Book discussion with Mae Ngai, Columbia University. Participants can join online or in-person. Dr. Ngai will be joining via Zoom. 

In the second half of the nineteenth century, gold rushes spurred a vast and diverse migration to the fields of California, Australia, and South Africa. Frictions between Chinese and white settlers catalyzed a global battle over “the Chinese Question.” In her book, the Chinese Question: The Gold Rushes and Global Politics, Ngai argues that laws restricting Asian immigration were an integral part of the global economy and forged modern conceptions of race. The book is a story of racist oppression but also of resilience and social advance – with strong connections to current debates on race and immigration.

Mae M. Ngai is the Lung Family Professor of Asian American Studies and Professor of History, and Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race at Columbia University. She is a legal and political historian interested in the histories of immigration, citizenship, nationalism, and the Chinese diaspora.  Ngai is the author of several award-winning books and has written on immigration for major newspapers. Before becoming a historian, she was a labor-union organizer and an educator. Photograph credit, Beowulf Sheehan.