How have the Chinese fared in America? What motivated them to come here in the nineteenth century? How were they received by native Americans? These are some of the questions that Henry Tsai deals with in this important new book. He treats the nineteenth-century immigration experience, the development of early Chinese communities, American exclusion and the difficulties of living in the shadow of exclusion, and the Chinese community in the post-World War II era and today. Also covered are Chinese women in conemporary American society, the problems with children and youth in a multiracial society, and international issues such as the relationships between the U.S., China, and Taiwan, and the implications of these issues for the Chinese in America. The work provides a solid statistical analysis in a way that will be accessible to students and scholars as well as general readers.