ABSTRACT
From the 18th century, China and Chinese culture were categorised by the West, via discourses of alterity and Orientalism, as the Other of what the West saw as its own progressive modernity. Chinese architecture, old and new, was seen as representing a culture mired in tradition and incapable of progress. It is argued here that the heritage of Chinese migrants in destination counties such as the USA, Canada and Australia has been similarly constructed as representing a timeless Oriental culture, an interpretation that is at odds with the self-identification of Chinese migrants as modern subjects. The Chinatowns of San Francisco, Vancouver and Sydney are shown to be exemplars of the Orientalist portrayal of an essential Chineseness. It is proposed that heritage experts in Australia have focused on structures such as temples and mosques to stress the difference of non-Anglo migrant cultures from an implied core Anglo culture which remains unalloyed by multiculturalism. It is argued that the ‘core culture’ construct has its counterpart in a ‘core heritage’ practice, a form of heritage practice that is overly concerned with difference and privileges the original form of old buildings over the material traces of their modification by migrants.
