Rebuilding the Ancestral Village: Singaporeans in China

Preface to the Second Edition

Since the publication of the first edition of this book in 2000, the relationship between the Chinese Diaspora and their qiaoxiang has intensified and the transnational linkages have grown stronger. Such relationship has spread to the north where new migrants from such places as Wenzhou, Hubei and Hunan have also returned to their ancestral villages and helped with village reconstruction. There is no doubt that Chinese lineage as a social organization has progressed into a cultural network that encompasses members scattered throughout the Diaspora in which some members are able to form a community while others remain isolated individuals. Nevertheless, they continue to look to their ancestral home as their source of origin. The intensification of the transnational linkages is a result of the global migration and return migration. It is also motivated by the migrants who want to help rebuild their ancestral homes irrespective of whether they are wealthy or are primarily labouring in an overseas environment. There are many rural villages that still experience abject poverty and migration continues to be seen as a route out of poverty. Once out, these migrants, in addition to paying their debts, are expected to send remittances back to their home villages, as in the nineteenth century, and help to rebuild their family home. For those who have made some fortune, it is expected that they contribute to village reconstruction, help fund schools, clinics and hospitals as well as construct roads, bridges and other infrastructure, in addition to create jobs for their village kin. These new qiaoxiang, not unlike the old ones, have become prosperous with new buildings dotting the rural landscape. One key issue in my book is to explore the link between ancestor worship and the creation of a moral economy that propels Chinese overseas to visit Preface to the Second Edition Kuah_00_00fm.indd 7 26/11/2010 3:40 PM viii Preface to the Second Edition their ancestral homes and help with reconstruction. Since the 1978 reform, there has been a gradual relaxation of policies pertaining to religious activities and ancestor worship. Ancestor worship is specifically listed as an integral part of Chinese culture and hence divorced from religion. As such, it is not subjected to the stringent control of the state. From the 1990s onwards, there has been a proliferation of large-scale communal ancestor worship throughout Guangdong and Fujian in South China. In Guangdong, wealthy Hong Kong Chinese have provided funds to help rebuild their ancestral villages. They also help revitalize the economy by relocating or setting up factories in key townships where many of the ancestral villages are located. The villages have become more urbanized as most of the agricultural lands are now being appropriated for other uses. On the whole, Guangdong has become very prosperous. The same is also true of Fujian. The process of urbanization has encroached into the rural areas as well. In the qiaoxiang districts, agricultural lands are being used for residential and economic purposes. The cultural concession granted in the form of large-scale ancestor worship and other religious celebrations has created a workable moral economy that enables these villages to benefit from the flow of capital into the region. The money thus helps rebuild the villages and transforms them into modern market towns. The creation of a moral economy has now spread to other parts of China where new migrants have rebuilt and revitalized their villages after they migrated overseas in the 1970s. The fluidity of migration, circulatory and return migration and settlement in the Diaspora has impacted on how we look at the identity issue of these Chinese. My argument that these Chinese continue to hold various sets of identities is even more relevant today as they try to make sense of the rapidly changing world and position themselves within different polities. While Chinese individuals locate themselves in the Diaspora, they are confronted with a set or sets of identities that they want and choose to align with. At the same time, they are also confronted with the issue of home and where home is. In this search for an identity and home, I argue that both home and identity lie in a continuum where the source of origin locates in one pole and the nodes on the other. Where one decides to locate oneself, either closer to the nodes, at midpoint, or closer to the source, will enable us to understand how the person views his/her status and identity. Such identity is not necessarily a fixed one...