• Compelling culture: The rhetoric of assimilation among Samoan migrants in the United States

    Author(s):
    Ilana Gershon (see profile)
    Date:
    2007
    Group(s):
    Anthropology
    Subject(s):
    Culture, Australasia, Oceania
    Item Type:
    Article
    Tag(s):
    Australasian/Pacific culture
    Permanent URL:
    http://dx.doi.org/10.17613/M64Z1D
    Abstract:
    Studies of assimilation tend to focus on whether or not members of a migrant group are adjusting to their new surroundings. This article inverts this focus, asking not how migrant groups adjust, but rather how migrant groups use the language of assimilation to explain generation gaps and other exigencies of migration. This inversion sheds light on the ways a migrant group’s epistemological assumptions underlie their understandings of cultural identity, and shape how they might respond to dilemmas caused by migration. Building upon ethnographic fieldwork among Samoan migrants in the United States, the article explores how and why community workers use the rhetoric of assimilation to teach Samoan parents how to raise children in the U.S. context.
    Metadata:
    xml
    Published as:
    Journal article     Show details
    Pub. DOI:
    10.1080/01419870701491812
    Publisher:
    Informa UK Limited
    Pub. Date:
    2007-8-2
    Journal:
    Ethnic and Racial Studies
    Volume:
    30
    Issue:
    5
    Page Range:
    787 - 816
    ISSN:
    0141-9870,1466-4356
    Status:
    Published
    Last Updated:
    6 years ago
    License:
    All Rights Reserved
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