The Chinese Lady: Afong Moy in Early America by Nancy E. Davis

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Chinese Lady: Afong Moy in Early America by Nancy E. Davis Yiyun Huang (bio) Keywords China, Chinese immigration, Afong Moy The Chinese Lady: Afong Moy in Early America. By Nancy E. Davis. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019. Pp. 331. Cloth, $29.95.) Afong Moy was very likely the first Chinese woman who ever set foot on American soil when she arrived in New York City in 1834. Historians who study Chinese immigration to America have overlooked Moy and others like her. They typically focus on the mid-to-late nineteenth century when the California Gold Rush and the First Transcontinental Railroad spurred an influx of foreign people into the United States. As a result, little light has been focused on Afong Moy until now. Nancy E. Davis's [End Page 159] new book explores Moy's encounter with antebellum United States. She skillfully and painstakingly reconstructed some important episodes during Moy's sixteen-year sojourn (1834–1850) in America. The attention and comments Moy attracted during this period both diverge from and foreshadow what happened to the Chinese immigrants in the 1860s and 1870s. Her experience also reflected how the Americans thought about racial minority groups during the antebellum era. The Chinese Lady first provides important contextual information about America's China trade to better explain why and how several American merchants and a ship captain brought Afong Moy from Guangzhou (Canton) back to the United States. They arrived at New York City in 1834, and Moy's manager wasted no time in establishing a Chinese-style parlor to showcase and promote the newly imported objects. Afong Moy was attired in elite Chinese female clothing and sat in the midst of the goods. Moy served as a cultural bridge for Americans who used to know about China and the Chinese only through imported objects and newspaper reports. From 1834 to 1837, Afong Moy's role turned from the promoter of goods to that of a spectacle as she took a journey through the mid-Atlantic, New England, the South, Cuba, and up the Mississippi River. She presented Chinese culture in theaters and often shared stages with itinerant musicians and magicians. In the meantime, Afong Moy experienced some of the most well-known upheavals of this era, including Native American removal. The financial panic in 1837 changed Moy's life. Her sponsors went bankrupt and cast her aside. Moy had been in the United States for more than three years but did not have much opportunity to learn English. She could not find any means to support herself and ended up in a New Jersey almshouse. She took to the stage again between 1845 and 1850. We do not know when she died or if she returned to China. But after 1850, her name stopped appearing in any newspaper advertisements and her manager's account book (264). Davis's focus on Afong Moy provides insights on how Americans viewed China and the Chinese two decades prior to the influx of Chinese immigrants. In the 1830s, the American public responded to China in a generally positive way. They viewed it as a distant, exotic, and enchanting country with "fine silks and arched bridges" (238). The Chinese textiles and accessories Moy helped market to American consumers "indicated a worldly familiarity" and facilitated middle-class pursuits of objects that conferred status (80). However, the public's attitudes toward [End Page 160] China became more negative after China's defeat in the First Opium War and the subsequent opening of four ports in the early 1840s. The press now described Afong Moy as an uneducated and prideful woman who sharply contrasted with the "advanced position and sensibilities" of American women (256). Some authors even used Afong Moy as a model in stories that highlighted the unacceptable treatment of women in China. These unfriendly attitudes toward Moy in the 1840s foreshadowed the anti-Chinese sentiment two decades later, which culminated in the enactment of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882. The Chinese Lady also reveals how Americans in the 1830s and 1840s perceived racial minority groups as Afong Moy's experience echoed that of the Native Americans. Many people actually placed Moy...