Preferential treatment and benefits for foreign students of all nationalities caused tensions with Chinese students, but it was African students-especially those dating Chinese women- who became the focal point of violence and mob attacks in the late 70s and 80s
Protests against black students in the US are well known, but did you know that there is also a well-documented history of racially charged protests and attacks against African students in Chinese universities? Understanding these anti-African riots on Chinese campuses and the history behind them is crucial as there are now thousands of Africans in Guangzhou alone facingincreasing violence from Chinese police as we speak.
The History of African Students in China
With small groups of African students arriving starting in 1960, the first documented attack on an African occurred shortly thereafter with a Zanzibari man being beaten by hotel attendants in 1962.
China began offering full scholarships and fairly generous stipends (compared to Chinese students) to students from “friendly” countries in 1960- as part of its broader efforts to create a coalition against “white imperialism” under Chinese stewardship. Africans were featured prominently in these efforts, albeit with strong paternalistic undertones, as shown in CCP propaganda from the time:
[CCP propaganda- “The feelings of friendship between the peoples of China and Africa are deep, 1972″ via chineseposters.net]
Despitethe benevolent racism and ostensibly warm relationships between China and Africa evoked in CCP propaganda from the time, the landscape that African students found in China was one rife with racism. The preferential treatment for foreign students, including better dormitories and separate eating facilities, engendered significant resentment from local Chinese students, but anti-African racism made African students- especially those dating Chinese women- the focal point of violence.
With small groups of African students arriving starting in 1960, the first documented attack on an African occurred shortly thereafter with a Zanzibari man being beaten by hotel attendants in 1962 (x). Most of this early wave of African students returned home after a year or two “due to poor living standards, lack of social opportunities, and the politicized environment of the Mao years” (x). The racism they faced was pronounced but it was these latter factors which became the straw that broke the camel’s back for these early students.
[Africans protesting in Guangzhou in 2012 after a Nigerian migrant dies under mysterious circumstances while in Chinese police custody via NTD.tv]
The scholarship program for African students was restarted by the Chinese government in the mid-1970s. With this new influx of African students a little over a decade later, racial tensions exploded on many Chinese campuses.
Here are two of the major racist incidents in the 70s and 80s faced by African students on Chinese campuses that shape a lot of the anti-African (and more broadly anti-black with some caveats) violence that we see today in China:
The Shanghai Incident of July 1979
[A] mob of Chinese students attacked the African students with makeshift weapons, spurred by anger at their ‘loud music’ and rumors of African students raping Chinese women
[African protesters in Guangzhou confront Chinese police after a Nigerian migrant died while leaping from a window to escape Chinese police doing a sting operation checking African passports in his building. July 15, 2009 viaSina.com]
On July 3, 1979 Chinese students at the Shanghai Textile Engineering Institute complained about the loud music being played by African students and confronted them. A fight ensued, wherein a mob of Chinese students attacked the African students with makeshift weapons, spurred by anger at their ‘loud music’ and rumors of African students raping Chinese women. All in all “sixteen foreign students were hospitalized, but as many as 50 foreigners and 24 Chinese may have been injured" (Sautman 415 via Cowries and Rice).
This mob violence, along with the inadequate police response to protect Africans, increased tensions and sparked additional violence against African students throughout the 1980s that took on similar dimensions. These attacks led to the arrest and deportation of several African students during the 80s (x). Attempts by African governments to increase protections for their students on Chinese campuses were met with no concerted policy response. This persisted to the point that “[s]ome ambassadors recommended that their governments send fewer students to China until the situation changed.” (Sautman 419) (Sautman 413-420; Snow 202 via Cowries and Rice).
In Nanjing universities in 1980, “Chinese students put up posters denouncing their government for lavishing food and clothing on African visitors.” (Snow 201-202; Sullivan 445 via Cowries and Rice). In 1985, Chinese women in Nanjing who spent time in at least one African student’s dorm room may have been arrested for doing so (x). Similar violence to the Shanghai Incident occurred in Tianjin in 1986, where Chinese students attacked African students for playing loud music and for their relations with Chinese women (x).
This wave of violence in the 80s culminated in the infamous incident below
The 1988-89 Nanjing Anti-African Riots
More than 3,000 Chinese then marched on the railway station where the Africans were camped out “singing the national anthem and chanting, ‘Down with the Black Devils!’”
[ “Beijing students protest an alleged rape by one of the foreign students, 1989,” Time Inc. These Beijing protests against the alleged rape of Chinese women by African students erupted shortly after the Nanjing Anti-African Riots]
The Nanjing Anti-African riots were a series of mass demonstrations and attacks on African students in Nanjing between December 1988 and January 1989 starting at Hehai University. The violence was sparked after months of escalating tensions between African and Chinese students.
Earlier in 1988, the authorities at Hehai University built a wall around the foreign student’s hall to “ensure that African students did not bring Chinese women to their rooms” (x). This wall was dubbed “The Great Wall” by students in Nanjing, evoking the symbolism of the Great Wall of China which was built to keep “barbarians” from the north, who posed a military threat, out of China proper.
Hehai University President Liang Ruiju, said directly that the structure was necessary “to prevent a small number of African students from bringing women to their rooms.” He continued to say, “It’s a sex problem.” (x)
African students responded by knocking down the wall. The university stated that funds from their stipends would be deducted to pay for the damages to the wall and the students staged protests in response. The university then responded on Dec 24th, the date of a dance on campus, by requiring all foreigners to register their guests at the university gate (x). When two African students arrived with two Chinese women at the gate, a brawl ensued. A mob of more than 300 Chinese students gathered around the foreign student’s dormitory, spurred by rumors that a Chinese woman had been kidnapped. The groups fought early into the morning on Dec 25th (x).
During the day on the 25th another mob of 300 Chinese students mobilized, after a false rumors spread that the African students had killed a Chinese person in the fights the previous night. These students stormed the African student’s dormitories shouting “Kill the Black Devils!” and set fire to the dormitories (x). The African students escaped to the Nanjing railway station but were prevented from leaving for Beijing by Chinese police.
More than 3,000 Chinese then marched on the railway station where the Africans were camped out “singing the national anthem and chanting, ‘Down with the Black Devils!’” (x). The police stopped the protests and moved the African students to a military guest house outside of Nanjing. Three of the African students would later be deported for “starting” the riot.
As a black person who lived in Taiwan and visited China, where I had my own horrific experiences with antiblackness, I had never even heard of any of these attacks. If I had, it may have given me some context and warning before I moved to Taiwan and traveled to China.
[An Afro-Chinese couple in Guangzhou with their children. The racialized ‘fears’ of Chinese men evoked in the 70s and 80s of Chinese women in relationships with African men has increasingly become a reality in recent years. In Guangzhou especially there has been a large increase in interracial marriages between African men and Chinese women especially via SCMP]
Since the 1990s, the numbers of Africans in China (particularly in Guangzhou) has increased tremendously. Today there are thousands of Africans in Guangzhou alone living primarily in a part of the city dubbed “Chocolate City” by local Chinese. There has been an increase in connections in recent years, including interracial marriages between Africans and Chinese, but Africans in China today continue to face wide-ranging racism and targeted police violence.
As a Nigerian-American who lived in Taiwan for a year, I documented my own experiences with incredibly severe antiblack racism in China and Taiwan through my blog BlackinAsia.Even with my traumatic experiences, though, my American-ness and Western privilege afforded me some protections that Africans without Western passports do not have. Other Africans simply did not have these protections to avoid immigration raids and more.
[An African protester confronting a Chinese policeman in Guangzhou after a Nigerian man died mysteriously in police custody after a taxi fare dispute. June, 2012 via Reporters-360]
In July 2009, a Nigerian man in Guangzhou died after jumping from a highrise to flee Chinese immigration authorities. Hundreds of Africans demonstrated at the local Public Security Bureau in response. In June 2012, a Nigerian migrant held in police custody after a taxi fare dispute died in mysterious circumstances in Guangzhou. This led to additional protests (x).
The historical roots of this violence traces back decades to the Nanjing Anti-African riots, The Shanghai Incident of 1979 and the sporadic attacks on Africans in the 60s. None of this was addressed at the time and the antiblackness and anti-African sentiments from then are still present today despite the increasing connections and numbers of Africans in China today.
I wish these events were better known and spoken about. As a black person who lived in Taiwan and visited China, where I had my own horrific experiences with antiblackness 4 years ago, I had never even heard of any of these attacks until the other day. If I had, it may have given me some context and warning before I moved to Taiwan and traveled to China. I can only hope that writing about this history will bring greater awareness to these events, so that other black people- especially Africans without Western passports- don’t go in as naive and unprepared as I was for the widespread antiblackness and anti-African sentiments there.
For the people who think that antiblackness in China is somehow a “new thing” after that museum exhibition that compared black people to animals this year
