Abstract
By focusing on the case of the Pekin Café in Sydney, this paper investigates the relationship between consumption, sociability and nationalism of the Chinese-Australian community in the early twentieth century. The paper examines the development of the Pekin Café in Sydney as a pleasant example of how Chinese Australian learned to establish a new style of enterprise in their urban life. By analyzing the connection between the Pekin Café and the Chinese nationalists, the second part of the paper demonstrates that the consumer culture of the Chinese diaspora community not only refers to the process of exchanging money for goods and services, but also to the experience of ethnic identity formation and of community organization. The paper argues that café sociability matters as a way to understand how Chinese Australians innovated new sociability to reshape their enterprise, social relationship and identity. Beyond kinship obligations and fraternal alliances, the organizing efforts of Chinese-Australian merchants constructed new spaces in which friendship, ethics, good citizens and gastronomy merged in a new sociability of Chinese diaspora community life.
Original language | English |
---|---|
Title of host publication | History of consumer culture: objects, desire and sociability |
Subtitle of host publication | 23-25 March 2017, Gakushuin University, Tokyo: conference proceedings |
Editors | Shinobu Majima, Satomi Ohashi, Hiroki Shin, Yusuke Tanaka |
Place of Publication | Tokyo |
Publisher | Forum for History of Consumer Culture |
Pages | 160-167 |
Number of pages | 8 |
ISBN (Print) | 978990820220 |
Publication status | Published - 2018 |
Externally published | Yes |
Event | History of Consumer Culture: Objects, Desire and Sociability (2017) - Gakushuin University, Tokyo, Japan Duration: 23 Mar 2017 → 25 Mar 2017 |
Conference
Conference | History of Consumer Culture: Objects, Desire and Sociability (2017) |
---|---|
Country/Territory | Japan |
City | Tokyo |
Period | 23/03/17 → 25/03/17 |