Children of Immigration

Carola Suárez-Orozco, Marcelo M. Suárez-Orozco

• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Year: 2002
• ISBN:
  9780674256972
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Emigration & Immigration
• Index: Social Sciences

Now in the midst of the largest wave of immigration in history, America, mythical land of immigrants, is once again contemplating a future in which new arrivals will play a crucial role in reworking the fabric of the nation. At the center of this prospect are the children of immigrants, who make up one fifth of America's youth. This book, written by the codirectors of the largest ongoing longitudinal study of immigrant children and their families, offers a clear, broad, interdisciplinary view of who these children are and what their future might hold.For immigrant children, the authors write, it is the best of times and the worst. These children are more likely than any previous generation of immigrants to end up in Ivy League universities--or unschooled, on parole, or in prison. Most arrive as motivated students, respectful of authority and quick to learn English. Yet, at the same time, many face huge obstacles to success, such as poverty, prejudice, the trauma of immigration itself, and exposure to the materialistic, hedonistic world of their native-born peers.The authors vividly describe how forces within and outside the family shape these children's developing sense of identity and their ambivalent relationship with their adopted country. Their book demonstrates how "Americanization, " long an immigrant ideal, has, in a nation so diverse and full of contradictions, become ever harder to define, let alone achieve.

1

THE VARIETIES OF IMMIGRANT EXPERIENCE

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Mei was born in an exclusive neighborhood in Hong Kong.¹ Her parents were focused in their motivation for migrating to the United States. As her mother put it, the family moved “to provide our children with a better learning environment.” The parents were concerned that in Hong Kong students like Mei and her brother, Xi, felt too much pressure to prepare for brutally competitive exams that are used to exclude even excellent students from pursuing higher education.

Mei, her parents, and her brother, Xi, came to Boston to visit relatives one summer a few years ago. After some reflection, the parents decided that Xi would stay behind with an aunt and uncle in a Boston suburb to pursue his high school studies. The parents returned to Hong Kong with Mei to prepare the family to make the permanent move. The family arrived in the United States nine months after receiving the proper documentation from the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). Three years after their migration, her mother was working as a Head Start teacher while her father had joined a high-tech company as a software engineer. Like many other immigrants, Mei’s father had a second job (in the PC-board import business).

Mei is a stellar student who is well liked by both peers and teachers. She has mastered the English language and already finds herself struggling to find words in her native Cantonese. Her mother is concerned that Mei’s new school is “too easy.”

Ramon’s mother revealed poignantly why she immigrated to the United States from El Salvador: “I came to save my life. My husband was in the military. He wanted to get out, so they tortured him and then he ‘disappeared.’ Then they came looking for me so I came here illegally to escape.” When his mother was forced to leave almost overnight, Ramon, a sad-eyed and slightly overweight twelve-year-old, stayed behind with caring relatives. He was able to join his mother after three years of separation.

When asked to complete the sentence “In life the most important thing is . . . ” Ramon promptly responded: “my school.” His mother reports with some irony in her voice that she is now forced to keep Ramon indoors after school and on weekends because of the pervasive violence and drug-related activities in their neighborhood. Though his friends and neighbors are nearly all Spanish speaking from a variety of countries (including El Salvador, Guatemala, and Mexico), Ramon spends most of his time indoors watching TV in English. In school, he is well behaved but struggles academically. One of his teachers wonders whether he is depressed or perhaps has a learning disability.

Monica, a vivacious ten-year-old with a warm smile and deeply inquiring eyes, arrived in the San Francisco area two years ago. Born in a Mexican border town with a booming tourist industry, she followed in the footsteps of her mother, who had migrated there three years earlier to learn English. When asked how she fared during the extended separation from her mother, Monica seemed puzzled because, she said, her mother had kept in close contact, visiting her often and regularly sending her gifts.

Monica’s mother was anxious that her three children learn English because, as she put it, “it is the universal language.” Her children, she insisted, will all become professionals. “We came here to go forward, not backward,” she reasoned. Her dream was that her children, with their flawless English and American education, would one day thrive in the upper levels of the tourist industry “either here [in the United States] or there [in Mexico].”

Monica loves her new school. When asked to complete the sentence “School is . . . ” her immediate response was “the pathway to success.” She excels in soccer and karate. Her teachers noted that Monica’s progress in English was remarkable. Though she greatly values her newly acquired language, Monica’s loyalty to her native Spanish is obvious. She says, with condemnation in her voice, that Latino students who no longer speak Spanish “negate Mexico.” While she loves her new school and is thriving academically, her loyalties to Mexico run deep. Nearly every holiday the family, en masse, returns to the border town where the children were born and where all their relatives live.

When asked why his family decided to migrate to Boston, André, a soft-spoken but precociously dignified twelve-year-old, replied chillingly, “There was too much killing in Haiti.” While his father’s explanation was more complex, it conveyed the same message. “Peace” in the United States was a primary factor in the decision to migrate, his father said. The father elaborated that beyond the safety concerns, he had been motivated by the economic opportunities and schooling options available to his children in the United States. He articulates the essence of the immigrant’s project: “I wanted a better life for my wife and children.”

André’s father was the family’s migration pioneer. He came to the United States six years ago, leaving his wife and children in a violence-torn neighborhood in Haiti’s capital. Though college educated, André’s father had to make a living as he could—mostly as a janitor and in maintenance work. Though demoralized by his inability to find work commensurate with his skill level, he worked regularly and was able to send money to his family in Haiti every month.

After a separation of over four years, André was able to join the father he now barely knew. His mother remained in Haiti, caring for the loving grandmother André dearly misses. André is enrolled in a bilingual program where he has little contact with white American children. Nevertheless, he is making good progress with his English. He hopes to one day become a doctor.

Sergio is a shy and acutely self-conscious twelve-year-old who arrived from a small rural village in Guatemala just over a year ago. He speaks Mayan as his first language and Spanish as his second. Sergio was left behind in Guatemala with his grandparents for six years. His father, mother, and uncles had gone ahead on the dangerous journey north by land through Mexico. They sent for Sergio once they felt secure enough to bring their son into the country. His parents said that in rural Guatemala there was nothing for them to do, “no jobs, no opportunities, no future.”

In Sergio’s view, the hardest thing about immigration for the family was being apart for so long. In response to the question “What do you hope for your family?” he responded, “that we will always be together.” Though he is delighted to be reunited with his parents, he deeply misses his grandmother, cousins, and classmates in Guatemala.

Sergio told us that the best thing about living in the United States was “having shoes and a telephone.” He is now enrolled in a San Francisco Bay Area school where most of his classmates are Mexican. While he interacts in Spanish with his Mexican peers, he does not feel fully accepted by them. His teachers find him to be well behaved and highly motivated to learn English.

As these portraits suggest, multiple pathways structure the immigrant’s journeys into their new home. Many children of immigrants enter the United States because their families are fleeing economic or political insecurity. Others come not simply to survive, but rather to thrive by taking full advantage of economic and professional opportunities. For analytical purposes, the motivations can be divided into two broad categories: socioeconomic factors and factors relating to fear of persecution based on political, ethnic, and religious affiliations.² In the real lives of real migrants, however, the pathways are not always so distinct. More often than not, the family’s decision is motivated by a variety of factors. Nevertheless, these categories are useful for understanding the experiences of immigrant families and their children.

In general, we call those who leave voluntarily due to social and economic motivations “immigrants,” while those who are escaping to freedom (paraphrasing Erich Fromm) we call “asylum seekers” or “refugees.” While they differ significantly in many important ways, immigrants and asylum seekers also share a number of common characteristics.

Once settled, both immigrants and asylum seekers often seek to bring family members to join them. A powerful (and natural) centripetal force draws families together. Indeed, over the last four decades, family reunification has continued to significantly add to the pool of new arrivals in American society.

Both asylum seekers and immigrants can have either documented (“legal”) or undocumented (“illegal”) status in their new country. In fact, contrary to widely held beliefs; the vast majority of immigrants in the United States today are documented.³ Many others remain in a limbo status (sometimes for many years) while their documentation requests are being considered and processed by the INS. The majority of asylum seekers fail to gain official (legal) status as formal refugees—with all the rights and obligations that such status confers.⁴

It would be a mistake to assume that asylum seekers and immigrants are internally homogeneous groups. For example, asylum seekers can be upper-status political elites (such as the early wave of Cuban refugees in Miami), members of an oppressed ethnic group (such as the Kosovo Albanians), or the poor and disenfranchised (such as those arriving from Haiti escaping state terrorism). Likewise, immigrants have highly personal motivations. Some seek to permanently settle in the new land. Others intend to return home eventually and view themselves as sojourners or temporary transnational migrants.

Immigrant Pathways

Immigration, a major life decision, has important psychological and social implications for the individual and the family group. On the eve of departure, immigrants face an uncertain future with potential for both gains and losses. It is an enterprise that is often carefully planned and never taken lightly.

Throughout human history, immigrants have been driven by twin forces: powerful socioeconomic factors as well as individual agency and motivation. What makes people migrate? Scholars of immigration have very different views.

Economists, not surprisingly, tend to emphasize factors such as employment and wages. Thus, in their view, a would-be immigrant from rural China makes a rational cost-benefit calculation that migrating to the United States will result in substantial gains for himself and his family. For example, he may conclude that in a month of working two or three jobs in the United States, he can earn more than he would in a year in China.

Economists talk about “push” factors—including unemployment, underemployment, and differences in wages between countries—and the “pull” factors such as employers’ recruitment of immigrant workers.⁵ In many settings, international labor-recruiting networks deliver low-skilled foreign workers into low-paying, physically demanding, and dangerous jobs that locals find unappealing.⁶ Employers seek these immigrants because they are noted for being compliant, reliable, and flexible about their job duties and hours.⁷

While some wonder if an advanced postindustrial economy like that of the United States really still needs to rely on foreign-born workers, other researchers argue that foreign workers continue to be critical to vast sectors of the U.S. economy.⁸ Large agricultural firms in dusty California towns—“agrobusiness”—are no longer alone in their strident lobbying for immigrant workers; the high-tech industry has joined the clamor. Indeed, in the last decade, the voracious demand for immigrant labor continues to draw workers from other countries.

On the other hand, sociologists tend to look for the causes of immigration in interpersonal forces and social networks. People migrate because others—relatives, friends, and friends of friends—migrated before them. The first immigrants break the ground for the foundation in the new land. They provide connections that are vital to subsequent immigrants from the same point of origin, by collecting information and contacts about jobs, places to live, schools, and so forth. Over time, powerful self-sustaining transnational networks are generated. It is no accident, then, that one of our research sites, in the largely Dominican Boston neighborhood of Jamaica Plain, has been dubbed “Baní Plain” after the Dominican town of Baní where many residents have their roots.

Another group of immigration observers—anthropologists—tend to focus on the cultural reasons behind immigration. Changes in cultural models about what is a desirable standard of living have figured powerfully in the history of immigration. When would-be immigrants see television images and hear first-hand accounts of life abroad, they begin to imagine a better future in another social setting. The media, increasingly a telescopic acculturation force, combine with an informal network of reported immigration experiences to extend the possibilities for new social and economic horizons. The search for a better standard of living is an enduring motivation among immigrants from such varied places as Ireland (en route to Boston), Japan (en route to Sao Paulo), and China (en route to San Francisco).

In certain cultural groups, immigration is seen as a rite of passage: when young men and women come of age, they are expected to migrate. In some rural Mexican towns, for example, a stunningly high proportion of youth migrate after reaching a certain age. Many never return; instead they start families in their new land.⁹

Immigrant parents share with other parents back home attitudes about the opportunities available to the next generation in the new country. During the course of our research, immigrant parents often reported that a primary motivation for leaving was to pursue better opportunities for their children in the new country.

These attitudes seem to change and intensify after parents settle in the new country and begin to have a better sense of the formidable task ahead. Many times they are faced with a severe social demotion. Old skills and degrees do not easily translate into good jobs in the new country. Luís Rodríguez, in his devastating memoir, describes how his father, a proud Mexican science teacher, ends up working as a lab janitor in Southern California.¹⁰ This is not uncommon. A Chinese doctor ends up working as a hospital attendant, and a Romanian photojournalist becomes a maid in a bed and breakfast.¹¹ Indeed, many of the parents in our study reported that while they were making more money than they had in their countries of origin, their social status was lower. Age, language skill, accreditation, and the enormous pressures to support the family financially (family both here and there) sharply limit the opportunities of many immigrant parents.

As these realities begin to sink in, the dream that their children may have a better future comes to sustain the parents. Our data suggest that prior to immigration (and indeed in the first phases of immigrant settlement in the new land), many parents have somewhat vague notions abou...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 The Varieties of Immigrant Experience
• 2 Rethinking Immigration
• 3 The Psychosocial Experience of Immigration
• 4 Remaking Identities
• 5 The Children of Immigration in School
• Epilogue
• Notes
• References
• Index