Asian Latin Americans

Asian Latin Americans or Latinasians, are Latin Americans of South Asian, East Asian or Southeast Asian descent. West Asians are usually excluded as they are typically considered "white". Asian Latin Americans have a centuries-long history in the region, starting with Filipinos in the 16th century. The peak of Asian immigration occurred in the 19th and 20th centuries, however. There are currently more than four million Asian Latin Americans, nearly 1% of Latin America's population. Chinese and Japanese are the group's largest ancestries; other major ones include Indians, Koreans and Filipinos. Brazil is home to the largest population of Asian Latin Americans, at some 2.2 million.[5][6] The highest ratio of any country in the region is 5%,[7] in Peru. There has been notable emigration from these communities in recent decades, so that there are now hundreds of thousands of people of Asian Latin American origin in both Japan and the United States.

For the Latino population of Asian descent living in or native to the United States, see Asian Hispanic and Latino Americans. For the population in Asia of Latin American descent, see Latin American Asian.
Asian Latin Americans
Total population
c. 6,107,730 approximately
Regions with significant populations
 Brazil2,200,000[1][2]
 Peru1,560,000
 Venezuela500,000
 Mexico370,560
 Argentina344,130
 Colombia213,910
 Panama140,000
 Guatemala138,000
 Cuba114,240[3]
 Honduras67,120
 Costa Rica61,500
 Dominican Republic52,000
 Paraguay51,000
 Chile25,000
 Ecuador17,080
 Bolivia15,000
 Puerto Rico6,390
 Uruguay4,000
 El Salvador3,000
 Haiti<1,000[4]
Languages
European Languages:
English · Spanish · Portuguese
Asian Languages:
Arabic · Chinese · Hindustani (Hindi–Urdu) · Tamil · Telugu · Japanese · Korean · Punjabi · Urdu · Filipino · Bengali · Vietnamese
Religion
Buddhism · Christianity · Hinduism · Islam · Shintoism · Sikhism · Taoism · Zoroastrianism · Jainism
Related ethnic groups
Latino, Hispanic, Asian, Filipinos, Spaniards, Portuguese, European Latin Americans, Asian Hispanic and Latino Americans, Latin American Asian, Asian Caribbean, Chinese Caribbeans

History

The first Asian Latin Americans were Filipinos who made their way to Latin America (primarily to Cuba and Mexico and secondarily to Colombia, Panama and Peru) in the 16th century, as sailors, crews, prisoners, slaves, adventurers and soldiers during the Spanish colonial period of the Philippines. For two and a half centuries (between 1565 and 1815) many Filipinos sailed on the Manila-Acapulco Galleons, assisting in the Spanish Empire's monopoly in trade. Some of these sailors never returned to the Philippines and many of their descendants can be found in small communities around Baja California, Sonora, Mexico City, Peru and others, thus making Filipinos the oldest Asian ethnic group in Latin America.

While South Asians had been present in various forms in Latin America for centuries by the 1800s, it was in this century that the flow into the region spiked dramatically. This rapid influx of hundreds of thousands of mainly male South Asians was due to the need for indentured servants. This is largely tied to the abolition of black slavery in the Caribbean colonies in 1834. Without the promise of free labor, and a hostile working class on their hands, the Dutch colonial authorities had to find a solution – cheap Asian labor.[8]

Many of these immigrant populations became such fixtures in their adopted countries that they acquired names of their own. For example, the Chinese men who labored in agricultural work became known as "coolies". While these imported Asian laborers were initially just replacement for agricultural slave labor, they gradually began to enter other sectors as the economy evolved. Before long, they had entered more urban work and the service sector. In certain areas, these populations assimilated into the minority populations, adding yet another definition to go on a casta.

In some areas, these new populations caused conflict. In northern Mexico, tensions became inevitable when the United States began to shut off Chinese immigration in the early 1880s. Many who were originally bound for the USA were re-routed to Mexico. The rapid increase in population and rise to middle/upper class standing generated strong resentment among existing residents. These tensions lead to riots. In the state of Sonora, the entire Chinese population was expelled in 1929.

Today, the overwhelming majority of Asian Latin Americans are of Chinese, Japanese or Korean descent. Japanese migration mostly came to a halt after World War II (with the exception of Japanese settlement in the Dominican Republic), while Korean migration mostly came to an end by the 1980s and Chinese migration remains ongoing in a number of countries.

Settlement of war refugees has been extremely minor: a few dozen ex-North Korean soldiers went to Argentina after the Korean War[9][10] and some Hmong went to French Guiana after the Vietnam War.[11]

Roles in labor

Asian Latin Americans served various roles during their time as low wage workers in Latin America. In the second half of the nineteenth century, nearly a quarter of a million Chinese migrants in Cuba worked primarily on sugar plantations. The Chinese "coolies" who migrated to Peru took up work on the Andean Railroad or the Guano Fields. Over time the Chinese progressed to acquiring work in urban centers as tradesmen, restaurateurs, and in the service industry. By the second decade of the nineteenth century, approximately 25,000 Chinese migrants in Mexico found relative success with small businesses, government bureaucracy, and intellectual circles. In the 1830s the British and Dutch colonial governments also imported South Asians to work as indentured servants to places such as Trinidad and Tobago, Suriname, Curaçao, and British Guiana (later renamed Guayana). At the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Japanese immigrants reached Brazil and Peru. Much like the Chinese, the Japanese often worked as indentured servants and low wage workers for planters. Japanese work contracts were notably more short term than those of the Chinese and the process was closely monitored by the Japanese government to dissuade abuse and foul play. In both cases, the influx of Asian migrant workers was to fill the void left in the Latin American work forces after the abolition of slavery. Employers of all kinds were desperate for a low cost replacement for their slaves so those who did not participate in any illegal slave operations turned to the Asian migrants.[12]

Geographic distribution

Four and a half million Latin Americans (almost 1% of the total population of Latin America) are of Asian descent. The number may be millions higher, even more so if all who have partial ancestry are included. For example, Asian Peruvians are estimated at 5%[7] of the population there, but one source places the number of all Peruvians with at least some Chinese ancestry at 5 million, which equates to 20% of the country's total population.[13]

Most who are of Japanese descent reside in Brazil, Peru, Argentina, Mexico, Bolivia, and Paraguay while significant populations of Chinese ancestry are found in Peru, Venezuela, Brazil, Colombia, Argentina, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Panama, Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Costa Rica (where they make up about 1% of the total population). Nicaragua is home to 12,000 ethnic Chinese; the majority reside in Managua and on the Caribbean coast. Smaller communities of Chinese, numbering just in the hundreds or thousands, are also found in Ecuador and various other Latin American countries. Most Korean communities are in Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Guatemala, Paraguay, Colombia, Ecuador and Chile. There are around 12,918 living in Guatemala. There is also a Hmong community in Argentina. Colombia, Peru, Argentina, Brazil, Panama, and Venezuela also have Asian Indian communities.

Japanese Peruvians have a considerable economic position in Peru.[14] Many past and present Peruvian Cabinet members are ethnic Asians, but most particularly Japanese Peruvians have made up large portions of Peru's cabinet members and former president Alberto Fujimori is of Japanese ancestry who is currently the only Asian Latin American to have ever served as the head of any Latin American nation (or the second, if taking into account Arthur Chung). Brazil is home to the largest Japanese community outside Japan, numbering about 1.7 million with ancestry alone. Brazil is also home to 10,000 Indians, 5,000 Vietnamese, 4,500 Afghans, 2,900 Indonesians and 1,000 Filipinos.

Korean people are the third Largest Group of Asian Latin Americans. this group at Brazil is the largest (specially in Southeast region) with a population of 51,550. The second largest is at Argentina being at the same time the largest at Hispanic America, with a population of 23,603 and with active koreatowns in Buenos Aires. More 10,000 at Guatemala and Mexico, This last with active communities in Monterrey, Guadalajara, Yucatan and Mexico city. More 1,000 at Chile, Paraguay, Venezuela, Honduras and Peru where the first Korean Peruvian Mario Jung was mayor in City of Chanchamayo's mayor, He is the first Mayor of Peru and Latin America from Korean origin. there are small and important communities (lees 1,000 peoples) at Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Panama, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Uruguay, Puerto Rico, and Haiti.

Emigrant communities

Canada

Canada has been a destination for Asian Latin American emigration. The immigrants usually settle in the largest cities, such as Vancouver and Toronto and integrate into the overall Asian Canadian communities.

Japan
Main article: Dekasegi

Japanese Brazilian immigrants to Japan numbered 250,000 in 2004, constituting Japan's second-largest immigrant population.[15] Their experiences bear similarities to those of Japanese Peruvian immigrants, who are often relegated to low income jobs typically occupied by foreigners.[14]

United States
Main article: Asian Hispanic and Latino Americans

Most Asian Latin Americans who have migrated to the United States live in the largest cities, often in Asian American or Hispanic and Latino communities in the Greater Los Angeles area, New York metropolitan area, Chicago metropolitan area, San Francisco Bay area, Greater Houston, the San Diego area, Imperial Valley, California, Dallas-Fort Worth and South Florida (mainly Chinese Cubans). They and their descendants are sometimes known as Asian Hispanics and Asian Latinos.

In the 2000 US Census, 119,829 Hispanic or Latino Americans identified as being of Asian race alone.[16] In 2006 the Census Bureau's American Community Survey estimated them at 154,694,[17] while its Population Estimates, which are official, put them at 277,704.[18] Some notable Americans of Asian Hispanic/Latino heritage include Harry Shum Jr., Franklin Chang-Diaz, Carlos Galvan, Kelis, Kirk Acevedo and Chino Moreno. In the United States, there are Facebook groups that are devoted to Asian Hispanics in New York,[19] California[20] and Bay Area.[21]

Composition
Asian Latin American population (incomplete data)
Country Chinese Indian[22] Japanese Korean Filipino Others References
Argentina 200,000 4,000 65,000 23,063 15,000 2,000
Bolivia No data No data 14,178 654 No data No data
Brazil 251,649 9,200 1,705,685 50,281 1,000 No data [7][23]
Chile No data 1,500 4,000 2,700 No data No data
Colombia 30,000 5,000 5,000[24] 900 17,000 [25][26]
Costa Rica 45,000 16 351 434 No data No data [27]
Cuba 114,240 200 1200 900 No data No data No data
Dominican Republic 50,000 200 847 675 No data No data
Ecuador 95,000 25,000 434 714 No data No data
El Salvador 2,140 55 176 151 No data 103
Guatemala 2,000 288 12,918 No data No data [28]
Honduras 123 No data 160 3,800 1,107 No data
Mexico 70,000[29] 2,258[30] 35,000[31] 11,897 200,000[32] 1,300[33]
Nicaragua 10 145 745 No data No data
Panama 258,886[34] 2,164 456 421 No data No data
Paraguay No data No data 9,484 5,039 No data No data
Peru 1'300,000 145 160,000[35][36][37] 1,493 No data No data [7][38]
Puerto Rico >2,200 823 10,486 109 9,832 No data
Uruguay No data ~100 3,456 216 No data No data
Venezuela 450,000 680 2,000 1,000 No data 10,000


Notable persons

Argentina

Bolivia

Brazil

Chile

Colombia

  • Shakira, of partial Lebanese descent.
  • Yuriko Yoshimura Japanese--Colombian model.
  • José Kaor Dokú Colombian--Japanese footballer and military.
  • Yokoi kenji Díaz, Japanese--Colombian lecturer. [39]
  • Sayaka Osorio Uribe, Korean--Colombian karateka.
  • Maru Yamayusa Colombian actress and great-granddaughter of a Japanese man.
  • Yu Takeuchi Japanese mathematician nationalized in Colombia.
  • Paublo Ng Choi Colombian--Chinese Chef.
  • Manuel Teodoro Bermúdez American journalists and son of a filipino-Colombian couple.

Costa Rica

Cuba

Dominican Republic

Ecuador

  • Li Jian - midfielder; Chinese Ecuadorian
  • Jinsop, singer; Korean Ecuadorian
  • Carlos Moncayo - co-founder and CEO of Asiam; Chinese Ecuadorian

Guatemala

Mexico

For a more comprehensive list, see List of Asian Mexicans.

Nicaragua

Panama

Peru

Puerto Rico

Uruguay

  • Barbara Mori, Mexican actress; Japanese Uruguayan

Venezuela

See also

Ethnic groups

Asian Latin American enclaves

References
  1. Alessandra Duarte; Flávio Freire (30 May 2011). População asiática aumentou 173% no Brasil, segundo o Censo de 2010 [Asian population climbed 173% in Brazil, according to 2010 Census] (in Portuguese). O Globo. Retrieved 11 January 2016.
  2. Japan, Brazil mark a century of settlement, family ties| The Japan Times Online
  3. CIA World Factbook
  4. <https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/cuba/>.
  5. "Pesquisa Nacional por Amostra de Domicílios 2006" [National Sample Household Survey 2006] (PDF) (in Portuguese). Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. 2007. Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 June 2008. Retrieved 10 June 2008: See Table 1.2
  6. Japan, Brazil mark a century of settlement, family ties | The Japan Times Online
  7. "The Ranking of Ethnic Chinese Population". Overseas Community Affairs Council, Republic of China (Taiwan). Archived from the original on 23 November 2013. Retrieved 26 July 2010.
  8. Meade, Teresa (2010). A History of Modern Latin America. West Sussex, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. pp. 141–142. ISBN 978-1-118-77248-5.
  9. Bialogorski, Mirta (2005). "La comunidad coreana - Argentina - Logros de una inmigración reciente". Cuando Oriente llegó a América: Contribuciones de inmigrantes chinos, japoneses, y coreanos. Banco Interamericano De Desarrollo. pp. 275–296. ISBN 978-1-931003-73-5.
  10. Park, Chae-soon (2007). "La emigración coreana en América Latina y sus perspectivas". Segundo Congreso del Consejo de Estudios Latinoamericanos de Asia y de Oceania (PDF). Seoul: Latin American Studies Association of Korea. Archived from the original (PDF) on 22 July 2011. Retrieved 27 September 2008.
  11. "Hmong's new lives in Caribbean". BBC News. 10 March 2004. Retrieved 25 April 2010.
  12. Meade, Teresa (2016). A History of Modern Latin America 1800 to the Present. John Wiley & Sons. Inc. p. 141.
  13. "Peruvian Culinary Culture: Chinese Influence". Taste of Peru. Archived from the original on 27 September 2013. Retrieved 13 November 2016.
  14. Lama, Abraham. Asian Times. Home is where the heartbreak is. 1999. 6 September 2006.<http://www.atimes.com/japan-econ/AJ16Dh01.html>.
  15. Richard Gunde (27 January 2004). "Japanese Brazilian Return Migration and the Making of Japan's Newest Immigrant Minority". UCLA International Institute. Archived from the original on 4 February 2012. Retrieved 21 March 2008.
  16. "Overview of Race and Hispanic Origin: 2000" (PDF). U.S. Census Bureau.
  17. "B03002. HISPANIC OR LATINO ORIGIN BY RACE - Universe: TOTAL POPULATION". 2006 American Community Survey. U.S. Census Bureau. Retrieved 21 March 2008.
  18. "T4-2006. Hispanic or Latino By Race [15]". Data Set: 2006 Population Estimates. U.S. Census Bureau. Retrieved 21 March 2008.
  19. "LatinAsians in New York". Facebook. Retrieved 1 September 2010.
  20. "LatinAsians in CA". Facebook. Retrieved 1 September 2010.
  21. "LatinAsians in Bay Area". Facebook. Retrieved 1 September 2010.
  22. Singhvi, L. M. (2000). "Other Countries of Central and South America". Report of the High Level Committee on the Indian Diaspora (PDF). New Delhi: Ministry of External Affairs. Archived from the original (PDF) on 3 March 2016. Retrieved 29 August 2017.; note all figures in this table given are the sum of those for Non-Resident Indians and for Persons of Indian Origin, which are tabulated separately in the original report
  23. "Publicação do IBGE traz artigos, mapas e distribuição geográfica dos nikkeis no Brasil". Archived from the original on 22 December 2013. Retrieved 2 December 2009.
  24. Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores del Japon
  25. 해외이주 통계 - 외교부
  26. コロンビア基礎データ ｜ 外務省 [Republic of Colombia: Basic data]. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan. Retrieved 13 November 2016.
  27. "Cuadro N° 1: Poblacion total. Por: zona y sexo. Segun: provincia y etnia" [Table No. 1: Total population. By: area and sex. By: province and ethnicity]. National Institute of Statistics and Census of Costa Rica (INEC) (in Spanish). Archived from the original (XLS) on 19 February 2009. Retrieved 21 March 2008.
  28. Pérez, Sonia (15 May 2005). ""Sólo queremos igualdad": Comisionado presidencial contra la Discriminación y el Racismo". Prensa Libre. Archived from the original on 8 June 2005. Retrieved 20 May 2009.
  29. Rodriguez, Olga R. (20 February 2015). "Chinese-Mexicans Celebrate Return To Mexico". The Huffington Post.
  30. "International Migration Database". OECD. Retrieved 7 September 2015. Country of origin: India, Variable: Stock of foreign population by nationality
  31. Lizcano Fernández, Francisco (May–August 2005). "Composición Étnica de las Tres Áreas Culturales del Continente Americano al Comienzo del Siglo XXI" [Ethnic composition of the three cultural areas of the American Continent to the beginning of the 21st century] (PDF). Revista Convergencia (in Spanish). Toluca, Mexico: Autonomous University of the State of Mexico. 12 (38): 201. Archived from the original (PDF) on 22 October 2013. Retrieved 28 January 2015.
  32. Floro L. Mercene. Filipinos in Mexican history Archived 5 April 2007 at the Wayback Machine. Ezilon Infobase. 28 January 2005.
  33. "Extranjeros Residentes En México" (PDF). Instituto Nacional de Migración. p. 38. Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 7 September 2015. 2009 resident migrants from South, Southeast and East Asian countries other than those separately listed
  34. "comunidad china Panama". Paisanito.com - Comunidad China en Panama - (in Spanish). Retrieved 27 February 2020.
  35. "Japan-Peru Relations (Basic Data)". Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan. 23 January 2015. Retrieved 11 January 2016.
  36. "Embajada del Japón en el Perú" [Embassy of Japan in Peru] (in Spanish). pe.emb-japan.go.jp. Retrieved 11 January 2016.
  37. "54,636 peruanos viven en todo Japón -Entrevista a Morimasa Goya" [54,636 Peruvians live throughout Japan - Interview with Goya Morimasa] (in Spanish). perushimpo.com. 24 November 2011. Retrieved 11 January 2016.
  38. Palma, Hugo (12 March 2008). "Desafíos que nos acercan" [Challenges that bring us closer] (in Spanish). universia.edu.pe. Archived from the original on 15 April 2009. Retrieved 26 July 2010.
  39. https://www.lifeder.com/yokoi-kenji/

Further reading
  • Affigne, Tony, and Pei-te Lien. "Peoples of Asian descent in the Americas: Theoretical implications of race and politics." Amerasia Journal 28.2 (2002): 1-27.
  • Avila-Tàpies, Rosalia, and Josefina Domínguez-Mujica. "Postcolonial migrations and diasporic linkages between Latin America and Japan and Spain." Asian and Pacific Migration Journal 24.4 (2015): 487-511.
  • Chee Beng Tan, and Walton Look Lai, eds. The Chinese in Latin America and the Caribbean (2010) excerpt
  • Fu, Puo-An Wu. "Transpacific Subjectivities:" Chinese"--Latin American Literature after Empire." in Chinese America: History and Perspectives (2018): 13-20.
  • Hu-Dehart, Evelyn. "The Chinese of Peru, Cuba, and Mexico." in The Cambridge survey of world migration (1995): 220-222.
  • Hu-DeHart, Evelyn. "Coolies, Shopkeepers, Pioneers: The Chinese of Mexico and Peru (1849–1930)." Amerasia Journal 15.2 (1989): 91-116.
  • Hirabayashi, Lane Ryo, Akemi Kikumura-Yano, and James A. Hirabayashi, eds. New worlds, new lives: Globalization and people of Japanese descent in the Americas and from Latin America in Japan. Stanford University Press, 2002.
  • Hu-DeHart, Evelyn. "Latin America in Asia-Pacific Perspective Evelyn Hu-DeHart." Asian Diasporas: New Formations, New Conceptions (2007): 29+.
  • Jingsheng, Dong. "Chinese emigration to Mexico and the Sino-Mexico relations before 1910." Estudios Internacionales (2006): 75-88.
  • Kikuchi, Hirokazu. "The Representation of East Asia in Latin American Legislatures." Issues & Studies 53.01 (2017): 1740005. doi: 10.1142/S1013251117400057
  • Kim, Hahkyung. "Korean Immigrants’ Place in the Discourse of Mestizaje: A History of Race-Class Dynamics and Asian Immigration in Yucatán, Mexico." Revista Iberoamericana (2012).
  • Lee, Rachel. "Asian American cultural production in Asian-Pacific perspective." boundary 2 26.2 (1999): 231-254. online
  • Lim, Rachel. "Racial Transmittances: Hemispheric Viralities of Anti-Asian Racism and Resistance in Mexico." Journal of Asian American Studies 23.3 (2020): 441-457.
  • Masterson, Daniel M. The Japanese in Latin America. University of Illinois Press, 2004. 0252071441, 9780252071447.
  • Min, Man-Shik. "Far East Asian immigration into Latin America." Korea & world affairs 11.2 (1987): 331+
  • Pan, Lynn, ed. The encyclopedia of the Chinese overseas (Harvard UP, 1998). pp 248–2630.
  • Rivas, Zelideth María. "Literary and Cultural Representations of Asians in Latin America and the Caribbean." in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Literature (2019).
  • Romero, Robert Chao, and Kevin Escudero. "“Asian Latinos” and the US Census." AAPI Nexus: Policy, Practice and Community 10, no. 2 (2012): 119-138. online
  • Seijas, Tatiana. "Asian migrations to Latin America in the Pacific World, 16th–19th centuries." History Compass 14.12 (2016): 573-581. online
  • Tigner, James L. "Japanese immigration into Latin America: a survey." Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs 23.4 (1981): 457-482.
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