamese for job leads, being reluctant to use the Manpower notice boards to find jobs. But the most important explanation lies in their strong psychological insecurity in the impersonal world of North America. The following report by a sponsor is a typical example:

I found h i m a job in a lumber mill. It lasted only one day. He quit because he discovered that there was not a single person f r o m Vie tnam working there. Soon he found out f r o m others that there were refugees f r o m Vietnam working at this particular bakery store and that‘s where he went .

This sponsor and many others were concerned that once their protCg6s worked with other newcomers from Vietnam, they would lose all the English they had learnt and would revert to their native languages. This was perhaps more true of

546 Y U E N - F O N C W O O N

the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam, who did not usually socialize with non-Vietnamese co-workers. The friendship circle of the Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam was much wider by comparison. Despite the fact that they still identified themselves subjectively as 'Sino-Vietnamese,' they socialized more readily with their co-workers, whether ethnic Vietnamese, Sino-Vietnamese, Caucasians, local Chinese, Koreans, Filipinos, or members of other ethnic groups.

L A N D L O R D S A N D N E I G H B O U R S

On a per capita basis, the local Chinese, as compared to the non-Chinese, provided more rental units for the Sino-Vietnamese households. Of the seventy-five rental units occupied a t one time or another by the Sino-Vietnamese households in my sample, eighteen (or 24 per cent) had local Chinese landlords, five (or 7 per cent) had East Indian landlords, and fifty-two (or 69 per cent) had Caucasian landlords.

Having a landlord who shares one's language and ancestry does not guarantee a harmonious relationship. In fact, proportionately speaking, far more Chinese landlords than non-Chinese landlords were perceived as 'unkind and interfering,' or 'demanding prompt payment of rent.' While these charges are difficult to prove, one possible explanation for these complaints against the Chinese landlords could lie in the fact that, as one sponsor put it, the Sino-Vietnamese 'didn't like to be told things by a landlord who spoke his language. He understood them too well!'

Similar to study results in other North American cities, my data show that after the period of sponsorship, Sino-Vietnamese increasingly move to the same neighbourhood as their compatriots. This is due to strong psychological insecurity as well as more reasonable rents. All of the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam and two-thirds of the Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam in my sample, including those who had had a Western education, said that given the choice, they still preferred to live within walking distance of another Sino-Vietnamese or ethnic Vietnamese family.

However, that does not mean that they were willing to share the same residence with their compatriots. Even though one-quarter of the households in my sample actually had to share accommodation with non-relatives at one time or another, this was purely out of economic necessity. All subjects said that they intensely disliked sharing a rental unit with outsiders. They wanted privacy; their children would bother others; it was too much trouble. While some recognized the advantage of sharing accommodation with fellow refugees to cut costs, they felt that the disadvantages of sharing would far outweigh the advantages.

As far as their relationships with other neighbours were concerned, it is interesting to note that while none of the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam socialized or engaged in co-operative projects with Caucasian neighbours, more than half of the Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam did. However, almost all Sino- Vietnamese in my sample remarked that the local Chinese were unconcerned neighbours.

One Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam who used to live in co-op housing in Chinatown was particularly bitter about her Chinese neighbours. Her husband gambled every night in a 'social club' in Chinatown. When she complained that he used up all the money, he beat her up. She was left without food or heat. The


Chinese neighbours kept away. They refused tofielp her with grocery money. She tried to look for work and asked if the Chinese lady next door would mind her children for her. The lady would only agree to do so for $300 a month, so she finally asked for help from the Ministry of Human Resources.

F R I E N D S A N D A C Q U A I N T A N C E S

Newcomers from Vietnam met one another in refugee camps, in English language classes, at work and in the neighbourhood, through mutual friends, and at various functions put on by churches, the Inter-cultural Association, or enthusiastic sponsors.

For late-comers to Victoria, acquaintance with other Sino-Vietnamese and ethnic Vietnamese was an invaluable source of information about life in the city. They often sought out their compatriots to translate or mediate between them and society. In addition to being of service to late-comers, friends and acquaintances were also useful as a constant source of information about jobs, rental units, and social services, particularly after the period of sponsorship had ended.

By and large, however, the Sino-Vietnamese drew a sharp line between relatives and non-relatives. For example, my subjects said that they did not intend to pool resources with friends to buy a car or an apartment, whereas they would do so with relatives. They would not ask friends to help with child care or housekeeping in case of emergency if they had relatives in Victoria or nearby cities. If they needed money, they would borrow from banks or occasionally from relatives, but never from friends. For family and emotional problems, they preferred seeking advice from relatives, or even from former sponsors or the Immigrant Services, to seeking advice from friends. For those with no relatives within reach, the tendency was not to ask anybody for help with such personal problems.' Partly because of this reluctance to entrust friends with personal or financial problems, some of my Sino-Vietnamese subjects, particularly those from North Vietnam, had no bosom friends in Victoria, even though they had many Sino-Vietnamese and ethnic Vietnamese acquaintances in town.

When asked to indicate the ethnic origins of their five best friends in Victoria, half of the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam said that they had no best friends, whereas the other half indicated that all their best friends were also Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam. Among the 46 Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam in the sample, 10 said that they had no best friends in Victoria. The rest of the group, however, have made good friends from a wider circle than the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam. Of the 180 best friends named by these 36 Sino-Vietnamese, 109 (or 61 per cent) were Sino-Vietnamese from South Viet- nam, 53 (or 29 per cent) were Caucasians and 18 (or 10 per cent) were local Chinese. It is to be noted that those who counted Caucasians among their 5 best friends in Victoria were mostly Sino-Vietnamese who could speak fluent English and posses- sed a Western education. Their Caucasian bosom friends were their co-religionists in the Catholic church, their former sponsors, and to a lesser extent their co- workers and neighbours. However, even among this group of Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam, more than half of their best friends were still fellow Sino- Vietnamese from South Vietnam.


One of the interesting facts to emerge from mapping out the friendship circle of the Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam was that very few of their best friends were ethnic Vietnamese. This fact was also noted by many sponsors, who made remarks such as the following:

Members of m y refugee household don't fit into the ethnic South Vietnamese group. The ethnic South Vietnamese are very close friends, but m y refugees are Sino-Vietnamese. The ethnic Vietnamese hate the Sino-Vietnamese and vice versa.

One sponsor who tried to bring his Sino-Vietnamese refugee from North Vietnam to make friends with an ethnic Vietnamese family from South Vietnam had to admit failure:

They just bristled at each other in the social function. There was no common ground on which they could even make a small talk. They did not quarrel so much as try to put each other down.

This is a curious paradox. As has been mentioned earlier, the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam are emotionally attached to their home country and tend to identify themselves as 'Vietnamese' instead of 'Sino-Vietnamese'; such strong feeling towards the homeland, however, does not result in intimate friendship with members of the dominant group from their home country.

Another interesting fact is that the South Vietnamese Chinese, particularly those with a Western education, tend to count Caucasians more than the local Chinese among their five best friends in Victoria. Below are typical explanations given by this group of Sino-Vietnamese:

It is not at all difficult to make friends with Caucasians. They are a very friendly and sociable people. It is difficult to make friends with the local Chinese. I don't know why. 1 know I can speak Cantonese, but I don't feel like making friends with them because they are not friendly to newcomers.

It is difficult to make friends with the local Chinese because they look down upon refugees in general.

V O L U N T A R Y A S S O C I A T I O N S

The idea of establishing a Vietnamese Association of Greater Victoria was first suggested in December of 1980 to the director of Refugee Aid Centre by a very closely knit group of ethnic South Vietnamese. The Secretary of State agreed to finance it for a period of six months. This source of funding was supplemented by a nominal membership fee. A full-time secretary was hired.

The association ran a monthly newsletter, advertising job vacancies and apartment vacancies. It also organized orientation and information sessions for members. It provided interpretation and translation services and made home visits to those in need. It organized celebration of the Vietnamese New Year and other ethnic Vietnamese traditional festivals. It kept members in touch with one another by periodically updating its membership list.

The inaugural meeting was held in May 1981. There were forty-five members at

549 ETHNIC IDENTITY A N D ETHNIC BOUNDARIES

this meeting. The association received an enthusiastic response for the first six months. At its height, there were seventy names on the membership list. Of these, twenty-two were Sino-Vietnamese. After six months, however, the association entered a period of decline. Total membership dwindled to fifteen and it failed to get further funding from the Secretary of State. It was then run unofficially through the Refugee Aid Centre, as it no longer had any paid staff. The phasing out of the Refugee Aid Centre in September 1982 proved fatal to the association.

At present, only about ten names, all ethnic South Vietnamese, remain on the membership list. Its sole source of funding comes from voluntary donations collected when the association celebrates the Vietnamese New Year or other ethnic Vietnamese festivals. Although occasional meetings are held, it offers no other services. The newsletter has been discontinued and no one is interested in acting as leader.

The Sino-Vietnamese in my sample were basically not involved in any voluntary association at the time of this survey. Although a few had joined the Viet- namese Association before or had participated in its functions, they did not remain members and did not intend to join (or re-join) in the future. Neither were they interested in seeing another Indo-Chinese association in Victoria, although one or two favoured a Vietnamese soccer team. None of my subjects was thinking of joining any local Chinese association, although the Chinese Consolidated Benevo- lent Association had tried to recruit them, nor were they currently members of any other community association in Victoria.

Why were these newcomers from Vietnam so apathetic to voluntary associations, particularly their own national association?

The former director of the Refugee Aid Centre gives three explanations. First, the newcomers from Vietnam are either moving in and out of town looking for work, or they are too busy working irregular shifts or at several part-time jobs and lack time or energy to attend or organize functions. Second, there have been bickering and resignations among the leaders - the association basically lacks leaders who are assertive enough to function smoothly in the Canadian context while remaining adequately genteel and cultured to suit the ethnic Vietnamese stereotype of ’natural leaders” Third, the fact that the initial leaders and members of the association were ethnic South Vietnamese has alienated the ethnic Viet- namese from North Vietnam as well as the Sino-Vietnamese from both North and South Vietnam.

The South Vietnamese do not like the Sino-Vietnamese or the Northerners. 1 have been to several meetings of the Vietnamese Association. The songs t h e y sang were often patriotic Southern songs. The flags and the posters pu t u p were those of the South. T h e y sang songs like ‘we want t o go back t o t h e Republic of South Vietnam. That’s our home country and our desire.‘ There were some Sino-Vietnamese and ethnic Nor th Vietnamese attending these earlier meetings, and 1 could see that they obviously felt out of place.

This last observation by the director of the former Refugee Aid Centre is confirmed by comments from the sponsors I interviewed:

My refugee ( a Sino-Vietnamese f r o m North Vie tnam) is not interested i n joining


the Vietnamese Association because there is a lot of friction between Northerners and Southerners. H e does not want t o get involved in that. 1 offered to take h i m to the Association meetings but he refused. M y refugees (Sino-Vietnamese f r o m South Vie tnam) didn‘t join the Vietnamese Association because t h e y are Sino-Vietnamese and have nothing to do with the ethnic Vietnamese. T h e y didn’t join a n y local Chinese association either. O n e local Chinese association was friendly and invited them to one or two functions, but they weren’t interested.

S U M M A R Y A N D C O N C L U S I O N

From the above account of the subjective ethnic identification of members of thirty Sino-Vietnamese households in Victoria and the description of their patterns of social interaction, it can be seen that they combine strong primordial attachment to other Sino-Vietnamese with selective circumstantial identification with the ethnic Vietnamese as well as with the local Chinese in Victoria. The Sino-Vietnamese subjects in my study, for example, have obtained sponsorship, jobs, services, and housing as a result of their ’ethnic’ connections with the local Chinese with whom they can claim to share a common language and a common ancestral origin. However, they do not identify themselves as ‘Canadian Chinese.’ There is, in fact, a strained relationship between them and the local Chinese. The Sino-Vietnamese regard the local Chinese as unsympathetic to them. Even the more enlightened and helpful sponsors in the Chinese community are perceived as authoritarian and impersonal and overly keen on pushing religion onto the Sino-Vietnamese. In addition, the Sino-Vietnamese see local Chinese landlords as exploitative, interfering, and less sociable than Caucasian landlords and employers. As neighbours, the local Chinese are also seen as more selfish and uncaring than Caucasians. As a result, the Sino-Vietnamese do not join any local Chinese associations; few send their children to the local Chinese school or count the local Chinese among their best friends.

The strained relationship between the Chinese and the Sino-Vietnamese shows that minorities sharing the same language and ancestry do not necessarily fraternize on a primary level. As both the Chinese and the Sino-Vietnamese have family-oriented cultures and both tend to draw very sharp lines between relatives and outsiders, their relationship runs more along the lines of ’familiarity breeds contempt’ than of ethnic solidarity. Moreover, a huge socio-economic gap exists between the better established sector of the local Chinese community and the Sino-Vietnamese who came initially as destitute refugees and who increasingly suffer from economic recession in Victoria. As is the case with other differentiated ethnic groups in Canada (Nagata, 1979: 177-8), class differences have interfered with ethnic loyalty.

Both the Sino-Vietnamese and the ethnic Vietnamese in Victoria have suffered from the trauma and the hardship of being refugees before resettlement. Their structural opposition in Vietnam was suspended when they left the country. Some ethnic Vietnamese even took Chinese names in order to leave Vietnam and enter North America. After reaching Victoria, both groups have been labelled ‘Viet-


namese refugees’ and given preferential treatment by government agents and other volunteers a t the Refugee Aid Centre. In addition, the Vietnamese Associa- tion of Greater Victoria received funding from the federal government to enable it to offer many essential services to all newcomers from Vietnam. Solidarity, based on common national origin as a charter, seemed most logical in obtaining comparative advantage in Victoria. Unfortunately, however, the period of preferential treatment was soon followed by the downturn of the Victorian economy, the end of the private sponsorship, the closing down of the Refugee Aid Centre, and the gradual loss of sympathy for the plight of the ‘Boat People’ among the Victorian public. The label ’Vietnamese refugees’ would no longer serve any comparative advantage to the Sino-Vietnamese.

Nevertheless, as products of an acute refugee movement and increasingly living in an economically difficult period, the Sino-Vietnamese suffer psychological insecurities. They also have the instrumental need for job leads, news about low-cost rental units, and information on available services. Hence, they maintain an informal social network with other Sino-Vietnamese as well as with the ethnic Vietnamese in the city. My respondents, for example, have a strong, almost neurotic, urge to live in the same neighbourhood as other families from Vietnam, and to work in the same concern as other ethnic Vietnamese and Sino-Vietnamese.

However, at the same time, these same Sino-Vietnamese seldom take their compatriots as bosom friends. They do not want to live in the same rental unit, or to pool resources with other newcomers form Vietnam to buy a car or an apartment. They do not like to borrow or seek advice on family or emotional problems from friends. This probably is a result of their cultural tendency to keep non- relatives at arm’s length. This is further aggravated by their conditions in North America, where newcomers are either moving from city to city looking for work or are given irregular shifts, cutting into free time for establishing stable friendships. More importantly, the unwillingness of my Sino-Vietnamese subjects to take the ethnic Vietnamese as bosom friends reflects the strained historical relationship between these two ethnic groups, preventing them from developing a genuine ’consciousness of kind’ with one another even in North America.

The strong primordial attachment of my respondents to other Sino-Vietnamese in Victoria is best illustrated by their determination to dissociate themselves from the national association formed by the ethnic Vietnamese from South Vietnam. The very fact that the Sino-Vietnamese from both North and South Vietnam do not identify with the symbols of the Republic of South Vietnam - the patriotic posters and songs, the national flag - is enough to deter them from participating in the Vietnamese Association of Greater Victoria which initially offered numerous essential services to all refugees from Vietnam.

The strong primordial attachment of the Sino-Vietnamese to one another also influences their relationship with others in Victoria. Confirming observations by Indra (1980) and Buchignani (1980), the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam are still strongly attached to their home country, although they do not befriend the ethnic Vietnamese in Victoria. They are not interested in settling permanently in Canada. They want to return home, should political conditions there improve. As a result, they tend not to socialize with Caucasians or local Chinese, whether at work or in their neighbourhood. Thus, the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam are


very isolated in Victoria, seeking friends only among other Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam. Their narrow social circle gives them no comparative advantage in Victoria; it only reflects their strong primordial attachment. Their mental state and pattern of social interaction in fact resembles the sojourners among the overseas Chinese in the pre-War period (Siu, 1952; Teske and Nelson, 1974: 365).

By contrast, the Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam now living in Victoria are weakly attached to their home country, as historically they were frequently persecuted both economically and politically while in Vietnam. They are interested in settling permanently in Canada and in eventually achieving upward mobility through new businesses or a return to school. Thus, in order to maximize their chances for advancement, they tend to possess a wider circle of friends in Victoria both at work and in the neighbourhood. Those with a Western education in Vietnam are also far more acculturated than the rest of the Sino-Vietnamese. Some cite Caucasians among their bosom friends. Even so, their primordial attachment to other Sino-Vietnamese is still very strong and they do not identify themselves as ‘Canadian citizens. ’ They want to maintain their cultural tradition and their language. Like other Sino-Vietnamese invictoria, they are keenly interested in sending their children to a Sino-Vietnamese school so that the Confu- cian values of mutual help among family members can be retained. Most of their bosom friends in Victoria are still fellow Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam.

My study confirms Nagata’s observation (1979) that an officially labelled ethnic category such as ’Vietnamese refugees’ includes people who actually have very different subjective ethnic identities and ethnic group boundaries. In addition, it also shows that neither the circumstantialist nor the primordialist approach, taken by itself, can offer more than a partial explanation of the persisting ethnic identity and ethnic group boundary of the Sino-Vietnamese in Victoria.

True, as the circumstantialists would have predicted, the Sino-Vietnamese in my sample did use cultural attributes such as national origin, language, and ancestry as ethnic charters to obtain instrumental help and comparative advantages. They were sometimes ‘overseas Chinese’ and sometimes ’Vietnamese refugees,’ depending on the situation and specific advantage to be obtained. However, because of their strained relationship with the local Chinese and the cessation of preferential treatment to the ‘Boat People,’ these ethnic charters have lost their functions. Nevertheless, the people from Vietnam maintain an informal social network based on their common national origin in order to statisfy their individual material and emotional needs.

However, my data also show that narrower primordial ties are retained by the Sino-Vietnamese even when no comparative advantage is to be obtained. The Sino-Vietnamese, for example, still remain much attached to one another, forming a select group with respect to the ethnic Vietnamese; the Sino-Vietnamese from North Vietnam do not fraternize with the Sino-Vietnamese from South Vietnam. This is where the circumstantialist approach, basing its explanation of ethnicity on the pursuit of demonstrable, manifest advantages, has reached its limit. The primordialist approach, stressing the historical relationship between ethnic groups and the latent, emotional needs of the individual for self-esteem, a sense of the past, and of belonging, is fundamental to understanding the narrower ethnic identity and group boundaries of the Sino-Vietnamese.


The Sino-Veitnamese i n Victoria, who have been the products of a n acute refugee movement, and who have been subsequently resettled in a bureaucratic and impersonal society and tucked a t the bot tom of the socio-economic scale, certainly need both the emotional solace and the maximization of their chances for survival. Hence, the circumstantialist and the primordialist approaches should be combined, i n the way that Bell (1975) has suggested, to better explain their subjective ethnic identity and the maintenance of their ethnic group boundary.

N O T E S

i This tendency to prefer relatives over friends is partly an outcome of Confucian tradition among the Sino-Vietnamese in Vietnam (Chan and Lam, 1983 : 209-10) and partly due to the fact that, in North America, newcomers from Vietnam realize that all their compatriots still struggle for survival. They are also aware of the unstable nature of friendship, as many move from city to city looking for work. Their desire to work with or live close to other Sino-Vietnamese and ethnic Vietnamese reflects a psychological need rather than a desire for actual assistance (Tran, 1980: 160-1).

2 Both these explanations for the failure of the Vietnamese Association in Victoria have been confirmed by existing literature. Research work done in Vietnam in the late 1960s (Woodside, 1971: 41-3,46-51,63) indicates that the ethnic Vietnamese are not accustomed to running voluntary associations even in their home country. Woodside, studying mutual aid associations set up in urban Vietnam by ethnic Vietnamese moving from the country to the city, observes that the ethnic Vietnamese were much more capable of developing an informal network of social relationships than of developing durable formal associations. The associations which they did set up in late colonial urban Vietnam were usually ephemeral and plagued by factionalism, much like the Vietnamese Association of Greater Victoria.

As well, the failure of the Vietnamese Association in Victoria can be attributed to the refugee experience of the ethnic Vietnamese, as the director of the Refugee Aid Centre suggests. Compared to those ethnic Vietnamese coming from Vietnam to North America before 1975, these newcomers, particularly those who arrived after 1979, tend to suffer more from deprivation and trauma. As products of an acute refugee movement, they are less likely to trust anyone. They are also on the whole more heterogeneous, poorer and less educated than their predecessors. The minority of Western educated ethnic Vietnamese also suffered more severely from unemployment and underemployment in North America than their compatriots who came earlier, so they had little time or initiative to organize associations. Hence, all the necessary prerequisites for a viable mutual aid association do not exist in Victoria. In fact, if one looks around Canada, cities which have developed the strongest ethnic Vietnamese associations are those which have received a core of intellectuals and university students from Vietnam before 1975 (Nguyen and Dorais, 1979: I, 5 , 13-19,27-30,35-39,47-54; Indra, 1979: 159; Social Planning Council of Metropoli- tan Toronto, 1981: 17-18,28,31,44-45,163). It was these Western-trained 'orga- nization men' who started the ethnic Vietnamese associations that eventually developed into the current mutual help associations, offering many services to compatriots who arrived after 1979.


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Documents

Ethnic identity and ethnic boundaries: the Sino-Vietnamese in Victoria, British Columbia