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Comprises: 

• China in America : a study in the social life of the Chinese in the eastern cities of the United States; Read before the American Association for the Advancement of Science...Original stiff wrappers, Folding frontispiece illustration.16pp.
• The I Hing or ‘Patriotic Rising’ / A Secret Society Among the Chinese in America (offprint, Proceedings of the Numismatic and Antiquarian Society of Philadelphia, 1887-89); Chinese Secret Societies in the U.S. (offprint, Journal of American Folk-lore, 1890): Customs of the Chinese in America (offprint, Journal of American Folk-Lore, 1890) Original wrappers. 22pp. total, as issued, not consecutively numbered. Inscribed “Compliments of the author” on front-wrapper.  With Culin’s card inserted.

Rare pioneering studies of Chinese-American society, by an academic who later became the renowned expert on Games in non-western cultures. 

At a time of violent  anti-Chinese racism in California ,Culin began his scholarly career by studying the social life and culture of Chinese Americans in his native Philadelphia. His later examination of Chinese-American society and tradition included the American origin of the secret societies that preceded the sinister “Tongs" featured in  early 20th century pulp fiction