This chapter compares European and Asian immigration to the United States from 1820 to 1920, expanding understanding of immigration to include the Eastern Hemisphere. It establishes immigration as a two-way process by focusing on both the United States and the “sending nations,” and thus directs attention to the Asian continent as a migration source. It synthesizes newly developing literature on China, Japan, India, and Korea that, like recent scholarship on European migrations, identifies advancing world capitalism and local political conditions as forces driving global migrations. Instead...

This chapter compares European and Asian immigration to the United States from 1820 to 1920, expanding understanding of immigration to include the Eastern Hemisphere. It establishes immigration as a two-way process by focusing on both the United States and the “sending nations,” and thus directs attention to the Asian continent as a migration source. It synthesizes newly developing literature on China, Japan, India, and Korea that, like recent scholarship on European migrations, identifies advancing world capitalism and local political conditions as forces driving global migrations. Instead of the usual emphasis upon distinctive national or continental experiences, this chapter emphasizes similar originating causes for Asian, European, and Latin American emigration.