Asian Australians

Asian Australians are Australians who trace their ancestry to Asia.

Asian Australians
Total population
Up to 3,550,882 (2016)
Up to 16.3% of Australia's population[1][2]
Regions with significant populations
Capital cities of Australia:
Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, Darwin and Canberra
Australian towns and regions:
Notably Broome and the Torres Strait Islands[upper-alpha 1]
External territories of Australia:
Christmas Island and Cocos Islands (More than 90% of the total populations of the two territories)[upper-alpha 2]
Languages
Australian English · Asian languages
Religion
Buddhism · Christianity · Hinduism · Sikhism · Islam · East Asian religions · Indian religions · other religions

The Australian Bureau of Statistics and Australian Census does not collect data on races or ethnicities. Instead, it collects information on distinct ancestries of which census respondents can select up to two. For the purposes of aggregating data, the Australian Bureau of Statistics in its Australian Standard Classification of Cultural and Ethnic Groups (ASCCEG) has grouped certain ancestries into certain categories, including:[7]

Notably, Middle Eastern ancestries are separately classified under Middle Eastern and North African and not as a subset of Asian ancestries.[7]

In general Australian English parlance (rather than statistical usage), 'Asian' generally refers to persons of East Asian and Southeast Asian ancestry, with persons of South Asian ancestry generally referred to by their specific national ancestral origin, e.g. 'Indian' or 'Pakistani'.

Given that ancestry is the primary statistical measure of ethnicity or cultural origins in Australia, and that the distinct ancestry groups may be historically, culturally and geographically far-removed from each other, information on Australians with ancestry from Asia are found at the respective articles for each separate article (e.g. Chinese Australian, Indian Australian, etc).

At the 2016 census, there were 3,550,882 nominations of ancestries classified by the Australian Bureau of Statistics as falling within the ASCCEG geographical categories of East Asia, Southeast Asia and Central and Southern Asia.[2] This represents 16.3% of the 21,769,209 persons who nominated their ancestry, and therefore represents the maximum proportion of the population with ancestry from one of the above Asian geographical categories given that some respondents may have nominated two ancestries from the Asian geographical categories.[8]

2,665,814 persons claimed one of the six most commonly nominated Asian ancestries, namely Chinese, Indian, Filipino, Vietnamese, Korean and Sri Lankan, at the 2016 census.[1] Persons claiming one of these six ancestries alone represented 12.25% of the total population who nominated their ancestry.[1]

History of immigration
See also: History of Chinese Australians

Gold rush
Main article: Victorian gold rush

Although the Chinese had been arriving in Australia as early as 1818 (e.g. John Shying), Chinese immigration to Australia increased dramatically as a result of the Victorian gold rushes (c. 1850s to 1860s). New Chinese and Australian communities came into conflict due to prejudice and misunderstanding, resulting in several riots at Lambing Flat and Buckland. Earlier anti-Chinese laws enacted by the individual Australian colonies were the background to the White Australia policy (1901-1973).

Immigration restriction
Main article: Immigration Restriction Act 1901

In the 1870s and 1880s, the trade union movement began a series of protests against foreign labour. The union movement was critical of Asians, mainly Chinese, who did not join unions, and who were prepared to work for lower wages and conditions. [9] Wealthy land owners in rural areas countered with the argument Asians working on lower wages and conditions were necessary for development in tropical Queensland and the Northern Territory.[9] It was claimed that without Asian workers these regions would be abandoned.[10] Under growing pressure from the union movement, each Australian colony enacted legislation between 1875-1888 excluding further Chinese immigration.[10]

Post-war immigration
Main article: Post-war immigration to Australia

The government began to expand access to citizenship for non-Europeans in 1957 by allowing access to 15-year residents, and in 1958 by reforming entry permits via the Migration Act 1958. In March 1966, the immigration ministry began a policy of allowing the immigration of skilled and professional non-Europeans, and of expanding the availability of temporary residency to these groups. These cumulatively had the effect of increasing immigration numbers from non-European countries. In 1973 Whitlam took steps to bring about a more non-discriminatory immigration policy—temporarily bringing down overall immigration numbers. The eventual evolution of immigration policy has been along a trajectory of non-discrimination, dismantling European-only policies, and the broadening of pathways to citizenship for Asians.[11] During the Fraser government, with the increasing intake of Vietnamese refugees in the aftermath of the Vietnam War, Australia experienced the largest intake of Asian immigrants since the arrival of the Chinese gold miners during the gold rush of the 1850s and 1860s. In 1983, the level of British immigration was below the level of Asian immigration for the first time in Australian history.[12]

Demographics

Notably, Australia does not collect statistics on the racial origins of its residents, instead collecting data at each five-yearly census on distinct ancestries, of which each census respondent may choose up to two..[8]

At the 2016 census, there were 3,550,882 nominations of ancestries classified by the Australian Bureau of Statistics as falling within the ASCCEG geographical categories of East Asia, Southeast Asia and Central and Southern Asia.[2] This represents 16.3% of the 21,769,209 persons who nominated their ancestry, and therefore represents the maximum proportion of the population with ancestry from one of the above Asian geographical categories given that some respondents may have nominated two ancestries from the Asian geographical categories.[8]

2,665,814 persons claimed one of the six most commonly nominated Asian ancestries, namely Chinese, Indian, Filipino, Vietnamese, Korean and Sri Lankan, at the 2016 census.[1] Persons claiming one of these six ancestries alone represented 12.25% of the total population who nominated their ancestry.[1]

30% of Asians in Australia go to university, 20% of all Australian doctors are Asian, and 37% of Asian Australians take part in some form of organised sport.[13] Second and third generation Chinese and Indian Australians are already present in large numbers.[13] Sydney and Melbourne have made up a large proportion of Asian immigration, with Chinese Australians constituting Sydney's fourth largest ancestry (after English, Australian and Irish). Chinese, Indian and Vietnamese-Australians are among Sydney's five largest overseas-born communities.[14]

Population of Asian Australian Ancestries[2]
AncestryPopulation
Chinese Australians1,213,903
Indian Australian619,163
Filipino Australians304,015
Vietnamese Australian294,798
Malaysian Australian138,364
Korean Australian123,017
Sri Lankan Australian 109,853
Japanese Australian71,013
Thai Australian70,234
Indonesian Australian65,881
Pakistani Australian64,346
Nepalese Australian62,806
Other Indian subcontinent56,400
Bangladeshi Australian50,072
Malaysian Australian46,074
Burmese Australian49,178
Cambodian Australian45,720
Other Central Asian25,166
Taiwanese Australian18,522
Laotian Australian15,132
Anglo-Indian Australian13,220
Timorese Australian8,961
Singaporean Australian8,404
Other Southeast Asian7,023
Other North Asian5,595
Hmong Australian3,343
Metropolitan areas with significant Asian Australian populations (2016 Census)[2]
Metropolitan areaAsian ancestry responsesAsian ancestry responses (% of population nominating ancestry)
Sydney 1,264,242 28%
Melbourne 1,026,536 24.4%
Brisbane 294,389 13.9%
Perth 319,302 17.6%
Adelaide 169,018 13.8%

Notable people

For principal lists of notable people, see the relevant articles for each relevant ethnicity, for example: Chinese Australians, Indian Australians, Vietnamese Australians, Malaysian Australians, Filipino Australians, Korean Australians.

Notes
  1. Broome and the Torres Strait Islands were historically home to thousands of Asian migrants that settled in northern Australia as part of the pearling industry. These Asian migrants were of Japanese, Chinese, Filipino, Malay and Sri Lankan (mostly Sinhalese descent). These migrants integrated into local society marrying Indigenous Australians (Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders), which was very common at the time, and European Australians later on. Today, many long time residents in Broome and the Torres Strait Islands have partial Asian ancestry tracing back to these early migrants.[3]
  2. The population of Christmas Islanders of full or partial Asian descent consists mainly of Australians of Malaysian descent particularly Malaysian Chinese and Malay descent but also some individuals of Malaysian Indian descent.[4][5] The majority of inhabitants on the Cocos Islands are the Cocos Malays, who are the indigenous people of Cocos Island. There are also minority populations of ethnic Chinese and Indian descent.[6]

See also

References
  1. "2016 Census Community Profiles: Australia". quickstats.censusdata.abs.gov.au. Archived from the original on 20 April 2020. Retrieved 13 April 2020.
  2. "Census TableBuilder - Guest Users Log in". guest.censusdata.abs.gov.au. Archived from the original on 26 April 2019. Retrieved 13 April 2020.
  3. Anna Shnukal; Guy Ramsay; Yuriko Nagata (2017). Navigating Boundaries: The Asian Diaspora in Torres Strait. Pandanus Books. ISBN 9781921934377. Archived from the original on 11 October 2020. Retrieved 13 September 2020.
  4. "Island induction - Christmas Island District High School". Archived from the original on 3 August 2017. Retrieved 29 October 2015.
  5. Simone Dennis (2008). Christmas Island: An Anthropological Study. Cambria Press. pp. 91–. ISBN 9781604975109. Archived from the original on 31 December 2015. Retrieved 29 October 2016.
  6. "Culture and Language | Cocos Keeling Islands". www.cocoskeelingislands.com.au. Archived from the original on 2 March 2018. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
  7. Statistics, c=AU; o=Commonwealth of Australia; ou=Australian Bureau of (18 December 2019). "Main Features - Overview". www.abs.gov.au. Archived from the original on 23 June 2019. Retrieved 23 June 2019.
  8. Statistics, c=AU; o=Commonwealth of Australia; ou=Australian Bureau of. "Fact sheet - Ancestry". www.abs.gov.au. Archived from the original on 26 January 2020. Retrieved 13 April 2020.
  9. Markey, Raymond (1 January 1996). "Race and organized labor in Australia, 1850–1901". Highbeam Research. Archived from the original on 19 October 2017. Retrieved 25 March 2013.
  10. Griffiths, Phil (4 July 2002). "Towards White Australia: The shadow of Mill and the spectre of slavery in the 1880s debates on Chinese immigration" (RTF). 11th Biennial National Conference of the Australian Historical Association. Archived from the original on 14 February 2015. Retrieved 25 March 2013.
  11. "Fact Sheet - 8. Abolition of the 'White Australia' Policy". Australian Department of Immigration. Archived from the original on 1 September 2006. Retrieved 11 April 2015.
  12. Price, CA (September 1998). "POST-WAR IMMIGRATION: 1945-1998". Journal of the Australian Population Association. 15 (2): 17.
  13. Kennedy, Duncan (17 September 2012). "Young Asians making their mark on Australia". BBC News. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 29 October 2016.
  14. "2011 Census QuickStats: Greater Sydney". Archived from the original on 16 January 2013. Retrieved 7 October 2012.
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