Chineseness and Affective Spatialities: New Chinese Migrants' (Dis)Orienting Experiences of Chinese Voluntary Associations in Singapore

ABSTRACT This paper explores how new Chinese migrants negotiate Chineseness through their engagement with Chinese voluntary associations (CVAs) in host societies. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork with new migrants involved in CVAs in Singapore, I conceptualize CVAs as affective spaces that generate (dis)orienting effects, shaping new migrants' negotiation of Chineseness in a context of ‘togetherness‐in‐difference’. Specifically, CVAs function as ‘convivial spaces’ where new migrants rely on a primordial form of Chineseness to gain familiarity, connectivity, and a sense of orientation in a new settlement. At the same time, CVAs serve as contact zones infused with disorienting encounters with local Singaporean Chinese, producing variegated understandings of Chineseness. By highlighting the affective spatialities of CVAs, this paper advances a geographical approach to understanding Chineseness and contributes to the existing literature on migrant (dis)orientation.