As mentioned in another thread, I've just come across and am very impressed by this book:
"The Encyclopedia of the Chinese Overseas"
General editor Lynn Pan, second edition.
ISBN: 981-4155-90-X
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Encyclopedia-Ch ... 692&sr=1-1
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ency-Chinese-Ov ... 692&sr=1-2
[Note: the second edition is apparently quite an extensive upgrade of the first edition, so don't buy the first edition.]
It's published by the Chinese Heritage Centre, based in Singapore. It's got very many short contributions from individual scholars, and then text written by the editor to weave the whole thing into a coherent whole.
It starts with a definition of what it means to be Chinese and to be an overseas Chinese. It then moves on to several general chapters ("Origins", "Migration", "Institutions", "Relations", etc). It then goes on to cover in very well-written detail the overseas Chinese communities all over the world - one chapter per country. Of course most of the countries in S.E. Asia are covered, as are the US, Canada, Britain, Australia and New Zealand, but also places and countries where one hardly thinks about overseas Chinese, like the Pacific Islands, some countries on mainland Europe, Russia, Japan and Korea, India, Madagascar, South Africa, etc.
It's lavishly illustrated with old (and *recent*) photographs, drawings, and maps. It covers the migration of Chinese not just "in the old days" (i.e. 19th and early 20th century), but all the way to the 1990's, after the ecomic rise of the People's Republic.
I found it in a bookstore in Singapore, and it cost me S$53.40 there. My apologies if this book has been mentioned previously on this Forum. This is the first time I've been aware of it. The subject matter is not restricted to just Hokkien/Minnan stuff, but there's so much information about Hokkien speakers (though not much about the language itself) that I thought many readers of this Forum would probably like to know about it.
Sim
P.S. The few remarks which are made about language are all very sensible ones, like the fact that the so-called Chinese "dialects" are more the equivalent of different languages in the Romance family, etc. I.e. the linguistic aspects of the book are just as professional as the rest.
I recommend this book
For this kind of book just flip through in a bookshop will do.I recommed this new dict published last month for our own good although we still can't ask for dict on 龙溪，海沧 ,南安 etc
http://product.dangdang.com/product.asp ... d=20097794
http://product.dangdang.com/product.asp ... d=20097794
. Take care, and have a great Rat Year!