Migration Studies Commons^™

Review Of Refuge Beyond Reach: How Rich Democracies Repel Asylum Seekers By David Scott Fitzgerald, Wolfe Padawer

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

Review of Refuge Beyond Reach: How Rich Democracies Repel Asylum Seekers by David Scott FitzGerald, Oxford University Press (2019).

Torn Apart: A Closer Look At Our Cover Image, Sandra Rios

Culture, Society, and Praxis

No abstract provided.

Denkyem (Crocodile): Identity Development And Negotiation Among Ghanaian-American Millennials., Jakia Marie

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Ghanaian immigrants and second-generation Ghanaian-American Millennials are largely ignored in scholarship. Using qualitative methods, this study explored the experiences of Ghanaian-American Millennials who are first, 1.5, and second-generations with the purpose of understanding how they create, negotiate, and re-create identities. Twenty-one individuals were interviewed using a phenomenological approach. The main findings suggest that even though the sample populations were of different immigrant generations, they have some similar experiences, which demonstrates the value in exploring age instead of solely immigrant generation. The findings also suggest that there are a number of complex layers that are involved in identity development and negotiation …

Cultivating Moral Imagination Through Deliberative Pedagogy: Reframing Immigration Deliberation For Student Engagement Across Differences. A Response To "Deliberating Public Policy Issues With Adolescents: Classroom Dynamics And Sociocultural Considerations", Lisa Weasel

Democracy & Education

In “Deliberating Public Policy Issues with Adolescents,” the authors described what they determine to be an unsuccessful attempt at deliberative pedagogy on the topic of immigration in three high school classrooms that differed demographically. Specifically, the authors observed that students failed to engage with evidence, stuck with their initial viewpoints, and only listened politely to those with different views, rather than interacting across differences to reach consensus. While student positionality, as the authors suggest, is important to take into account, there may be ways to reorient deliberations on “wicked problems” such as immigration, which are by their nature prone to …

Experience With And Perceptions Of Immigrants In Italy, Arianna Babraj

Claremont-UC Undergraduate Research Conference on the European Union

This research explores Italians’ experiences with and perceptions of immigrants, along with their ideas of how the government should formulate immigration policy. Using in person surveys, 117 subjects were interviewed in the northern, central and southern regions of Italy. After accounting for variables like age, gender, and region, the data revealed interesting trends. Overall, the main findings of this study hold that there is a connection between the proximity of a subject’s relationship with immigrants and how positive their experiences are. These experiences can influence how the subject then views immigrants as either an advantage or a disadvantage, however, other …

Population Movement And State Building: A Case Study Of Migratory Policies In Italy, Julia Pagnamenta

Student Theses

The current study examines Italian laws and policies around migratory movements since Italy first became a modern nation state in 1861 up until April 2019, when the research was concluded. This paper is a case study of Italian migratory policies. It first looks at the way Italy’s early efforts at nation building coincided with the mass emigration of its citizens, informing its policies on emigration and colonial expansion. The study then analyzes the way in which Italy developed a policy response to the growing immigrant and refugee population in the late 1980s following geo-political transformations in Europe. The evolution of …

Defending The "Bad Immigrant": Aggravated Felonies, Deportation, And Legal Resistance At The Crimmigration Nexus, Sarah Rose Tosh

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation explores the development and effects of the “aggravated felony”—an expansive legal category that has spurred the detention and deportation of hundreds of thousands of immigrants, including many green-card-holding lawful permanent residents, over the past thirty years. Offenses in this category need not be “aggravated” nor “felonies,” but rather, include a broad range of criminal convictions, including misdemeanors, ranging from check fraud and simple drug possession to drug trafficking and murder. Non-citizens in removal proceedings based on aggravated felony convictions are mandatorily detained and almost certainly deported—usually without legal representation. Still, despite growing academic interest in deportation and the …

Group Distinctiveness And Ethnic Identity Among 1.5 And Second-Generation Russian-Speaking Jewish Immigrants In Germany And The U.S., Jay (Koby) Oppenheim

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study investigates the ethnic identity of the 1.5 and second-generation of Russian-speaking Jewish immigrants to Germany and the U.S. in the most recent wave of immigration. Between 1989 and the mid-2000s, approximately 320,000 Russian-speaking Jewish immigrants departed the (former) Soviet Union for the U.S. and an additional 220,000 moved to Germany. The 1.5 and second-generations have successfully integrated into mainstream institutions, like schools and the workforce, but not the co-ethnic Jewish community in each country. Moreover, Russian-speaking Jewish immigrants are subject to a number of critiques, most prominently, of having a ‘thin culture’ that relies on abstract forms of …

Study Abroad Experience: Ireland Spring Semester 2018, Carla Canseco-Maca

Student Engagement Posters

Carla Canseco-Maca discusses student engagement at Linfield College with regard to her semester studying abroad in Ireland and her subsequent role as a Study Abroad Ambassador.

A Profile Of Highly Skilled Mexican Immigrants In Texas And Its Largest Metropolitan Areas, Ariel Ruiz Soto, Andrew Selee

Mission Foods Texas-Mexico Center Research

Much of the U.S. debate on Mexican immigration has focused on low-skilled immigrants, who have composed the largest share of that population, but recent data suggest that the share of college-educated immigrants among recent Mexican arrivals is rising considerably. Texas has long been a gateway for Mexican immigration in part because of proximity and its deep economic ties to Mexico.

As more Mexican immigrants settle in Texas, especially in its metropolitan areas, governments and local communities stand to gain valuable contributions of an increasingly educated work force. Knowing the profile of highly skilled Mexican immigrants can inform policy-making decisions and …

Massachusetts Latino Population: 2010-2035, Phillip Granberry, Trevor Mattos

Gastón Institute Publications

The Latino population in Massachusetts continues to grow at a rapid rate. From 2010 to 2017, the Latino population increased by 28%. This represented about 60% of all population growth in the Commonwealth. Using a cohort-component methodology, the Gastón Institute projects that by 2035 the Latino population will grow to over 1.15 million and represent nearly 15.3% of the population. This growth will be due more to future Massachusetts births than to international migration. Thus, Latinos already living in Massachusetts will have more impact on the future population than will future immigrants.

Ignatian Banners Of Hope And Support For Recently Detained Immigrant Families, Daniela Domínguez

Psychology

University of San Francisco (ASUSF) decided to allocate a portion of its annual budget each year to assist undocumented students with non-tuition dollars, most often used for the growingly expensive cost of living within the Bay Area. One year prior, in 2015, USF’s School of Law launched its Immigration and Deportation Defense Clinic to represent unaccompanied children and migrant women with children in Northern California and the Central Valley.

Altogether, these acts of solidarity demonstrate how Jesuit institutions have strived for greater acceptance and empowerment of migrants and refugees. Contributing to this effort, the collection of essays in this book …

Current Perceptions Of Undocumented Immigrants In The United States, Gabriela Lozano

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The intent of this thesis is to examine current perceptions that U.S. Americans have about immigrants coming to the U.S. illegally/ undocumented. There is currently an ongoing debate around immigration in today's political climate. Historically, immigration has always happened in the U.S. and has sparked a vast array of feelings from the U.S. population (Obinna 2018). This study aims to contribute to the existing literature on undocumented immigration to the U.S. and opinion surrounding it. The current study uses the opinion of 177 people to compare current perceptions of undocumented people based on gender, income, and political standing. This study …

Undocumented: Living In The Shadows, Jennifer C. Sloan

Open Educational Resources

This course explores the lives of undocumented students in the United States. The first portion of the course will explore the socioeconomic and political institutions that created the "illegal immigrant" problem and how the US government, civil society, immigrant advocates, artists, and humanitarians have approached the issue. The second portion of the course will discuss how undocumented students navigate the education system, public spaces, and work life in the U.S. Finally, we discuss previous "solutions" to the undocumented immigration "problem", what were the outcomes of those decisions, and what we can learn from these previous attempts.

Operation Boulder And Its Effects On Arab-American Communities Of The 1970'S, Molly Wancewicz

Gettysburg Social Sciences Review

Operation Boulder, a United States government surveillance program deployed in 1972 under the direction of then-President Richard M. Nixon, launched a large-scale federal investigation of both Arab immigrants to the U.S. and Arab-Americans.1 In this context, the term “Arab” is used to mean a person originating from an Arabic-speaking country in the Middle East or North Africa, while “Arab-American” refers to a person of Arab lineage who was born in the United States. For the purposes of this paper, the Arabs and Arab-Americans referred to are only those residing in the United States. Before the project was canceled due to …

Local Governance Of Immigrant Incorporation: How City-Based Organizational Fields Shape The Cases Of Undocumented Youth In New York City And Paris, Stephen P. Ruszczyk

Department of Sociology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

City-based organizations and governments play an important role in incorporating undocumented immigrant youth. This article investigates how localities sociopolitically incorporate these immigrants by examining the governance constellations and institutional logics of the organizational field that manages undocumented youth. Comparing sets of municipal and civil society organizations in different national settings, I use the two cases of New York City and Paris to ask how the ‘city-based organizational field of immigrant incorporation’ shapes citizenship experiences of undocumented youth. Data come from multi-level longitudinal ethnography over 8 years with two dozen undocumented youth and with organizations in each city as well as …

A Life Absolutely Bare? A Reflection On Resistance By Irregular Refugees Against Fingerprinting As State Biopolitical Control In The European Union, Ziang Zhou

Claremont-UC Undergraduate Research Conference on the European Union

In a legally transitory category, irregular refugees- experience a double precariousness. They risk their lives to travel across treacherous seas to Europe for a better life. However, upon the long-awaited embarkation on the European land, they are exposed once again to the precariousness of the asylum application. They are “powerless”, “with no rights” and “to be sacrificed” as Giorgio Agamben and Hannah Arendt suggested in their respective understanding of a “bare life”, la nuda vita. In light of the administrative difficulties in managing asylum application, the European Union introduced the “Dublin Agreement”, which stipulates mandatory biometric data collection for …

Sociology 29000: Immigration, Jennifer C. Sloan

Open Educational Resources

This course is designed to provide students with a comprehensive introduction to the study of immigration from a sociological perspective. The course begins with an overview of the factors leading to migration and examines how social, economic, political, and legal issues affect individual decisions to migrate. Immigration is first examined first through a historical lens by looking at the history of migration to the United States as well as migration to European and Latin American countries. Next, we turn to the policies that govern migration and borders to study how those policies have affected migrant flows and the ethno-racial makeup …

North African Regular And Irregular Migration: The Case Of Libya, Mustafa O. Attir

New England Journal of Public Policy

Because of its geographical size and location, Libya has for centuries been a transit county for human movement across the region. Thus, its experience with immigrants has a long history. In the early 1970s, Libya became a destination for foreigners seeking jobs. Some entered the country legally, others illegally. All came to work, live, and send remittances back to their families. During the 1990s, when many migrants used Libya as a transit country for crossing the sea to Europe, the European Union started negotiating with the Libyan government to curb the flow of irregular migrants. In 2011, the country joined …

European Immigration Controls Conforming To Human Rights Standards, Yannis Ktistakis

New England Journal of Public Policy

The European continent has for some years been facing increased pressure from migration. In 2010, Europe, in comparison with the other continents, was expected to host the largest number of migrants: 69.8 million migrants representing 32.6 percent of the total flow of migrants (213.9 million international migrants). This pressure has caused the two main European organizations, the Council of Europe and the European Union, to act decisively for the protection of migrants. Although the European legal order offers a high standard of human rights protection—having adopted, over the decades, the relevant instruments and developed effective mechanisms—the two European organizations have …

Educational Attainment Of Immigrant Students In The United States: Generational Struggle Towards Success, Robin Das

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Known as the land of opportunities, United States has always been a key attraction to outside world as the place where people can live up to their potential dreams. People migrate from far lands to settle down and find the missing link that was absent in their native country. Among numerous reasons, financial inefficiency and social and political insecurity at homeland, new immigration policies in the US, expectation of a better socio-economic lifestyle and a secure and prosperous future for their children are some key reasons why immigrants move out of their motherland and travel to America. They hope and …

Brentwood, New York 11717: A Multimedia Ethnographic Study On An Immigrant Town, Ashley Mungo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Brentwood, New York is a working-class town of about 60,000 situated forty miles east of Manhattan on Long Island. As of the 2010 Census, 68.5 percent of residents are Latino or Hispanic, with 10.7 percent of the overall population living below the federal poverty level. Less than ten percent of the population has obtained a bachelors degree or higher. Street violence, gangs, and overall crime are frequently addressed at community meetings, igniting a fierce debate on immigration within the town that has reached national media, with critics arguing that the exponentially increasing Latino migrant population has caused this crisis.

The …

Chile’S Decree-Law 1094: A Source Of Immigrant Vulnerability, Joao M. Da Silva

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The South American nation of Chile is rapidly becoming a receiving nation for immigrants from other South American nations and the Caribbean. By December 31, 2017, the immigrant population had surpassed 1.1 million, 300,000 of whom are in irregular status. Immigration to Chile is governed by Decree-Law No. 1094 (DL 1094) of 1975, the oldest immigration law in South America, decreed by the military junta led by General Augusto Pinochet. I argue that the continued application of DL 1094, and the Chilean state’s failure to enact a new law that addresses immigration from a human rights-based approach, contributes to perpetuating …

"But The Heart Stays Turkish": Identifications Of Immigrants And Boundaries Of Belonging In America, Zeynep Selen Bayhan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation focuses on the symbolic boundary-making processes of first-generation Turkish immigrants in New York and New Jersey, where Islam has been tainted with negative meanings and symbols. By focusing on the characteristics, salience and endurance of ethno-national, religious and gender boundaries that immigrants perceive and experience in the U.S., it examines the possibilities of social inclusion and assimilation/integration of immigrants into the mainstream society. The dissertation addresses following research questions: What sort of symbols and markers, as well as narratives do immigrants use in order to construct boundaries regarding American society? How do Turkish immigrants, in the aftermath of …

Effects Of Senate Bill 4 On Wage-Theft: Why All Workers Are At Risk In Low-Income Occupations, Daniella Salas-Chacon

The Scholar: St. Mary's Law Review on Race and Social Justice

Abstract forthcoming

Crimmigration, Deportability And The Social Exclusion Of Noncitizen Immigrants, Shirley P. Leyro, Daniel L. Stageman

Publications and Research

The spread of crimmigration policies, practices, and rhetoric represents an economically rational strategy and has significant implications for the lived experience of noncitizen immigrants. This study draws up in-depth interviews of immigrants with a range of legal statuses to describe the mechanics through which immigrants internalize and respond to the fear of deportation, upon which crimmigration strategies rely. The fear of deportation and its behavioral effects extend beyond undocumented or criminally convicted immigrants, encompassing lawful permanent residents and naturalized citizens alike. This fear causes immigrants to refuse to use public services, endure labor exploitation, and avoid public spaces, resulting in …

Becoming United Statesian: Experiences Of Newly Resettled Iraqi Refugees And Iraqi Immigrants, Bnar Mustafa

Institute for the Humanities Master's Papers, Projects, and Capstones

The differences between refugees’ dreams before and after coming to the United States of America is often shocking. One might ask, “Isn’t America the country of the refugees?” The United States is the largest nation built by refugees and immigrants, yet recently resettled refugees or “new Americans” struggle in multiple and overlapping ways to reach successful resettlement. Some of the challenges they face are inherent to resettlement, others come from the socialization process, and the interplay of human beings as they exist together. Language and culture shock are the natural struggles that any internationally-relocated person experiences. The challenges that stem …

Czech Immigrants In Nebraska: A Question Of Identity And Assimilation, Katharine Meegan

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

This thesis examines the dynamics of cultural and social assimilation through the experiences of Czech immigrants into Nebraska. The Czechs' long struggle to maintain their ethnic identity has shaped their experiences with assimilation. After a review of assimilation theory, I conclude that the Czech experience with assimilation follows a “straight-line” assimilation model, a progression of assimilation that is complete by the third generation. Their relatively small size, settlement in rural areas, and a strong desire to maintain ethnic identity, as reflected in the formation of Czech language benevolent associations, gymnastic societies, and Czech language newspapers, led to “social” and “structural” …

“I Want Her To Make Correct Decisions On Her Own:” Former Soviet Union Mothers’ Beliefs About Autonomy Development, Masha Komolva, Jane Y. Lipnitsky

Publications and Research

This qualitative study examined Former Soviet Union (FSU) mothers’ explicit and implicit attitudes and parenting practices around adolescents’ autonomy development. Interviews were conducted with 10 mothers who had immigrated from the FSU to the US between 10 and 25 years ago, and who had daughters between the ages of 13 and 17 years. Mothers predominantly defined autonomy in terms of adolescents’ ability to carry out instrumental tasks, make correct decisions, and financially provide for themselves, but rarely mentioned psychological or emotional independence. Mothers reflected on the various aspects of autonomy emphasized in their country of origin and America, and balancing …

“We’Re All In This Together:” Exploring The Effectiveness And Responsiveness Of Nonprofits In Promoting The Socioeconomic Integration Of Refugees, Brittany Keegan

Theses and Dissertations

When a person is forced to flee their home due to violence or the fear of persecution, they must seek refuge elsewhere – either within the borders of their home country or in a new country. Those who travel to another country in search of safety and protection are known as refugees, and as world conflicts continue, the number of refugees around the world is steadily increasing. As refugees integrate into their new communities, they often receive support from nonprofit organizations once government assistance has ceased. This mixed method study uses 60 open-ended, first-person interviews with refugees and nonprofit service …