Chinese Mining Kongsi in Eastern Oregon: A Case Study of Cultural Amnesia

This research article draws on transnational histories of Chinese mining companies to argue that biases of the dominant Euro-American population diminished the contribution of Chinese immigrants to the formation of modern Oregon. Chinese immigrants who were highly skilled at the art and science of gold mining dominated placer gold mining in eastern Oregon during the nineteenth century. For over a century, however, historical narratives have generally portrayed them as unskilled laborers subsisting on scraps of gold recovered by rewashing the waste rocks abandoned by white miners. Chinese miners from Guangdong Province had worked in southeast Asia for a century before the discovery of gold in Oregon. By the time Chinese miners reached eastern Oregon in the 1860s, they were experienced at moving people, supplies, and gold over great distances in foreign lands. Following the established practice, most Chinese miners in eastern Oregon worked in partnerships wherein they earned a share of the profits, instead of wages. Several nineteenth-century documents accurately describe these Chinese mining partnerships in eastern Oregon, and as author Don Hann argues, the disconnect between those earlier depictions of Chinese mining companies and the later portrayal of the Chinese as unskilled laborers is a form of cultural amnesia.

《俄勒冈东部的华人矿业公司：文化失忆案例研究》

这篇研究文章从华人矿业公司的跨国营商史出发，主张占主导地位的欧裔人口的偏见削弱了华人移民对现代俄勒冈成型的贡献。十九世纪，精通采金技艺的华人移民主导了俄勒冈东部的砂金开采。然而，百余年来，史话常将华人描摹为非技术劳工，以重洗白人矿工遗弃的废石，回收黄金残渣为生。在俄勒冈发现黄金之前，来自广东省的华人矿工已在东南亚采矿百余年。华人矿工在十九世纪六十年代来到俄勒冈东部时，在异国远距离搬运人员、物资和黄金方面已经很有经验。按照惯例，俄勒冈东部的华人矿工大多合伙作业，赚取利润分成而非工资。十九世纪的多份文献准确描述了俄勒冈东部的华人采矿合伙企业，正如作者 Don Hann 所言，早期对华人矿业的描摹与后来华人身上贴附的非技术劳工标签彼此脱节，这是一种文化失忆症。