Chinese Exclusion Act Themes

In a lot of ways, fear is the primary motivator behind the Chinese Exclusion Act. Not just the fear you might be thinking of: spiders. (Because who's not scared of spiders?) But not even xenophobia...

Despite the name, the Chinese Exclusion Act isn't entirely about race. There's a lot going on here, from an economic, political, and even practical standpoint. It's a complex issue, motivated by ma...

The people who wrote the Chinese Exclusion Act didn't get to know any Chinese people. They were judging the entirety of an entire ethnic group without meeting them.Prejudice and racism are closely...

Any situation involving racism or prejudice is probably going to have shades of the struggle between majority and minority. Generally, the majority wants to protect what they have, while the minori...

Before the 20th century, most of the immigrants coming to America were Europeans. Most of those were western European Protestants, too. So not just white people, but a very specific kind of white p...