A Study on the Inheritance of Craftsman's Spirit in the Early Chinese American Laborers

Abstract

The craftsman's spirit is now strongly advocated in China and relevant topics greatly publicized, but little attention is paid to how it was promoted in the working experience and laboring practice of the earliest Chinese American immigrants, who, in their endeavor to settle and survive, played an indispensable part in the development of the American West as gold miners, railroad builders or agricultural workers. The essay, in attempts to illustrate the essential inheritance of the Chinese craftsman's spirit with analysis of historical facts, aims to justify the its great influence upon the American during west expansion as well as the Chinese laborers' lives during the second half of the nineteenth century.