Australian Gold Rush Research Paper

Gold was discovered in Australia during The Australian Gold Rush in 1853 and the main part of the gold rush lasted for 25 years. The news about gold was spread quickly all around the world. Due to its value and wealth, gold was attracted Chinese immigrants and other nationalities such as European people. Chinese immigrants came to Australia to try to discover gold to get rich and make money. They had many difficulties during their migration and settling in Australia in order to achieve their dreams of having a better life. The aim of this paper is to discuss the experiences of the Chinese immigrants during the Australian gold rush period. This paper argues that Chinese migrants faced a lot of difficulties. However, most of them were able to

The gold rush contributed significantly and played a critical role in the Australian economy during the period. The result of this was that there were a lot of foreigners from European and Asian countries that migrated to Australia. China was one of these countries with the highest number of immigrants. According to Crissman, Beattie, and Selby (1985, p. 181) there are large numbers of Chinese came to Australia because of the discovery of gold in south-eastern Colonies. It is maintained by Crissman (1991) there were approximately 200,000 Chinese during the Australian gold rush. These people left their families in their home country and came by themselves to hopefully striking it rich in Australia. Furthermore, Chinese immigrants came to Australia across the sea by boat. Their journeys were not easy, as they were supposed to survive on the sea for several months. As reported by Zumerchik and Danver (2010) Chinese were attacked by pirates while travelling to Australia for the gold rush of the 1850s. They tried to survive with lack of food and caused them poor health condition. It is claimed by Watters (2002, p. 331), “The S.S. Ocean was unnecessarily placed in quarantine ... the 450 Chinese immigrants on hoard suffered severe deprivations.” Therefore, Chinese people faced difficulties when coming to

Ngai (2011, p. 12) argues that the goldfields were rife with conflict born of competition conflict among Europeans miners and Chinese miners. The European diggers considered the Chinese immigrants as their competitors. Although they were working together in order to find gold deposits, the European immigrants thought that the Chinese immigrants would overtake them (Fisher 1990). Additionally, the Chinese immigrants were seen as a menacing threat. Consequently, they were victimized and discriminated by the other immigrants and locals and faced discrimination due to their ethnicity. According to Littlejohn (2013) Anti-Chinese sentiment grew steadily, erupting in Australia’s worst race riot, in which 3000 Europeans attacked Chinese miners. Moreover, there was a law that was enacted to cast aside the Chinese immigrants. The Australian policies which started in the 1850’s Gold Rush continued through the "White Australia" policy were to make Chinese pay poll tax and suffer other discrimination imposed by statutes (Jia 2011). However, they overcame this issue with their petition to the Australian government. Gao (2011) points out that Chinese residency seekers fought in the Australian courts as part of their efforts in seeking the right to stay in Australia. Moreover, they experienced culture shock as a result of different values and ideologies from their traditional core beliefs. The Chinese immigrants