PhD thesis final - Royal Holloway, University of London

Chapter 4- Home, domesticity and belongingSoon after I found that they have some strange behaviours, I was very careful about theirmanner and told them what they can do and what not to do. [Yuhui: For example?] At onetime, my son was punished and beat seriously by my husband just because he spat on thestreet, just like those Chinese do. We just wanted him to know that it is not good mannersand he should not to do that again. [Besides], I am also concerned with the way mychildren dress, I can stand it if they dress like a local Chinese. But my daughter alwayswants to do that [helpless smile], like she always likes to wear socks when she puts onsandals. No Taiwanese will do that, it is so weird and ugly. So, I always dress her myself tomake her look like a Taiwanese kid [laugh].As the excerpt implies, Taiwanese expatriates will often do something to keep theungraceful manners which are often attributed to bad Chinese influences out of theirhouseholds and to impose Taiwanese manners in home education and raising children(see also Wolf 2002, cited in Blunt and Dowling 2006:218). As such, it also implicatesthat it is parent‘s identity, especially their national identity, which has been imposed ontheir children through home education. Betty told me that, once, when her son (in thethird grade in a local primary school) saw Taiwan‘s national flag on a book, he told toher ‗this is the flag of your country‘. She said that she was so surprised and very sadabout that, so, she corrected him by saying that ‗this is not only mine, it is yours too‘.This incident has made Betty realise her patriotism as she said to me ‗not until then, Ididn‘t know how patriotic I am [laugh]‘. This also reveals that Taiwanese identity isoften reinforced and affirmed by the very ordinary things that happened in myrespondents‘ everyday lives.Taiwanese expatriates‘ practices to turn the domestic domain into a bulwark for146