Chinese American Culture

International business requires a deep level of industry insight but also a keen understanding of the cultural differences that impact how business is done. If you’re an American working in China or Japan for the first time, you may not realize the way each culture thinks and reasons is quite different from your own, which can lead to frequent misunderstandings. You may be unaware, for example, that Americans reason in a linear manner, Chinese in a lateral manner, and Japanese intuitively.

Mahjong: A Chinese Game and the Making of Modern American Culture illustrates how the spaces between tiles and the moments between games have fostered distinct social cultures in the United States. This mass-produced game crossed the Pacific, creating waves of popularity over the 20th century. Annelise Heinz narrates the history of this game to show how it has created a variety of meanings, among them American modernity, Chinese American heritage, and Jewish American women's culture.

Shanghai, 1912. Violet Minturn is the privileged daughter of the American madam of the city's most exclusive courtesan house. But when the Ching dynasty is overturned, Violet is separated from her mother in a cruel act of chicanery and forced to become a "virgin courtesan." Half-Chinese and half-American, Violet grapples with her place in the worlds of East and West - until she is able to merge her two halves, empowering her to become a shrewd courtesan who excels in the business of seduction and illusion, though she still struggles to understand who she is.

After years of hard work, Mia Tang finally gets to go on vacation with her family - to China! A total dream come true! Mia can't wait to see all her cousins and grandparents again, especially her cousin Shen. As she roams around Beijing, witnessing some of the big changes China's going through, Mia thinks about the changes in her own life.

In this poignant and refreshingly authentic memoir, a daughter chronicles her parents, her siblings and herself in a multicultural life that reveals America through Chinese eyes. The story is Kathleen’s, but her daughter Carolyn helps tell it for American readers. Sentimental memories haunt these sometimes harrowing stories and recollections of generosity in the midst of poverty and prejudice, eight pound irons and endless baskets of other people’s laundry, the search for worth, the struggle for acceptance, the awkwardness of growing into womanhood, and a gracious acceptance of those ...

Cary, a middle-aged Chinese American, was brought up to believe that children should shed blood for their parents. Confucius says so: filial piety is a sacred duty that requires extreme sacrifice on the part of the young. Thus when Cary’s parents become too old and feeble to live on their own, she doesn’t hesitate to take them in. With the blessing of her Caucasian husband, Steve, she dives into caregiving with enthusiasm. But the more Cary tries to please her parents, the crabbier they become. Baba fights with Mami, and Cary with both; sibling rivalry fuels the fire, and Steve is fed ...

Winnie Louie and Helen Kwong have always shared secrets, but now Helen wants to reveal them. Helen is convinced she is dying and decides to celebrate what might be her last Chinese New Year by telling all the secrets of her life, as well as Winnie Louie's and those of Winnie's daughter Pearl. There are some things, however, that Pearl would rather her mother didn't know. The result of Helen's tell-all mood is a series of comic misunderstandings and heartbreaking realizations about luck, loss, and trust.

AN AMERICAN CLASSICIST IN CHINA is an account of a tour I led to China in 1995. This short book is a description of adventures in six Chinese cities with discussions of Buddhist and Taoist thought, Chinese writing, amusing episodes, and speculations about China's future, which are now being realized. Although set twenty-seven years ago, its description of Chinese people and places is timeless. It is illustrated with twelve photos. This book is a short but sweet introduction to Chinese culture and history, fun to read and revelatory in its descriptions of Chinese culture.

May, one of the new generations of Chinese super-rich kids, has outgrown Beijing and has come to California for an exciting life. She meets two American men: a Jewish American Harvard-educated professor named Leaf, and Mentor, a Silicon Valley self-made billionaire. As her relationships with Leaf and Mentor progress, May's past traumas in patriarchal China are revealed, while her cultural naivete leads to divergent interpretations of trust, personal boundaries, respect, fetishism, and sexual deviancy. May's life descends into a mad triangle of deception.

A journey back in time, The Golden Mountain is the gripping tale of four generations of Chinese women who live and die under the restrictions of their culture, except for one, the author. Her story tells of growing up in Hong Kong and of her transition to New York City where she struggled to meld the American dream with her ethnic background. Finally, at age 50, she dares to move into the present and understand the true nature of dreams and what it means to live.

Anne thought all of the family secrets had been revealed until she saw the photo. A second journal falls into Anne's lap just as she is accepting her inheritance and her grandmother’s secret. This time, an old photo of her mother with a mixed-race boy and an unknown woman comes with it. When she finds out the boy is her long-lost uncle—someone whom her mother has never mentioned—she promises to find him. Anne embarks on a new journey to Taiwan with her mother and boyfriend, Sebastian, where her Taiwanese American culture hinders more than helps. She must navigate a culture and a ...

Obsession is a story about emotional growth and the pains that accompany it. Written in an experimental voice that employs an omniscient second-person perspective, it chronicles the life of a young Chinese woman who comes to the US in order to fall in love in a foreign land. Throughout her bizarre relationship with a Jewish-American scholar, who is both brilliant and selfish, we see how cultural difference leads to different interpretations of trust, personal boundary, respect, or even rape.