Chineseness and Affective Spatialities
New Chinese Migrants' (Dis)Orienting Experiences of Chinese Voluntary Associations in Singapore
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 19225565 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Ningning Chen (0000-0001-6777-0649, Sun Yat-sen University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 32 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Publication date | 2026-05-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Population Space and Place (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1544-8444 • E-ISSN: 1544-8452 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1002/psp.70273 |
| OpenAlex | W7160629174 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 45 |
This paper explores how new Chinese migrants negotiate Chineseness through their engagement with Chinese voluntary associations (CVAs) in host societies. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork with new migrants involved in CVAs in Singapore, I conceptualize CVAs as affective spaces that generate (dis)orienting effects, shaping new migrants' negotiation of Chineseness in a context of ‘togetherness‐in‐difference’. Specifically, CVAs function as ‘convivial spaces’ where new migrants rely on a primordial form of Chineseness to gain familiarity, connectivity, and a sense of orientation in a new settlement. At the same time, CVAs serve as contact zones infused with disorienting encounters with local Singaporean Chinese, producing variegated understandings of Chineseness. By highlighting the affective spatialities of CVAs, this paper advances a geographical approach to understanding Chineseness and contributes to the existing literature on migrant (dis)orientation
Affect (linguistics) · Context (archaeology) · Ethnography · Function (biology) · Identity negotiation · Negotiation · Diaspora, migration, transnational identity · Migration, Aging, and Tourism Studies · Tourism, Volunteerism, and Development
Imperial Eyes
Non-Representational Theory
Voluntary Organizations in the Chinese Diaspora
On Not Speaking Chinese
Beyond integration versus homeland attachment
Competing interests
From Commonplace Diversity to Relational Hybridization
Connotations of ancestral home
Negotiating China's rise
Diasporic Chinese voluntary associations engage China's rise
New Migrants and the Revival of Overseas Chinese Nationalism
A Beautiful Bridge’
Performing conviviality in diverse and precarious urban spaces
Immigrant Transnational Organizations and Development
Chinese Migration to Singapore
Migrant worker recreational centres, accidental diversities and new relationalities in Singapore
Early Chinese Clan Organizations in Singapore and Malaya, 1819–1911
Disorientation and Asylum-Seeking Youth
Spatialising affect; affecting space
Affective atmospheres
The territoriality of atmosphere
Disoriented geographies
Social geography III
Architecture/Affect/Inhabitation
Transnationalism and Community Building
The myth of migrant transience
Illuminated Atmospheres
We Turks are No Germans
Singaporean and British transmigrants in China and the cultural politics of 'contact zones
Space, Place and Identity
Emotions and cosmopolitan sociability
Who do migrant associations represent? The role of 'ethnic deservingness' and legal capital in migrants' rights claims in Turkey
Diasporic reorientations
Hometown associations and the micropolitics of transnational community development
"Negotiating Chineseness in an age of China's "rise
Bangladeshi migrant associations in Italy
Chinese ethnicities in neoliberal Singapore? State designs and dialect(ical) struggles of community associations
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |