Chinese in New York City in the context of "Elmhurst, Queens"

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⭐ Core Definition: Chinese in New York City

The New York metropolitan area is home to the largest and most prominent ethnic Chinese population outside of Asia, with populations representing all 34 provincial-level administrative units of China. Estimated at 924,619 in 2024, it is the largest and most prominent metropolitan Asian national diaspora outside Asia. New York City proper contained an estimated 628,763 Chinese Americans in 2017, by far the highest ethnic Chinese population of any city outside Asia.

New York City and its surrounding metropolitan area, including Long Island and parts of New Jersey, is home to 12 Chinatowns: districts where Chinese immigrants were made to live for economic survival and physical safety that are now known as important sites of tourism and urban economic activity. The city proper includes six Chinatowns (or nine, including the emerging Chinatowns in Elmhurst and Whitestone, Queens, and East Harlem, Manhattan). There are also Chinese communities in more suburban areas such as Jersey City, New Jersey, Nassau County, Long Island; Edison, New Jersey; West Windsor, New Jersey; and Parsippany-Troy Hills, New Jersey.

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Chinese in New York City in the context of Southern Min

Southern Min (simplified Chinese: 闽南语; traditional Chinese: 閩南語; pinyin: Mǐnnányǔ; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Bân-lâm-gí/gú; lit. 'Southern Min language'), Minnan (Mandarin pronunciation: [mìn.nǎn]) or Banlam (Min Nan Chinese pronunciation: [bàn.lǎm]), is a group of linguistically similar and historically related Chinese languages that form a branch of Min Chinese spoken in Fujian (especially the Minnan region), most of Taiwan (many citizens are descendants of settlers from Fujian), Eastern Guangdong, Hainan, and Southern Zhejiang. Southern Min dialects are also spoken by descendants of emigrants from these areas in diaspora, most notably in Southeast Asia, such as Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Brunei, Southern Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, Southern and Central Vietnam, as well as major cities in the United States, including in San Francisco, in Los Angeles and in New York City. Minnan is the most widely-spoken branch of Min, with approximately 34 million native speakers as of 2025.

The most widely spoken Southern Min language is Hokkien, which includes Taiwanese.Other varieties of Southern Min have significant differences from Hokkien, some having limited mutual intelligibility with it, others almost none. Teochew, Longyan, and Zhenan are said to have general mutual intelligibility with Hokkien, sharing similar phonology and vocabulary to a large extent. On the other hand, variants such as Datian, Zhongshan, and Qiong-Lei have historical linguistic roots with Hokkien, but are significantly divergent from it in terms of phonology and vocabulary, and thus have almost no mutual intelligibility with Hokkien. Linguists tend to classify them as separate languages.

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Chinese in New York City in the context of East Harlem

East Harlem, also known as Spanish Harlem, or El Barrio, is a neighborhood of Upper Manhattan in New York City, north of the Upper East Side and bounded by 96th Street to the south, Fifth Avenue to the west, and the East and Harlem Rivers to the east and north. Despite its name, it is generally not considered to be a part of Harlem proper, but it is one of the neighborhoods included in Greater Harlem.

The neighborhood has one of the largest Hispanic communities in New York City, mostly Puerto Ricans, as well as Dominicans, Cubans, and Mexicans. The community is notable for its contributions to Latin freestyle and salsa music. East Harlem also includes the remnants of a once predominant Italian community, or Italian Harlem. The Chinese population has increased dramatically in East Harlem since 2000.

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Chinese in New York City in the context of Indians in the New York City metropolitan area

Indians in the New York City metropolitan area constitute one of the largest and fastest-growing ethnicities in the New York City metropolitan area of the United States. The New York City region is home to the largest and most prominent Indian American population among metropolitan areas by a significant margin, enumerating 792,367 uniracial individuals at the 2020 U.S. census. The Asian Indian population also represents the second-largest metropolitan Asian national diaspora both outside of Asia and within the New York City metropolitan area, following the also rapidly growing and hemisphere-leading population of the estimated 893,697 uniracial Chinese in the New York City metropolitan area in 2017.

The U.S. state of New Jersey, where most of the population is situated within the New York City metropolitan region, has by a significant margin the highest proportional Indian population concentration of any U.S. state. According to Census estimates in 2023, 4.6% of New Jersey's population consists of individuals of Indian origin. New Jersey is the state with the highest percentage of individuals with Indian ancestry in the United States, at approximately 5%.

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Chinese in New York City in the context of Liu Wen (model)

Liu Wen (simplified Chinese: 刘雯; traditional Chinese: 劉雯; pinyin: Liú Wén; born 27 January 1988) is a Chinese model. She is widely regarded as China's first supermodel. She was the first Chinese model to walk the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show, the first East Asian spokesmodel for Estée Lauder cosmetics, and the first Asian model to ever make Forbes magazine's annual highest-paid models list. In 2017, Liu became the second Chinese model to ever appear on the cover of American Vogue, and the first to be featured on the front cover rather than foldout. She landed on the cover a second time in American Vogue's April 2020 issue and a third in May 2023, becoming the first person of Chinese descent to appear three times. In 2024, she became the first model of Asian descent to be featured solo on the cover of French Vogue. She is currently represented by The Society Management and is based in New York City.

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Chinese in New York City in the context of Fuzhounese Americans

Fuzhounese Americans, also known as Hokchew Americans or Fuzhou Americans or imprecisely Fujianese, are Chinese American people of Fuzhou descent, in particular from the Changle district. Many Chinese restaurant workers in the United States are from Fuzhou. There are also a number of undocumented Fuzhounese immigrants in the United States who are smuggled in by groups such as snakeheads.

Fuzhounese Americans helped develop the Chinatown bus lines system, which originated as a means to transport restaurant workers from New York City to various parts of the northeastern United States.

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