44
DOUGLAS W. SPARKS
These changes may have future implications for the continued growth and viability of Teochiu religious organizations. Present growth in number and size of Hungry Ghost festival organizations, the majority of which are located in resettlement estates, suggests that Teochiu local leaders have been successful in mobilizing support for this festival within the lower socio-economic levels of the Teochiu population. This mobilization has obviously been carried out and expressed in terms of ethnic solidarity and a common cultural heritage, and has been successful partially because it has utilized and, in fact, worked through the extensive and dense friendship and kinship networks that have developed within the housing estates. These festival organizations can be viewed as extensions of these networks into the organization of rituals which express Teochiu cultural solidarity to others and reflect underlying inter-ethnic rivalry and hostility in the local area.
One purpose of this article is to derive a preliminary conceptualization of ethnicity in the urban areas of Hong Kong. Such a conceptualization should involve more than an analysis of ethnic groups residing in a city. It should also indicate in what ways urban ethnicity is different from rural or non-urban ethnicity as a result of particularly urban processes and urban structure. This would involve the consideration of such factors as urbanization and urban planning, transportation networks, available housing and different types of residential settlements, the extent of housing segregation, occupational structure, and occupational specialization by particular groups, differential access to, and ethnic competition for, economic resources.
This paper has briefly discussed some of these factors with reference to urban areas of Hong Kong; in particular, the relative lack of Teochiu occupational specialization, the absence of housing segregation but the tendency of many Teochiu to segregate themselves in squatter settlements, the general absence of restrictions on social mobility based on ethnic group membership, the effects of urban housing policies on ethnic identity in resettling large ethnic concentrations to housing estates. Certain features of the urban system have thus clearly influenced the expression of ethnic identity and hostility. It is questionable, however, whether any part of