Asian Tragedies in the Americas

Won K. Yoon is retired and was long-time professor of sociology at La Sierra University and Loma Linda University.

• Chapter 1: Western Encounters and Encroachments in East AsiaChapter 2: A Floating Hell in Devil’s ThroatChapter 3: The Coolie Mart and Bitter Sugar in CubaChapter 4: A One-way Passage to a Peruvian HellChapter 5: Paper Children: The Enticement of Gold MountainChapter 6: Koreans in Thorny Henequen Fields in YucatanChapter 7: A Korean Picture Marriage: The Lure of HawaiiChapter 8: Peruvian Japanese in U.S. Relocation CampsChapter 9: An Empire Never Defeated: The Japanese in BrazilChapter 10: Japanese War Brides Following G.I. Husbands

In recent years, scholars have written extensively about Chinese and Japanese labor migration and migrants' lives in the Americas. In this wide-ranging, insightful book, Yoon synthesizes some of this research into a single volume, including extensive coverage of Koreans and Asian women in particular. Descriptions of Chinese working on sugar plantations in Cuba and mining guano in the Chincha Islands of Peru complement the more well-known story of their compatriots laboring in the US. Interestingly, the exploitation in the Chincha Islands was so notorious that it moved even Karl Marx to write about the tragic situation. Koreans recruited for the henequen industry in Yucatan, Mexico, are contrasted with those in the sugar fields of Hawaii. Japanese who migrated to the US are compared with those who went to Peru and elsewhere, but the largest community outside Japan was located in Brazil. The effects of laws and immigration policy, WW II and its aftermath, picture brides, war brides, children of mixed ancestry, race relations, and the prospects for future immigration are also discussed. Recommended. General readers through faculty.