History Main / ChineseLaborer

* ''Film/BlazingSaddles''
--> [Chinese Laborer working on railroad tracks falls to the ground from exhaustion]\\
'''Lyle''': [[KickTheDog Dock that Chink a day's pay for napping on the job]].

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* During UsefulNotes/WorldWarI the British government recruited the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Labour_Corps Chinese Labour Corps]]. Though the men served under British officers, were subject to military discipline, and took casualties from enemy fire, they were not dignified with the status of soldiers, in the same way as normal military engineers. The French government hired Chinese laborers in a similar manner. In total, something like ''140,000'' Chinese citizens served on the Western front, and are now almost totally forgotten.

* Kwai Chang Caine tended to run into a lot of these while WalkingTheEarth in ''Series/KungFu''; not surprising given his ethnicity.

* A British variant on this trope: Chinese immigrants in the UK are best known for working in catering and the food takeaway trade. In controversial sitcom ''Series/LoveThyNeighbour'', the put-upon owner of the local takeaway is the butt of casual racism by both Bill (black) and Eddie (white). Eddie, predictably, calls him Literature/FuManchu. Bill displays a racist streak - against Chinese - by calling him [[UsefulNotes/MaoZedong Mao Tse Tung]]. Neighbours normally locked in everyday black-versus-white prejudice [[NotSoDifferent bond]] against yellow.

* The video game ''VideoGame/ShadowWarrior'' features undead coolies as a type of enemy. They try to blow you up with dynamite, and sometimes come back as ghosts when they die.

* In the Colleen McCullough novel ''The Touch'', upon emigrating to Australia from Scotland and being given a tour of her wealthy new husband's home, Elizabeth Kinross is surprised to see that everyone of her servants is Chinese--there was a substantial Chinese immigrant population in Australia at the time of the book's setting—as she's never even seen people of another ethnicity before leaving Scotland.

'''Lyle''': [[KickTheDog Dock that Chink a day's pay for napping on the job.]]
* Miniature Chinese laborer figures come to life and attack Ben Stiller's character in a wild west diorama in ''Film/NightAtTheMuseum''.

* ''Film/DeathToSmoochy'' has Edward Norton's pacifist character explain, "When my brothers played CowboysAndIndians, I was always the Chinese railroad worker."

* A British variant on this trope: Chinese immigrants here are best known for working in catering and the food takeaway trade. In controversial sitcom ''Series/LoveThyNeighbour'', the put-upon owner of the local takeaway is the butt of casual racism by both Bill (black) and Eddie (white). Eddie, predictably, calls him Fu Manchu. Bill displays a racist streak - against Chinese - by calling him Mao Tse Tung. Neighbours normally locked in everyday black-versus-white prejudice [[NotSoDifferent bond]] against yellow.

* A British variant on this trope: Chinese immigrants here are best known for working in catering and the food takeaway trade. In controversial sitcom ''Series/LoveThyNeighbour'', the put-upon owner of the local takeaway is the butt of casual racism by both Bill (black) and Eddie (white). Eddie, predictably, calls him Literature/FuManchu. Bill displays a racist streak - against Chinese - by calling him Mao Tse Tung. Neighbours normally locked in everyday black-versus-white prejudice [[NotSoDifferent bond]] against yellow.

In the fiction of the Nineteenth and early Twentieth Century, the ChineseLaborer is often a sinister figure who fills the ranks of a [[NebulousEvilOrganization Secret Society]] and lusts for the pure white women that the hero must protect. About the time of UsefulNotes/WorldWarII, when China became the United States' ally, the depiction [[FairForItsDay shifted]], and the Chinese laborer tended to be shown as the victim of prejudice and needing the help of a [[WhiteMansBurden white hero]] to save him from bigots. Modern depictions tend to be a bit more nuanced... we hope.

--> [ChineseLaborer working on railroad tracks falls to the ground from exhaustion]\\

-->'''James H. Strobridge''', Central Pacific Railroad foreman, testifying before the US Congress in 1876

* A bunch of them feature in ''Film/ShanghaiNoon''.