Chinese in the American West

Essay from the year 2007 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 1,0, University of Siegen (FB 3 (Literatur-, Srach- und Medienwissenschaften)), course: Fictions of the American West, language: English, abstract: In the times of the great gold rush, 1848-1855, a large number of Chinese people migrated to the 'melting pot' and 'land of unlimited opportunity' California for economic reasons. This essay does not only give an overview of the facts and figures of Chinese-American history; moreover, it has a look at two very different literary works and their divergent ways of dealing with the controversial issue: Mark Twain's autobiographic adventure narrative Roughing It (1872) and Frank Chin's spirited novel of education Donald Duk (1991).