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that of cultural transmission. What was the nature and content of cultural transactions between those low status Chinese and Europeans who met at work, and sometimes socially?* Did working class Europeans play an equivalent role in Hong Kong as beachcombers and castaways in the South Seas??
Finally, the problem of the relationship between low and high status Europeans in Hong Kong demands investigation, for although the two groups formed separate communities, it is clear that Taipans depended upon working class Europeans, such as policemen, for their private security and also skilled European workers for the successful running of their business enterprises in Hong Kong. These and other questions suggest that working class Europeans, although only a minor part of the total European population (if we exclude soldiers, sailors and merchant seamen), cannot be dismissed summarily as of little account in the social and economic development of Hong Kong. A thesis of this essay is that their importance has not been stressed sufficiently by historians and writers on colonial Hong Kong.
THE EUROPEAN WORKING CLASS IN HONG KONG
Broadly speaking, working class Europeans in nineteenth century Hong Kong may be divided into five groups—(1) beachcombers; (2) police or those with quasi-police functions: inspectors, supervisors, and overseers in government employ; (3) soldiers, sailors and merchant seamen; (4) mechanics, artisans, and others in low status occupations; and (5) outcastes.† The divisions are not clear cut; there is a certain amount of overlapping; movement from group to group did take place. The divisions reflect a subjective ranking of occupations and statuses by middle class Europeans, such as merchants, in Hong Kong. In Britain at that time, supervisors and inspectors would have been regarded as members of the lower middle class; but in Hong Kong a telescoping of social classes took place because there was no true equivalent of a European proletariat, of manual workers. A European was accepted as either respectably middle class or as not—the acid test was one of commensality. Inevitably, a number of Europeans existed in a limbo
* I have been unable to explore this subject as exhaustively as I would have wished, and suggest that it is a suitable subject for research.
† For a contemporary instance see Halcombe (1896) p. 186.
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that of cultural transmission. What was the nature and content of cultural transactions between those low status Chinese and Euro- peans who met at work, and sometimes socially?* Did working class Europeans play an equivalent role in Hong Kong as beach- combers and castaways in the South Seas??
Finally, the problem of the relationship between low and high status Europeans in Hong Kong demands investigation, for al- though the two groups formed separate communities, it is clear that Taipans depended upon working class Europeans, such as policemen, for their private security and also skilled European workers for the successful running of their business enterprises in Hong Kong. These and other questions suggest that working class Europeans, although only a minor part of the total European popu- lation (if we exclude soldiers, sailors and merchant seamen), cannot be dismissed summarily as of little account in the social and eco- nomic development of Hong Kong. A thesis of this essay is that their importance has not been stressed sufficiently by historians and writers on colonial Hong Kong.
THE EUROPEAN WORKING CLASS IN HONG KONG
Broadly speaking, working class Europeans in nineteenth cen- tury Hong Kong may be divided into five groups-(1) beachcom- bers; (2) police or those with quasi-police functions: inspectors, supervisors, and overseers in government employ; (3) soldiers, sailors and merchant seamen; (4) mechanics, artisans, and others in low status occupations; and (5) outcastes.† The divisions are not clear cut; there is a certain amount of overlapping; movement from group to group did take place. The divisions reflect a subjective ranking of occupations and statuses by middle class Europeans, such as merchants, in Hong Kong. In Britain at that time, super- visors and inspectors would have been regarded as members of the lower middle class; but in Hong Kong a telescoping of social classes took place because there was no true equivalent of a European proletariat, of manual workers. A European was accepted as either respectably middle class or as not-the acid test was one of com- mensality. Inevitably, a number of Europeans existed in a limbo
* I have been unable to explore this subject as exhaustively as I would have wished, and suggest that it is a suitable subject for research.
† For a contemporary instance see Halcombe (1896) p. 186.
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