SOCIAL RESEARCH IN THE N.T. OF HONG KONG, 1963 245
population in the figures often makes detection difficult). Large numbers of able-bodied men being away, the women must assume new or at least increased responsibilities. Now it would seem that New Territories women, both Punti and Hakka, play a very active role in agricultural life. (It was not so everywhere in China, nor even throughout the south-east). And it may be that their agricultural skill is not only a consequence but a cause of the absence of the men. (I also raise the question whether in the past the agricultural roles of women were more noticeable among the Hakka than the Punti, and whether, in turn, male emigration was in earlier times promoted more strongly among the Hakka by such a difference). But however competent the women, a heavy draining away of male labour, when it cannot be replaced with hired hands, must impose a considerable strain on the women who stay at home. To see a woman ploughing the fields with a baby at her back suggests many questions about the conduct of her domestic affairs. But it is not simply a matter of her economic duties being increased; if men are away some reallocation must take place in the social roles of the household; family life is affected; even the control of community affairs may pass partly to women. One study in the New Territories (see Miss Jean Pratt's paper in The Eastern Anthropologist, vol. XIII No. 4, 1960) has already approached this subject, but it is a fit topic for several detailed enquiries, for, apart from the theoretical problems it raises in sociology and demography, it has many welfare aspects in the field of marriage, the care of children, and social control.
83. It seems to me to be important to study both ends of the movement to the United Kingdom. The migrants there are very far from being cut off from people at home, and their problems have a direct bearing on New Territories life. Stories of gambling losses and debt circulate widely. Talk of unemployment and the abuse of labour by restaurant owners upsets families with young men away. How the Chinese in Britain organise themselves, adjust themselves to their strange surroundings, and make use of the opportunities open to them are questions which deserve careful study. I have a Chinese graduate student under training in London who is interested in the problem, and if all goes well he should be able to produce a valuable study of it. As for the New Territories themselves, I think that the best material will come from community studies, because the effects of migration need to be studied in the
SOCIAL RESEARCH IN THE N.T. OF HONG KONG, 1963 245
population in the figures often makes detection difficult). Large numbers of able-bodied men being away, the women must assume new or at least increased responsibilities. Now it would seem that New Territories women, both Punti and Hakka, play a very active role in agricultural life. (It was not so everywhere in China, nor even throughout the south-east). And it may be that their agricul- tural skill is not only a consequence but a cause of the absence of the men. (I also raise the question whether in the past the agricul- tural roles of women were more noticeable among the Hakka than the Punti, and whether, in turn, male emigration was in earlier times promoted more strongly among the Hakka by such a difference). But however competent the women, a heavy draining away of male labour, when it cannot be replaced with hired hands, must impose a considerable strain on the women who stay at home. To see a woman ploughing the fields with a baby at her back suggests many questions about the conduct of her domestic affairs. But it is not simply a matter of her economic duties being increased; if men are away some reallocation must take place in the social roles of the household; family life is affected; even the control of community affairs may pass partly to women. One study in the New Territories (see Miss Jean Pratt's paper in The Eastern Anthropologist, vol. XIII No. 4, 1960) has already approached this subject, but it is a fit topic for several detailed enquiries, for, apart from the theoretical problems it raises in sociology and demography, it has many welfare aspects in the field of marriage, the care of children, and social control.
83. It seems to me to be important to study both ends of the movement to the United Kingdom. The migrants there are very far from being cut off from people at home, and their problems have a direct bearing on New Territories life. Stories of gambling losses and debt circulate widely. Talk of unemployment and the abuse of labour by restaurant owners upsets families with young men away. How the Chinese in Britain organise themselves, adjust themselves to their strange surroundings, and make use of the opportunities open to them are questions which deserve careful study. I have a Chinese graduate student under training in London who is interested in the problem, and if all goes well he should be able to produce a valuable study of it. As for the New Territories themselves, I think that the best material will come from community studies, because the effects of migration need to be studied in the
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