Despite more than a century of continuous migration from China to Chile, there is little public acknowledgement of the existence of several generations of Chileans of Chinese descent. A Chinese presence in Chile dates back to the late 19th century, with the arrival of Cantonese men who worked in guano mining and agriculture in South America. Based on an ethnographic study of diverse Chileans of Chinese descent based in northern and central Chile, this article illuminates the factors conditioning the contemporary desire of some Chileans to claim a Chinese ancestry that their parents or grandparents sought to deny or downplay. We show how they employ history and temporal distance to articulate a specific sense of Chineseness that legitimates their territorial and national belonging to Chile while at the same time excluding contemporary Chinese migrants. A historical and ethnographic analysis of Chinese racialization in Chile contributes to our understanding of how racial categories are reproduced, transformed and refracted over time.

尽管一个多世纪以来中国人持续移民到智利, 但公众对几代华裔智利人的存在鲜有认知或承认。华人在智利的存在可以追溯到19世纪末, 当时一些广东男子来到南美从事鸟粪矿开采和农业劳动。本文基于对居住在智利北部和中部地区多样化华裔群体的民族志研究,揭示了影响部分智利人希望重新认同其被父母或祖父母否认或淡化之中国血统的诸多因素。我们展示了他们如何借助历史叙事与时间距离, 构建一种特定的 “华人性” 认同, 以此正当化自己对智利领土和国家的归属感, 同时在叙事中排除当代中国新移民。通过对中国人在智利种族化的历史和民族志分析,本文有助于理解种族分类是如何随着时间被再生产、转变和折射。