Multiracial Britishness
Multiracial Britishness
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What does it mean to be British? To answer this, Multiracial Britishness takes us to an underexplored site of Britishness – the former British colony of Hong Kong. Vivian Kong asks how colonial hierarchies, the racial and cultural diversity of the British Empire, and global ideologies complicate the meaning of being British. Using multi-lingual sources and oral history, Kong traces the experiences of multiracial residents in 1910-45 Hong Kong. Guiding us through Hong Kong's global networks, and the colony's co-existing exclusive and cosmopolitan social spaces, this book uncovers the long history of multiracial Britishness. Kong argues that Britishness existed in the colony in multiple, hyphenated forms – as a racial category, but also as privileges, a means of survival, and a form of cultural and national belonging. This book offers us an important reminder that multiracial inhabitants of the British Empire were just as active in the making of Britishness as the British state and white Britons.
- Traces the long history of engagement that the multiracial residents of Hong Kong have made with Britishness, and how this affects identity formation in Hong Kong today
- Centralises the voices of people of colour, presenting them not as passive recipients, but active claimants and contributors to debates on Britishness
- Shows how multiculturalism enriched Britishness, and informs current debates on the meaning of being British
Reviews & endorsements
‘Multiracial Britishness is the first book-length work that examines the political, cultural, and social milieu of Britishness in Hong Kong. It is innovative, important, and original in a number of ways - in its focus on Hong Kong, in its effectiveness at centering colonial subjects in the making of empire, and in its introduction of a diverse cast of historical actors, many of whom came from spaces outside of the formal empire.’ Charles V. Reed, author of Royal Tourists, Colonial Subjects, and the Making of a British World, 1860–1911
‘A most timely book. Vivian Kong shows that Britishness in mid-20th-Century Hong Kong not only involved race but was a kaleidoscopic device/concept that encompassed legal status, cosmopolitan sensibility, convenience, privilege, imperial instrumentality, cultural attributes and a rhetoric to steer Hong Kong away from anti-colonialism. Her analysis is particularly relevant to Britain today.’ Elizabeth Sinn, Author of Pacific Crossing: California Gold, Chinese Migration, and the Making of Hong Kong
‘Conceptually broad and empirically rich, Multiracial Britishness unpacks the complexities and contradictions of a more capacious Britishness in Hong Kong’s uniquely urban, cosmopolitan and diasporic historical setting - with enduring implications, not just for the strained civic fabric of Britain’s former colony, but also that of Britain itself.’ Stuart Ward, author of United Kingdom: A Global History of the End of Britain
‘This well-researched book provides important perspectives on the construction of power and belonging in Hong Kong from 1910 to 1945. … Recommended.’ G. W. McDonogh, CHOICE
‘A thought-provoking exploration of the deceptively simple question it opens with, ‘What does it mean to be British?’ … academically rigorous yet eminently readable.’ Bernard Z. Keo, H-Diplo
‘This book tackles a difficult subject, but one which remains very relevant as the colonial period is not yet thirty years behind us … an interesting and thought-provoking work.’ Tony Banham, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong
‘By juxtaposing the concepts of race, nationality, and citizenship, Kong offers a fresh perspective on the historiography that frames colonial Hong Kong as an in-between place on borrowed time … groundbreaking …’ Huei-Ying Kuo, American Historical Review
Product details
November 2023Hardback
9781009202947
292 pages
235 × 158 × 21 mm
0.57kg
Available
Table of Contents
- Introduction. Hong Kong as a site of Britishness
- 1. British by law
- 2. The Britishers
- 3. Britishness and Chineseness in an age of nationalism
- 4. The British Portuguese
- 5. Multiracial civic Britishness
- 6. The test of war
- Epilogue: After empire, after Brexit.
