Overview

In the mid-nineteenth century, Chinese opera theater arrived as one of the significant performing art forms in California. Nancy Yunhwa Rao excavates and contextualizes the important history of Chinese Opera Theater, bringing to light the ways it became woven into the financial, political, social, and family life in California and beyond. Chinese opera theater found brick-and-mortar homes with San Francisco theaters like the Hing Chuen Yuen and the Donn Qui Yuen. But troupes had already followed Chinese immigrants to mining and railroad towns, and across the American West. As Chinese theater became part of California and San Francisco culture, popular Chinese actors advocated for their art alongside appeals for civil rights. Rao draws on personal diaries, newspapers and artifacts to place Chinese theater within the everyday lives of San Francisco. She also examines the costumes, singing, staging, and storytelling that impacted mainstream reception and influenced how Chinese communities saw themselves. Illustrated with seventy photographs, Inside Chinese Theater is an expert and eloquent journey into the early decades of Chinese opera in America.

Full Product Details

Author:   Nancy Yunhwa Rao
Publisher:   University of Illinois Press
Imprint:   University of Illinois Press
Edition:   New edition
Dimensions:   Width: 15.60cm , Height: 2.80cm , Length: 23.50cm
Weight:   0.626kg
ISBN:  

9780252088636

ISBN 10:   0252088638
Pages:   392
Publication Date:   08 April 2025
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
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Table of Contents

Chronology of Chinese Theaters in San Francisco Note on Chinese Names and Terms Prologue Introduction Chapter 1. First Encounters Chapter 2. Bringing Opera to the Mines and Railroad Chinese Chapter 3. Performing Chinese Opera in San Francisco Chapter 4. Cultural Capital: Theaters on Jackson Street Chapter 5. Prosperity: A New Theater on Washington Street Chapter 6. Education, Diplomacy Culture, and the Fourth Theater Chapter 7. Contest the Restriction Act: In re Ho King Chapter 8. Star Power and Chinese American Theater Chapter 9. Picturesque Chinese Theater Chapter 10. Civil Rights, Owning Glamour, and Sonic Ethnology Epilogue Acknowledgments Glossary Appendix. Stylistic Characteristics of Cantonese Opera and A Transcription Notes Bibliography Index

Reviews

“Capturing the extraordinary movements, sounds, spectacles, and central presence of Chinese Cantonese opera in nineteenth century California, Nancy Rao’s Inside Chinese Theater presents a fascinating and long neglected cultural history that is simultaneously American and Transpacific.”--Gordon H. Chang, author of Ghosts of Gold Mountain: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad ""This comprehensive and encyclopedic history of staged performances of transpacific music explores the emergence of a complex visual and aural system of signification that shaped and reflected the lives of nineteenth century Chinese immigrants in California. Nancy Yunhwa Rao's brilliantly inventive and imaginative book reveals the importance of asking and answering difficult yet immensely generative questions about the nature of archival research, about performance as a site of racial formation, and about the roles of sight and sound in shaping social identities.--George Lipsitz, author of The Possessive Investment in Whiteness

Author Information

Nancy Yunhwa Rao is a professor of music at Rutgers University and the author of Chinatown Opera Theater in North America.

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