A Comparison of the Integration Experiences of Two African Immigrant Populations in a Rural Community

Abstract

Most U.S. migration research compares very distinct groups, such as Mexicans and Asians, and virtually ignores the small, but growing number of African immigrants. In contrast, this study describes and compares the integration experiences of two Black, East African refugee populations in a small town in the Midwestern United States. We demonstrate that Muslim Somalis and Christians from southern Sudan encounter similar structural obstacles to social and economic integration, but that their religious affiliations lead to sharply different opportunities and cultural strategies. This paper ends with a discussion of the implications of these findings for social work practice and the potential role of social workers as cultural brokers between new immigrant groups and the general public.     

行进中的家园书写——加勒比流散文学的变迁研究

家园书写是流散文学创作亘古不变的主题。作为最早的世界性移民地区之一,加勒比是多种不同的种族、语言、宗教和文化传统杂交和融合的十字路口,因此,其文学中的家园书写在全球化流散背景下极具前瞻性意义。加勒比文学中的家园书写形成过程经历了较长历史时期的变迁,时间跨度约四百年,前后主要经历了三个阶段,即以真实的家园再现为特点的殖民书写、以真实与想象混杂中的家园镜像为特点的后殖民书写和以想象中的家园梦想为特点的流散写作等     

Transnational diaspora entrepreneurship in emerging markets: Bridging institutional divides

Transnational diasporan entrepreneurs are migrants and their descendants who establish entrepreneurial activities that span the national business environments of their countries of origin and countries of residence. We explore how business incubators contribute to the economic development of emerging markets by organizing their programs to bridge the institutional divides that transnational diaspora entrepreneurs face when establishing their multi-territorial ventures in these markets. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork conducted in the Netherlands during 2007, we present the case study of IntEnt, an incubator providing services exclusively to transnational diasporan entrepreneurs. We apply Bergek and Norrman's (2008) assessment framework to this case, examining IntEnt's goals, model (selection, business support, and mediation activities), and outcomes. Employing Eisenhardt's case-based theory development approach (1989), we then leverage case findings to generate theory about the institutional challenges faced by transnational diaspora entrepreneurs and the role that incubators can play in helping these entrepreneurs overcome these challenges.     

Cluster life cycle and diaspora effects: Evidence from the Indian IT cluster in Bangalore

The role of local clusters has been of interest to scholars and policymakers in international business alike. Research found that clusters enable a region to develop faster compared to dispersed economic activity, based mainly on a local concentration of competing and cooperating firms and sophisticated domestic demand. Locating in a cluster has certain benefits for firms stemming from pooling of human capital and supporting institutions varying by industry and international specialization.In this paper, we extend the local view of clusters and emphasize the complementary role of non-local linkages, in particular diasporas, illustrating our model employing the case of the evolution of the Bangalore IT cluster. The novelty of our paper lies in its longitudinal character. We are thereby able to identify how the roles of local and non-local networks differ across life-cycle phases; moreover, we find that diasporas can trigger or accelerate local development. We discuss implications for managers and policy makers.     

论“流散诗人”艾布·马迪长诗《秘符》的哲学思想

《秘符》是"流散诗人"艾布.马迪的一部经典之作。诗中场景的不断转换、诗人对万物的不停质疑体现着诗人在阿拉伯传统文化和西方文化的双重作用下不断对自我身份探索、认同的过程。诗人身上文化的混杂性使他不断地反思自己的属性。作为一名流散者,他迫切地希望找到自己的归属感,而两种文化的差异注定使他的心灵漂泊在对归属的寻求中而不能落脚。于是,诗人的作品中便充满了这种寻求所带来的哲学思考,这也便是《秘符》之所以"秘"的原因所在。     

Securing the diasporic ‘self’ by travelling abroad: Taglit-Birthright and ontological security

ABSTRACT

In recent years, the literature on diaspora politics has focused primarily on why and when migrant or ethno-religious groups adopt a diasporic stance and mobilise on behalf of their homeland. The ability of a community to sustain a diasporic stance across generations is less explored and often assumed to be dependent on discrimination in the host country or events in the homeland. By contrast, this article focuses on internal dynamics of the Jewish-American community to explore the development of Taglit-Birthright – a free educational trip to Israel offered to young Jewish adults. Drawing on the concept of ontological security – security of identity and subjectivity – I argue that the decision to invest in such a costly and experimental programme was the result of two perceived threats to Jewish diasporic identity: the threat to the diasporic narrative and the threat to the relationship with the homeland. Evidence for this claim is generated through interpretation of internal documents, media reports, and secondary literature.     

The Lebanese diasporic field: the impact of sending and receiving states

What is a diaspora? Can it be distinguished from a ‘transnational community’? This paper discusses the Lebanese migrants abroad and their relationships with Lebanon by deploying the Bourdieusian concept of ‘field’. It argues that Bourdieu’s concept of field helps to capture the dynamic character of diasporic relations and the power relations that underpin them. It also enables the researcher to better delineate the boundary of a diasporic community and at the same time to treat this boundary as flexible enough to identify the specific terms for entering and exiting the ‘diasporic field’. It also argues that at a time when diasporic relations are cross-national, that specifically revolve around a real or imaginary ‘homeland’, they encompass individual, group and institutional actors that belong with varying degrees to the country of origin and the countries of settlement. Finally, the paper concludes that the ‘diasporic field’ is a useful analytical tool to capture the complexities of increasingly ubiquitous diasporic relations.     

Palestinian perceptions of home and belonging in Britain: negotiating between rootedness and mobility

In this article based on ethnographic research among Palestinians in Britain, I argue that applying a ‘decentred’ conception of diaspora provides an understanding of the complexity of Palestinian identity-making in Britain. After a critical review of theorizations of the notion of diaspora and its relevance to this case study, I discuss ethnographic data to illustrate how processes of rooting and mobility are linked together in various contexts in which personal migration trajectories and positionalities play an important part. I demonstrate that, for Palestinians in Britain, diaspora relates to connections constructed both in relation to their homeland and other frames of reference: in relation to both roots and mobility.     

Transnationalism and Relationships with ‘Home’ among Women in the East Timorese Community in Melbourne

This article focuses on transnationalism and long distance nationalism among East Timorese women in Melbourne, Australia, in the post independence period. It explores the relationships these women have with East Timor and how they engage in transnational practices. It examines the community's self-perception as East Timorese in Australia and their engagement with East Timor, particularly during the 2006 unrest there. Despite being in a liminal position living between two cultures, their country of origin and the country they reside in, most women (even those who rarely visit East Timor) still identify as ‘East Timorese’. I discuss the challenges with returning ‘home’, and how this affects the community's ‘imaginings’ of East Timor. The community retains a predominantly idealistic view of East Timor, but this is increasingly complemented by a nuanced understanding of the challenges faced by their presence ‘at home’.     

‘Coming Down to the Shop’: Trajectories of Hadhrami Women into Indonesian Public Realms

This article is concerned with the trajectories of Indonesian women of Hadhrami-Arab descent into public realms. It enquires how their agency has developed out of a particular diasporic tradition that has brought a gender order to colonial Indonesia characterised by a rigid division of public and domestic domains. In Indonesia, Hadhrami concepts of the public and domestic encountered local and governmental gender regimes and experienced considerable transformations in recent decades. The article shows how Hadhrami women coped with this dynamic and manifold field of gender relations and examines the expansion of their agency into Indonesian public realms paying particular attention to their economic activities, their public roles as skilled employees and professionals, and their engagement in the women's wings of Hadhrami-Islamic organisations. The article concludes that their deployment of particular Islamic discourses stressing piousness through the construction of a gendered hierarchy in the domestic but not in the public sphere underpins their agency in today's Indonesia which witnesses a general trend towards the appearance of self-consciously pious Muslim women.