Chinatown

A Chinatown (Chinese: 唐人街; pinyin: Tángrénjiē; Jyutping: tong4 yan4 gaai1) is an ethnic enclave of Chinese people located outside mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau or Taiwan, most often in an urban setting. Areas known as 'Chinatown' exist throughout the world, including Europe, North America, South America, Asia, Africa, Australia, Zealandia and The Middle East.Manhattan's Chinatown, the largest concentration of Chinese people in the Western HemisphereChinatown, Chicago, one of the few preserved and authentic Chinatowns in the United StatesChinatown, San Francisco, one of the largest Chinatowns in North AmericaPaifang gate to Chinatown, BostonHoian Settlement Pattern, Vietnam, 1991.Pengchau Settlement Pattern, Hong Kong, 1991.Chinese Settlement in Georgetown, Malaysia, 1991.Chinese Settlement in Kuching, Malaysia, 1991.Tin Hua (Goddess of Mercy) Temple in Kucing, Malaysia, 1991.To Di Gong (Land God) Temple at Kucing, 1991.Entrance to Chinatown, SydneyPaifang in PhiladelphiaPaifang in Buenos Aires, ArgentinaChinatown, Boston looking towards the paifangGate of Chinatown, Portland, OregonChinatown entry arch in Newcastle, EnglandChinese Garden of Friendship, part of Sydney ChinatownChinese stone lions at the Chinatown gate in Victoria, British Columbia, CanadaHarbin Gates in Chinatown of Edmonton, Alberta, CanadaMillennium Gate on Pender Street in Chinatown of Vancouver, British Columbia, CanadaChinese Cultural Centre in Calgary, Alberta, CanadaChinese Temple 'Toong On Church' in Kolkata, India.Manhattan ChinatownSan Francisco's ChinatownChinatown, BostonChinatown, PhiladelphiaPortland, Oregon's ChinatownVancouver ChinatownChinatown in Canada's Capital, OttawaArch honors Chinese-Mexican community of Mexico City, built in 2008, Articulo 123 StreetYokohama Chinatown's Goodwill Gate in JapanKan Yin Temple (Kwan Yin Si), a place of worship for Burmese Chinese in Bago, also serves as a Mandarin schoolChinatown gate in Mangga Dua, Jakarta, IndonesiaKya-Kya or Kembang Jepun, Surabaya's Chinatown, one of oldest Chinatown in IndonesiaChinese New Year celebrated in Chinatown, Kolkata, India.Paifang at Sydney ChinatownPaifang at Bendigo Chinese PrecinctAdelaide ChinatownMelbourne Chinatown entrance at Little Bourke StreetMap of Chinatown MilanGate of Chinatown, Liverpool England, is the largest multiple-span arch outside of China, in the oldest Chinese community in EuropeWardour Street, Chinatown, LondonChinatown in Birmingham, EnglandChinese new year celebration in Lyon, France. A Chinatown (Chinese: 唐人街; pinyin: Tángrénjiē; Jyutping: tong4 yan4 gaai1) is an ethnic enclave of Chinese people located outside mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau or Taiwan, most often in an urban setting. Areas known as 'Chinatown' exist throughout the world, including Europe, North America, South America, Asia, Africa, Australia, Zealandia and The Middle East. The development of most Chinatowns typically resulted from mass migration to an area without any or with very few Chinese residents. As described by the 16th century European travellers to East India, Chinese quarters were already in existence at most of the port towns in this region. Notable early examples outside Asia include San Francisco's Chinatown in the United States and Melbourne's Chinatown in Australia, which were founded in the mid-19th century during the California gold rush and Victoria gold rush, respectively. A more modern example, in Montville, Connecticut, was caused by the displacement of Chinese workers in the Manhattan Chinatown following the September 11th attacks in 2001. The Oxford Dictionary defines 'Chinatown' as '... a district of any non-asian town, especially a city or seaport, in which the population is predominantly of Chinese origin'. However, some Chinatowns may have little to do with China. Some 'Vietnamese' enclaves are in fact a city's 'second Chinatown', and some Chinatowns are in fact pan-Asian, meaning they could also be counted as a Koreatown or Little India. One example includes Asiatown in Cleveland, Ohio. It was initially referred to as a Chinatown but was subsequently renamed due to the influx of non-Chinese Asian Americans who opened businesses there. Today the district acts as a unifying factor for the Chinese, Taiwanese, Korean, Japanese, Filipino, Indian, Vietnamese, Cambodian, Laotian, Nepalese and Thai communities of Cleveland. Further ambiguities with the term can include Chinese ethnoburbs which by definition are '... suburban ethnic clusters of residential areas and business districts in large metropolitan areas where the intended purpose is to be '... as isolated from the white population as Hispanics'. An article in The New York Times blurs the line further by categorizing very different Chinatowns such as Chinatown, Manhattan, which exists in an urban setting as 'traditional'; Monterey Park's Chinatown, which exists in a 'suburban' setting (and labeled as such); and Austin, Texas's Chinatown, which is in essence a 'fabricated' Chinese-themed mall. This contrasts with narrower definitions, where the term only described Chinatown in a city setting. In some cities in Spain, the term barrio chino ('Chinese quarter') denotes an area, neighborhood or district where prostitution or other businesses related to the sex industry are concentrated; i.e. a red-light district. Some examples of this are the Chinatown of Salamanca and the Chinatown of Barcelona, although in Barcelona there was a small Chinese community in the 1930s. Trading centres populated predominantly by Chinese men and their native spouses have long existed throughout Southeast Asia. Emigration to other parts of the world from China accelerated in the 1860s with the signing of the Treaty of Peking (1860), which opened the border for free movement. Early emigrants came primarily from the coastal provinces of Guangdong (Canton, Kwangtung) and Fujian (Fukien, Hokkien) in southeastern China – where the people generally speak Toishanese, Cantonese, Hakka, Teochew (Chiuchow) and Hokkien. In the late 19th century and early 20th century, a significant amount of Chinese emigration to North America originated from four counties called Sze Yup, located west of the Pearl River Delta in Guangdong province, making Toishanese a dominant variety of the Chinese language spoken in Chinatowns in Canada and the United States. As conditions in China have improved in recent decades, many Chinatowns have lost their initial mission, which was to provide a transitional place into a new culture. As net migration has slowed into them, the smaller Chinatowns have slowly decayed, often to the point of becoming purely historical and no longer serving as ethnic enclaves.