immigrants struggling with identity essay

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Out of Many, One: Immigration, Identity and the American Dream

Knight Foundation asked four leading scholars and community leaders to consider this question: “What is the most important trend that will transform how Americans think about community over the next decade?” Ali Noorani, Executive Director, the National Immigration Forum , shares insights below. Click here to download and view all essays.

Unprecedented global migration, how it is perceived and how it is experienced, is the prism through which we will understand the 21st century American community. How we respond determines what kind of America future generations live in.

In just over 25 years the number of international migrants in the world increased approximately 70 percent to reach 257.7 million . In the same period, the U.S. foreign-born population more than doubled to reach 49.8 million immigrants in 2017. Along the way, America experienced the Great Recession and economic disruptions driven by technology and globalization that changed the way we work and the way we relate to one another.

Over the course of 2018, the National Immigration Forum convened 26 Living Room Conversations to better understand how Americans are grappling with these changes. What we heard, what we learned, offers a roadmap for civic leaders across the political spectrum to help communities grapple with the politics of immigration.

Over the last few years, stories of mass migration have found their way to our homes, filtered through our news feed of choice, bringing a level of urgency to the debate. For many of us, when we see the Central American child on the train or the Syrian family in the raft, we are led to believe by certain press and politicians that they will be our neighbor in a matter of weeks. As our communities diversify, through marriage or migration, our new neighbor reminds us of what we saw on our screen. Diversity brings to our communities new languages, new customs, new religions. Our divisive politics define our perception, creating unease and insularity.

The fragmentation of traditional media and the powerful influence of social media bring these changes into sharp focus. We don’t trust our institutions, so we turn to our friends and family for the information and influence that shapes our opinion. For Americans worried that their children will not be better off than they are, it feels like the movement of goods, people, commerce, and ideas presents future generations an overwhelming set of economic and social challenges.

In some cases, leaders respond with a hardened politics, the building of actual and metaphorical walls, legislation that seeks to exert greater control at the local and national level. Paralyzed by anger and fear, the politics and policies of these communities stymie growth. And that feeds into the sense of victimhood as neighboring communities that embrace the challenges and opportunities of immigration see greater economic growth.

The combination of a more diverse America and a rapidly-changing economy has exacerbated a perception that immigrants and immigration are a threat, not a benefit, to American communities.

Those policy makers looking to lead more inclusive communities, buoyed by the rule of law, thrive with growing, diverse populations. They do the hard work necessary to help communities understand the changes around and beyond them. Fears are acknowledged and addressed, not dismissed and ignored. Programs and policies are put into place to welcome immigrants and refugees into the community without displacing native born residents.

The combination of a more diverse America and a rapidly-changing economy has exacerbated a perception that immigrants and immigration are a threat, not a benefit, to American communities. In this new normal, there are two paths we can take. One leads to an expanded sense of community, positively influenced by a diversity of sights, sounds and relationships that come from global migration. The second, darker path is more insular, narrowed by fears of immigration.

These days, it feels like America has chosen the second path where leaders are quick to sow seeds of xenophobia and division. The seeds that lead to cultural, security and economic fears define the questions that polarize the nation’s immigration debate:

• Culture: Are immigrants and refugees isolating or integrating? Do they live in isolated enclaves, or are they immersed in the community, learning English and becoming American?
• Security: Are immigrants and refugees threats or protectors? Are they national security or public safety threats, or do they make positive contributions to communities, even serving in law enforcement and in the military?
• Economy: Are immigrants and refugees takers or givers? Are they taking jobs and benefits, or are they economic contributors?

Rather than help Americans understand and facilitate the cultural and economic changes around them, supporters of immigration ignore these questions, while anti-immigrant forces weaponize them. Yet, we observed that when Living Room Conversations participants were able to voice their fears and feel heard, the discussion migrated away from division towards solutions.

Changing course requires us to understand the broader context of demographic change, the fears Americans have, and, more importantly, how to acknowledge and address those fears. Only then can America live up to the ideal of e pluribus, unum – “out of many, one.”

A Changing Nation

In a historical context, what we’re experiencing is not new. In 1890 and again in 1910, U.S foreign-born residents and citizens made up at least 14.7 percent of the nation’s population. Decades of xenophobia and political backlash followed the 1910 crest, resulting in multiple laws restricting immigration. Today, with 13.7 percent of the United States’ current population being foreign born, we are at a similar inflection point . What lies ahead depends on how Americans think about and engage with community.

Today, more than 40 million U.S. residents and citizens were born in another country. And, while immigration of generations past diversified the ethnic makeup of the nation, modern day immigration has made today’s America more racially and ethnically diverse than ever before. The Pew Research Center paints a colorful statistical portrait of America in 2016 where Mexican immigrants accounted for 26 percent of the nation’s foreign born, with the next largest origin groups are those from China (6 percent), India (6 percent), and the Philippines (4 percent). And America will only become more diverse in the years ahead, with Asians as a whole projected to become the largest immigrant group by 2055.

The diversification of America’s communities is not wholly dependent on future immigration. In fact, new U.S. Census estimates found that for the first time, in 2013 over half of babies born in the U.S. were non-white. Which means, “non-Hispanic whites will cease to be the majority group by 2044.

The challenge is that the combination of demographic and economic changes is hard to unpack for Americans who see their community and their livelihood changing at the same time.

For recent generations of Americans, a diverse America is the reality they were born into. But, for the nation’s Baby Boomers — those born between 1946 and 1964 — these were tectonic shifts that rattled their economic and social framework. In 1960, 88.6 percent of the U.S. population was white, dropping to 72.4 percent in 2010. In 1970, 4.5 percent of the nation’s population was Hispanic. Just 40 years later the Hispanic population quadrupled to 16.3 percent.

In the 1990’s, as the nation’s immigrant population began to grow, the Baby Boomer generation peaked at 78.8 million. At this point, Baby Boomers were between 25 and 45 years old, and beginning to start their families, worrying about college tuition and job prospects for their children. And along comes immigration and globalization to fundamentally reshape their socioeconomic reality.

As American Action Forum President Douglas Holtz-Eakin said in 2016 before the House Ways and Means Committee, from World War II to 2007, the economy grew fast enough that GDP per capita — a crude measure of the standard of living — doubled on average every 35 years, or one working career. Coming out of 2008’s Great Recession, projections indicated that it would double every 75 years. And, in 2016, those households that worked full-time for the full year saw zero increase in their real incomes. As Holtz-Eakin put it, “The American Dream is disappearing over the horizon.” For many Americans experiencing this new reality, particularly as their children came of working age, immigration was a source of competition, not of optimism.

It isn’t hard to see why Americans are feeling stress and anxiety about their future. Demographic, economic and cultural shifts lead them to question their sense of community and turn too quickly to blame immigrants as the source of their problems. Our politics track this anxiety as the generational and geographic divide between political parties grows. So much so that the difference in generational diversity is driving not only a competing sense of community, but divergent political priorities.

Our starting point in this case is the fact that nearly half of Americans under the age of 20 are minority, while over three-quarters of those 65 and older are non-Hispanic white. William Frey, a Brookings Institution demographer, writes, “The rapid growth of minorities from the ‘bottom up’ of the age structure is creating a racial generation gap between the old and young that reflects the nation’s changing demography.” He finds that 75 percent of the population over age 55 is white, while 54 percent of those under age 35 are white – a “gap” of 21 percent, nationally. As a result, the lived experience of Baby Boomers is fundamentally different than Millennials; a difference that lays the foundation for very different perspectives on community.

Most importantly, Frey finds, “The gap is especially high in states that that have received recent waves of new minority residents to counter more established old whiter populations: Arizona leads all states with a gap of 33 percent.” Nevada, New Mexico, Florida and California round out the top five. With the exception of New Mexico, all five states have been the epicenter of heated immigration debates as older voters pressure lawmakers to clamp down on immigration through a range of local enforcement policies.

To state the obvious, our changing nation has changed our politics. The echo chamber nature of our political debate creates bubbles where perceptions of community are narrow and divisive. Driven by primary elections, policy makers have little incentive to explain these changes to their electorate, much less reach out beyond their base. As a result, a racial and geographic divide to our politics settles in.

Luzerne County, which includes and surrounds Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, provides a 2016 election example. The county’s diversity index — which measures the variance of the racial and origin-based composition of a given population — increased by 360 percent from 2000 to 2015. It was one of the counties that saw a dramatic swing from blue to red in 2016. President Barack Obama carried Luzerne County by nearly 5 percentage points in 2012. Four years later, based on a campaign defined by racial and geographic fearmongering, President Trump carried the county by more than 19 points.

The racial gap between the parties grew in 2018. While 54 percent of whites voted for Republicans, African Americans, Latinos and Asians voted for Democrats at 90 percent, 64 percent and 69 percent, respectively. And, geographically speaking, urban and suburban voters preferred Democratic candidates, while voters in small towns and rural places favored Republicans.

Estimates indicate that by 2040, approximately 70 percent of Americans will live in the 15 largest states. Even as New York City, Los Angeles and Houston continue to see population growth, 30 percent of the country’s population — living in smaller states without major metropolitan centers — will hold disproportionate electoral power. Unless political and civic leaders have strategies to help communities understanding the changes they see (or read about), political dysfunction will lead to national tension.

Coming of age in big cities that include a greater range of economic opportunities, many (mostly liberal) Americans are insulated from the demographic and cultural changes Americans in suburban or rural communities struggle with. Diverse, urban environments have been built over generations, and the changes there have been steady and gradual. While not perfect or easy, cities allow youth and families to familiarize themselves with the idea of diversity. Over time, it becomes the norm as institutions in urban areas shape, and were shaped by, the diversity of the populations they served or engaged.

Suburban and rural parts of the country, home to an older and white population, with less access to the spoils of the technology economy, experienced these demographic changes more recently, and more dramatically. The changes that took place were proportionately larger, faster, and more acute – and accompanied changes as the global economy shifted. Demographic changes became a proxy for economic disruption.

Unless we change course, the political divide between young and old, rural and urban, will only widen as migration pressures are exacerbated by continuing economic shifts. Needless to say, the need for a different understanding of the American community has a certain level of urgency.

With or without immigration, the American community is becoming more diverse. As Richard Longworth of the Chicago Council for Global Affairs put it, “You can’t build a wall against hormones.” Which means we are not going to return to the Baby Boomer definition of America.

So charting a viable path toward compromise and common purpose requires us to meet people where they are, understanding the origins of their hopes and fears and reactions to their fast-changing communities. Our current politics and politicians limit the opportunities to do this kind of work. Ultimately, we must work together to hold elected officials from both parties accountable for divisive rhetoric.

Understanding the Fears

Deepened understanding of these fears and anxieties starts with careful listening. The National Immigration Forum works to engage conservative and moderate faith, law enforcement and business leaders living in the Southeast, South Central, Midwest and Mountain West, regions that have experienced some of the fastest growth in the foreign-born population and are struggling with the political and cultural changes that come with it.

In the sprint of 2018, Forum staff traveled to dozens of rural and suburban communities in conservative regions of the country to convene “Living Room Conversations.” We tapped into our networks of faith, law enforcement and business leaders to recruit 10-15 participants per conversation in order to better understand how conservative leaning rural and suburban communities perceived a changing America. A discussion guide designed by a team of researchers helped us lead robust and open conversations that included themes of identity, community and polarization, and perceptions about immigrants.

We launched this learning campaign to test our hypothesis that Americans grapple with three specific fears that lead to critical questions of our changing sense of community:

To complement our findings, we partnered with More in Common, an international initiative to build stronger and more resilient communities and societies, which had just completed an exhaustive quantitative survey of the American public. More in Common’s report, “Hidden Tribes : A Study of America’s Polarized Landscape,” provides greater texture to these issues. Rather than a typical conservative versus liberal categorization of the public, their research led to a segmentation of the American public into seven tribes. Four of the tribes, they concluded, are a part of the “Exhausted Majority.”

More in Common’s findings aligned with the results of our Living Room Conversations, “Unsettling changes in our economy and society have left many Americans feeling like strangers in their own land.” They defined the Exhausted Majority as being:

• Fed up with the polarization plaguing American government and society
• Feeling forgotten in the public discourse, overlooked because their voices are seldom heard
• Flexible in their views, willing to endorse different policies according to the precise situation rather than sticking ideologically to a single set of beliefs
• Believe we can find common ground

Just because the Exhausted Majority is, well, exhausted, it doesn’t mean they agree on the issues. Their views on issues range across the spectrum but they are turned off by polarization, feel disregarded in the public discourse, and are flexible in their views. So, while there are certainly a large number of Americans trying to find consensus on our nation’s changing communities, finding that consensus requires careful listening.

As the authors wrote, “It would be a mistake to think of the Exhausted Majority merely as a group of political centrists, at least in the way that term is traditionally understood. They do not simply represent a midpoint between the warring tribes of the left and right. They are frustrated with the status quo and the conduct of American politics and public debate.”

This mirrors what we saw in our 26 Living Room Conversations across the country in 2018. Participants wanted leaders to hear their concerns. They sought information they can trust. And there was an unambiguous desire to rise above polarization and divisiveness in order to build coalitions and advance overdue policy reforms.

Before specific fears or anxieties came to the fore, questions of identity undergirded the conversation.

Francis Fukuyama wrote that the nation’s identity crisis is exacerbated by the perception of invisibility. “The resentful citizens fearing the loss of their middle-class status point an accusatory finger upward to the elite, who they believe do not see them, but also downward to the poor, who they feel are unfairly favored.” Therefore, “Economic distress is often perceived by individuals more as a loss of identity than as a loss of resources.

The perception that one’s job is going to be taken by the Mexican next door, or the Mexican in Mexico, creates a deep distrust of demographic change and the elites who seem so comfortable with it. Again, perception melds into reality and our political leaders are ill equipped to navigate the changes – or, more often, exploit the changes to divide rather than unite the electorate.

Fukuyama goes on, “The rightward drift also reflects the failure of contemporary left-leaning parties to speak to people whose relative status has fallen as a result of globalization and technological change.” The nation’s changes are much bigger than demography.

The authors of a new book, Identity Crisis, define “racialized economics” as “the belief that undeserving groups are getting ahead while your group is left behind.” As Washington Post columnist Dan Balz explained, “Issues of identity — race, religion, gender and ethnicity — and not economics were the driving forces that determined how people voted, particularly white voters.” We know from recent data that 69 percent of Americans — including 56 percent of Republicans — believe immigrants are “an important part of American identity.” But what shines through in our work, whether it was the Living Room Conversations or our broader approach, is that the when you localize the concept of “identity,” the term speaks as much to people’s hopes as to their fears.

“You’re a little bit of everything, and that’s really what America is … and that is the beauty and some of the angst in America … that you don’t want to give up your heritage.”

In Corpus Christi, Texas, we heard about the loss of American identity, while in Memphis, Tennessee, we heard that the church can be a powerful entity that organizes efforts to build transformative and inclusive national identities. In Gainesville, Florida, a man told us that “we are tribal and can’t handle difference,” whereas up the road in Tallahassee, we heard, “One of America’s proudest and most beautiful things is that it is a melting pot of cultures.” In Bentonville, Arkansas, a participant remarked, “You’re a little bit of everything, and that’s really what America is … and that is the beauty and some of the angst in America … that you don’t want to give up your heritage.”

Identity also speaks to a person’s community; which, at times, is different from the idea of an American identity. Numerous participants told us their identities were tied to their local communities, their neighborhoods, their sense of place. In Texas, unsurprisingly, there was a strong affinity with the idea of being “a Texan.” And Bentonville had a deep sense of civic pride when participants talked about the community’s growing diversity. Overlooking people’s economic concerns would be an error, but so would underestimating the power of identity as it underlies broader fears and anxieties people have.

With change taking hold all around them, we watched law enforcement officers, small business owners, and pastors — in real time — soul-searching, exploring what these changes mean to their own identities. Those who were hopeful saw their identities connected to larger themes of values and ideals. Those who were fearful found themselves in the midst of “an identity crisis.” But if they felt heard, if their opinion mattered, the tension melted out of the room.

So, why does the imperative to help America reimagine a sense of community in this global environment feel so challenging?

We need to move past binary arguments that attempt to delineate between race and class concerns. As our work has demonstrated, Americans experience immigration in a much more complicated way; our explanation of immigration, and engagement of the public, has to be just as complex.

Culture: Are immigrants integrating or isolating?

While cultural concerns are linked to identity, participants spoke to them in the context of a changing country, not always how they identified within those changes. For some participants, issues of race and ethnicity were central. For others, language determined whether an immigrant was integrating into American culture. Diversity and inclusion were also a consistent theme; as one participant in Fresno, California, said, “We don’t celebrate diversity … and too often it’s been us and them.”

A participant in El Paso, Texas, captured the tension between cultural integration: “It’s just easy to be American, and that is what this country is about, that we assimilate and unite as Americans … and I see that as a problem with some immigrants that want to isolate themselves and try to continue their own cultural behaviors — styles and behaviors … while they want to take advantage of the privileges of America … ”

In Appleton, Wisconsin, we heard that immigration “grows our culture, makes us more educated, [and] better people.” In Lubbock, Texas, a participant remarked, “I think [immigrants] bring a lot to our community by way of service and family values.” But in Las Vegas, Nevada, we heard that although immigrants are viewed as patriotic and hardworking, there were anxieties around a loss of cultural and language unity.

The conversations echoed More in Common’s findings: that freedom, equality and the American Dream are beliefs that make someone American, and that the ability to speak English can be valued as an important marker of American identity.

Security: Are immigrants threats or protectors?

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, security and terrorism concerns have loomed large in the nation’s immigration debate. More recently, the administration’s enforcement actions at the border and in the interior, along with progressive efforts to “Abolish ICE” and create “sanctuary cities,” have further polarized the debate. As the Trump administration falsely conflates immigration, terrorism and crime in order to achieve political goals, voters are left looking for information they can trust.

Our conversations indicated that personal relationships mitigated fears that center on security. People were willing to extend the benefit of the doubt to the “good” immigrants they knew. But many participants indicated that portrayals of immigrants as security threats are pervasive throughout the media. Therefore, even if people believe that such portrayals are misleading, what they read in the newspaper or saw on the television influenced their opinions.

Some 65 percent of Americans, including 42 percent of Republicans, do not believe that undocumented immigrants are more likely to commit serious crimes, according to Pew Research. This maps to reports that show, “immigrants are much less likely to commit crimes than the native-born.”

In the border town of El Paso, we observed a tension between some Americans wrestling with a desire to be compassionate as they fear threats posed by unauthorized immigration. The conversation in Mesa, Arizona, which included a handful of local law enforcement officers, revealed that although issues of legality and criminality continue to plague local residents’ perceptions and attitudes, participants generally agreed that immigrants do not pose an increased security threat. In Parker, Colorado, the sense among participants was that the broader community did believe immigrants posed a security threat.

Security fears are difficult to overcome. Even if someone feels immigrants are not a threat, one tragic incident, one hyperbolic headline, can plant a seed of doubt. All of which underscores the importance of local law enforcement in the conversation about the changing American community.

We often hear that immigrants have a bootstraps mentality — they work as hard as they can to build a better life. Data suggest that these participants are echoing national sentiment. A 2017 Gallup Poll found that 45 percent of Americans believe immigrants make the economy better overall, compared with 30 percent who believe immigrants make the economy worse overall. It’s a sentiment that lines up with the contributions immigrants make to the U.S. economy: According to New American Economy, immigrants paid $105 billion in state and local taxes, and around $224 billion in federal taxes, in 2014.

Participants in southern border communities, where the economy is closely tied to Mexico and to immigration, recognized the economic benefit of immigration. In San Marcos, California, participants saw that the economy is dependent on the ability of businesses to buy and sell in both the U.S. and Mexico. There was general agreement among participants in Corpus Christi that immigrants were an economic benefit. On the other hand, thousands of miles from the border in Spartanburg, South Carolina, participants remarked that some in the community invoked the economy as a reason to close borders and deport people here without authorization.

Fears related to the economy can be persistent. We can address questions of culture and security only to have questions about jobs and trade linger. Business leaders, at the national or local level, can help Americans understand a changing community when they partner with other civic leadership. Speaking to American competitiveness and growth in a fashion that serves all workers, American and immigrant, helps people understand the value of immigration to the nation. When the message is immigrant-centric, people feel left out of the conversation, believing elites are looking for cheaper workers.

Changing Hearts and Minds

More in Common concluded, “To bring Americans back together, we need to focus first on those things that we share, and this starts with our identity as Americans.” Questions of race, religion, and patriotism led to competing frames that pushed people apart. But, “One belief that brings Americans together is a sense that the country is special.”

We observed that when Living Room Conversations participants with different religious or political beliefs felt that their individual concerns were being heard, the tension in their voices dissipated, and their faces brightened. The discussions turned towards solutions, not divisions. In our conversations, we saw the same theme More in Common found in their data: a need for new approaches and a different conversation on immigration that helps people come together.

Taken together, the Living Room Conversations left us with a powerful realization: American identity is being reshaped as perceptions related to culture, security and the economy are shifting. Quickly changing demographics are not solely responsible; the industries of the past are giving way to the industries of the future, and the transition from a post-industrial to a knowledge-based economy is disruptive. New technologies, social norms and conventions are accentuating the way many Americans view issues such as immigration. When it comes to identity in the context of culture, security, and the economy, there is both optimism and concern.

“It’s very easy to hate from a distance,” one participant in Spartanburg said. But as people get to know the immigrant family next door, at their child’s Little League games, or one pew over at church, they come to understand them, appreciate them, love them and value their individual contributions to the larger American story. The challenge in front of us is whether we can bridge the personal relationships with a broader perception of immigrants.

Which leads to the foundational question: What actually changes people’s hearts and minds? It is easy to assume, and a lot of social change campaigns do, that if you can change someone’s attitude or emotion towards something, you can change behavior. But that isn’t really true, or, at least it’s not the whole picture.

From the Theory of Planned Behavior we learn that campaigns that focus solely on creating an emotional reaction, shifting an attitude or even creating empathy, don’t tend to have sustained and lasting effects on behavior. In other words, the emotionally gripping story of a mother seeking asylum or a successful immigrant business owner offers a fleeting sense of what is possible. And in this media environment, that moment is quickly replaced by the next headline.

Taking a step back to offer an audience an emotion, attitude or empathetic moment connected to an underlying belief or value, allows for a conversation about change that can be sustained. And when that value or belief is connected to a person’s self-perception and connected to the norms of their community, there is potential for behavioral change.

The new normal is a fast changing, fast moving world that impacts the way Americans see themselves and each other. And, at least for the foreseeable future, the fears of migration and immigration will continue to be exploited for political gain.

Few politicians can step into this fray unless they are willing to cross partisan lines. Which is hard to imagine these days.

But local leadership — the pastor, the police chief, the local business owner – have the potential to bridge the divide. These are the trusted messengers who can operate within the networks of friends and family that are some of the most trusted places in society.

They are the local leadership with the trust and the credibility to help Americans understand the shifting nature of community in the context of global migration. They are trusted leadership who can meet people where they are, but not leave them there.

About the Author

Ali Noorani

Ali Noorani is the Executive Director of the National Immigration Forum, a non-partisan advocacy organization working with faith, law enforcement and business leaders to promote the value of immigrants and immigration. Growing up in California as the son of Pakistani immigrants, Noorani quickly learned how to forge alliances among people of wide-ranging backgrounds, a skill that has served him extraordinarily well as one of the nation’s most innovative coalition builders. Noorani is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, holds a Master’s in Public Health from Boston University and is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley. Noorani is a regular contributor to Boston Public Radio, the author of “There Goes the Neighborhood: How Communities Overcome Prejudice and Meet the Challenge of American Immigration,” (Prometheus, April 2017) and host of “Only in America” podcast. He lives in Washington, D.C.

Click here to download essay and view full footnote references . The author’s views expressed in this essay are his own.

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Recent Content

• Winter 2021

The State of the American Dream

Surviving or Thriving? What It Takes for Immigrants to Succeed

The American dream is alive for immigrants, but the obstacles can feel nearly insurmountable — and that burden can be felt for generations.

If you were to review my Google search history, the most recent phrase you would find is “top 10 personal finance books.” You might think better budgeting is part of my New Year’s resolutions, or maybe I’m looking to buy a house or save for a big trip (COVID-permitting). Part of that may be true, but I am also the daughter of immigrants — and part of the “1.5 generation” that was born somewhere else but grew up here — and that means the reason I’m devouring any and all tips on personal financial management is a bit more complicated.

For every dollar I save or invest for myself, I save or invest one — sometimes more — for my mother and extended family. 

They fled war and conflict in Afghanistan, lost their livelihoods and professions, and arrived in a completely new environment with its own gargantuan share of challenges. They rebuilt their lives from the ground up. I am deeply proud of them and of their achievements, and I am humbled to be their daughter, niece, and cheerleader. Every opportunity I have had in my life is because of their sacrifice, hard work, and resilience.

Enduring through these experiences and working twice as hard for each step forward, however, takes its toll  — a toll that is felt both socially and economically. Their story is not unique, and neither are the struggles of first- and second-generation families. As we strive to achieve and maintain our American dream, I share just one perspective to help illustrate what it means to attempt to put into practice the idea of America as the land of opportunity.

First generation challenges

Without getting into the why , we will start with facts: People leave their home countries, and people choose to come to the United States. With the caveat that immigrants are not a monolithic group, what challenges might some face when they get here?

At the forefront may be an inability to communicate. As of 2018, almost half of immigrants in the U.S. are not English proficient, according to Pew Research.  It takes time to learn a language, and that time increases with age of migration. This affects immigrants’ ability to access services, navigate the bureaucracy of government institutions, and understand the nuances of things like insurance policies and health care. It also increases their risk of being taken advantage of by those who wish to profit from their lack of language access. The Internal Revenue Service’s list of 2020 tax scams included one specifically targeting nonnative English speakers. A taxpayer receives a phone call purportedly from the IRS threatening jail time, deportation, or revocation of a driver’s license if they don’t provide personal or financial information.

I recently helped my mother call her auto insurance company to argue against an increase in her rate. It turns out that the company automatically estimates her mileage, not based on her history of driving but a seemingly arbitrary number, and puts the onus on the customer to call and report the actual mileage in order to accurately calculate her payment. While practices like these are not inherently nefarious, they require that you (1) understand what the statement is telling you, (2) know what to do about it, and (3) can articulate your argument. If not, you lose more of your money, essentially paying a language penalty.

First-generation immigrants may also face psychological trauma or adverse health effects from the circumstances of migration from their home country, or violence endured during their journey. This is especially true for women and girls, who face an increased risk of gender-based violence, abuse, and trafficking.

For those who were educated, accomplished professionals in their home country, the inability to pursue their original careers — due to language and credentialing requirements, for example —  and need to take low-skilled, low-paying jobs in order to quickly bring in income may result in a loss of value and self-worth. Over time, this may also mean the inability to save for retirement or their children’s education. They may not know that they need to in the first place, and/or may not have the means to do so. And all of this may be compounded by the realities of integrating into a new culture and society that can be a difficult task in and of itself.

Immigrants overcome these obstacles and more with an intense motivation to re-establish their lives and create a brighter future for their children and loved ones. While doing so, they contribute to economic growth, spark innovation and creativity, and enrich the food, art, and musical landscape of America. But that success is not guaranteed, and it may not be enough to reach the level of prosperity and integration that results in socioeconomic advancement and the opportunities it provides. Not every immigrant is stuck in a low-paying job forever, but neither is every immigrant a successful, millionaire entrepreneur.

[Immigrants’] success is not guaranteed, and it may not be enough to reach the level of prosperity and integration that results in socioeconomic advancement and the opportunities it provides.

“1.5”- and second-generation responsibilities

The struggles of first-generation immigrants have social and economic implications for their “1.5”- and second-generation families.

Many children of immigrants spend time translating documents, making phone calls on behalf of their parents, finding relevant information, and generally providing support when needed. While native-born children may do this for native-born parents as well, the difference is that immigrant children start young, often requiring them to grow up faster. It also brings into focus the intricacies of navigating two cultures and environments that may be very different, and, at a young age, can elicit chaos and confusion at seemingly conflicting identities. I still remember what it felt like to stand in line at the then Immigration and Naturalization Service office at 5 a.m.  and then telling my elementary school friends I had an identification card that said I was an “alien.”

As we become adults, go through college and enter the workforce, we recognize the advantages that some of our classmates and colleagues had: the help with school work when needed; understanding the American educational system and how to manage key milestones like taking the SATs or college applications; lack of student loans because one’s parents were able to pay for college; the social connections that lead to internships at major companies or institutions; the ability to take unpaid internships in expensive cities because rent was taken care of; financial management and investing advice shared; vacations paid for and money set aside.

All of this lays bare just how important equitable education systems and policies are in helping immigrants reach the ladder of prosperity that seems to have twice as many rungs for us to climb. We don’t have the benefit of parents guiding us through the pathways to success in America, so we have to find that guidance elsewhere.

It also means that sometimes first- and “1.5”-generation immigrant children don’t have the space to consider pursuing their “dream” job because finding stable, secure, and dignified work becomes the priority. When your early childhood years are filled with uncertainty, and you learn responsibility at a young age, it seems too risky to pursue a career in the arts or other professions without a guaranteed income. Second-generation children and their younger siblings might have that luxury down the line once an immigrant family is more settled and established. And the “1.5”-generation might branch out and pursue their passions later in their adult lives when it seems more feasible to do so.

When your early childhood years are filled with uncertainty, and you learn responsibility at a young age, it seems too risky to pursue a career in the arts or other profession without a guaranteed income.

And as we get older — and our families get older — we worry about our family’s retirement years. Were they able to save enough? What if they have a health crisis? What if they need in-home caregiving?

As a woman, I already face a gender wage gap, a “pink tax” that charges me more than men for the same item, and the need to save more money for retirement because women tend to live longer.  Statistically, I am more likely than a man to be a caregiver for my parents. As a millennial woman — but one of the lucky millennials that is currently employed — I face the reality that Social Security may not exist when I retire, and I may be paying into something that has nothing to give me back. I need to put even more aside to address this eventuality. And as an unmarried woman, I can add the inability to take part in the tax benefits of marriage and children (while also not bearing the associated costs).

How can I ensure that my family is able to continue to live a life of dignity and prosperity, while facing the reality of what it takes to guarantee that for them? Will I be able to guarantee it for myself, and my future family if I have one? 

What Statistics Don’t Tell You

You can look at the statistics of how many immigrants have bought homes or started businesses, but those statistics don’t tell you what it took to get there or the nuances of maintaining those achievements over time.

It also doesn’t tell you that immigrant children carry the emotional weight of what their families lost. It is, after all, part of their immigrant story and heritage too. Part of my identity as a first-generation immigrant who moved here at a young age is enmeshed in the opportunities I have had as a result: to get an education, to pursue work that is meaningful to me, to build a life and stand on my own two feet because I live in a country that allows me the freedom and independence to do that. And I am privileged in many ways within the immigrant community  — in being documented, and in access to higher education, for example.

The part of my identity that is the child of immigrants understands what my family lost — and what they sacrificed — in the process of leaving their home and wants desperately to help them regain some semblance of it. I would not be here and would not have had any of those opportunities had they not made the journey across continents. I owe it to them to try to make life a little bit easier.

The part of my identity that is the  child of immigrants   understands what my family lost — and what they sacrificed — in the process of leaving their home and wants desperately to help them regain some semblance of it.

Educating myself on personal financial management and taking appropriate steps is just one way I’m trying to do that. But it’s worth asking a very important question: do we want immigrants in the United States to survive, or thrive? If the latter, what does it take to get there?

If the American dream and living in the “land of opportunity” means that immigrants are better off here than in their home countries, then perhaps that is a relatively low threshold to reach. But we have a lot of work to do if it means building generational wealth, climbing the socioeconomic ladder, developing social connections and being civically engaged  — to ensure not just access to basic social services but the whole continuum of social, political, and economic integration that builds a strong foundation for success for generations to come. That’s what it looks like for immigrants to thrive in America.

My goal here is not to dive into the specifics of successful immigrant integration policies and programs, but rather to provide a personal perspective of an immigrant family’s enduring struggle to succeed. We can place the challenges immigrants face in discreet buckets of education, inclusive access, economic mobility, etc., but sometimes we fail to connect human faces and stories with those challenges, or to consider the intergenerational aspects of them.

We focus on the beauty of the American dream without evaluating what it means to achieve it and maintain it, especially today. If all I’ve done is spread an ounce more of awareness that contributes to asking better questions, and perhaps more empathetic policy responses, then I will have made my immigrant family proud.

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number 60 • Summer 2024

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Identity and Assimilation

Spring 2018.

In our politicallly polarized society, there are few topics that are more controversial than immigration. There are valid arguments for loosening or strengthening immigration restrictions based on economic, national-security, and cultural concerns. Of the cultural concerns lodged by those who want tighter restrictions, the most common is immigrants' seeming inability or unwillingness to assimilate to American society. Many do not speak English, and prefer to live in enclaves populated by immigrants from their home countries rather than taking on the difficult task of weaving themselves into their new communities. Many do not wish to become American at all, and would gladly return to their homelands if only they could live there in safety.

One of the most difficult barriers to assimilation is religiosity. Observant non-Western immigrants especially find it difficult to adapt to the predominantly secular American culture. For those who come from cultures defined by man's relationship to God — even when the state religion is not their own — conforming to the anti-metaphysical philosophy that implicitly informs everyday life in the modern West can be a bridge too far. Assimilating would require giving up the defining aspect of their cultural and individual identities.

The struggle to live in accordance with one's religious beliefs likely sounds familiar to many conservatives, who have had to fight in recent years for special "conscience clauses" to exempt them from laws that impinge on their right to live according to their convictions. This is merely another front in the same battle that some immigrants face: that between a dominant universal secularism and a culture that recognizes God — a culture populated by infinitely plastic identities versus one based on metaphysically informed identities rooted in reality, as George Weigel described in the Spring 2013 issue of this magazine.

Modern life in the secular, anti-metaphysical West has been bled dry of meaning beyond the material, and it is leading to an identity crisis not just for immigrants but for modern man in general. As an immigrant, I have felt acutely the identity crisis that comes from being a speck in a global system, untethered from any nation or people, and I know how intimately this experience is connected to a metaphysical understanding of the world.

To see this is not to argue for one particular immigration policy over another. It is merely to shed light on the immigrant experience in a way that might lead to a better understanding of the larger struggle to find identity and meaning in the modern, secular West.

IDENTITY UNDER CONSTRUCTION

Every person at some point in his life will ask the big questions for himself: "Who am I?" "Why am I here?" "What am I supposed to do with my life?"

Most likely, he'll find the answers to those questions in the institutions and relationships that connect him with other people and (in many cases) with his God. He'll find his identity and purpose in the roles he plays in these different relationships and in the responsibilities those roles demand of him. Every healthy human person is formed in this way, though each must find his own answers in his own time and place.

For a believer, the most fundamentally formative relationship is that with his Creator. Having been created by God in His image imbues all human beings with dignity; as St. Pope John Paul II described it, "For God and before God, the human being is always unique and unrepeatable, somebody thought of and chosen from eternity." The foundation of each unique individual thus starts with the metaphysical and continues through the ties he forms with others.

The most basic and most significant of earthly relationships is the nuclear family. This is the first sphere of belonging for most people, and the unchosen role of son or daughter the first role of one's life. It is as a family member that one learns responsibility and recognizes one's own value as an individual. From the beginning of life, it is the venue for the most consequential relationships and formative experiences. Each family has its own traditions, rules, habits, jokes, and history that make it distinct from all other families. And the family is where one gets the first sense of being a part of a larger, distinct whole.

From the nuclear family, the spheres of belonging grow larger: extended family relationships and friendships; community institutions like school, work, clubs, religious communities, and other organizations; even one's city and state. The shared bonds between the people in these overlapping spheres shape one's identity and sense of self. These roles and relationships all come with responsibilities and imbue life with meaning and purpose. The cords of attachment to family, one's religious home, one's community, as they are strengthened, weakened, or exchanged during one's lifetime, make up one's identity. Without them it's hard, if not impossible, to answer the big questions.

Just as each individual is defined by these attachments and his own history, and each family has its own identity with its own rules, history, and traditions, so every nation has its own identity. Different peoples have always had their own stories, myths, music, and gods, and they have taken pride in what makes their people special. For the individual members of a nation, to see these differences is to identify one's fellows and to see where one belongs. Just as belonging to a particular family gives an individual a sense of himself as a family member, being part of a nation also forms an important aspect of an individual's sense of self.

In many enlightened, elite circles today, this recognition of group difference (or sameness within one's own group) is frowned upon, and sometimes condemned as nationalist or even racist. Such charges are deeply wrongheaded and damaging to the public discourse; there is real evil in racism, and it is counterproductive to pretend it is the same as the mere recognition of difference. Western society has forgotten that such distinctions are at the root of human identity. Spartans knew they were not Athenians, and the British understood that they were different from the French. People have long grasped personal and national identity; they haven't been scandalized by their differences. Indeed, their differences defined them and made them part of something larger than themselves.

In his 1941 essay "The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius," George Orwell made the observation (unpopular then as now) that national identities are rooted in real difference. Contrary to arguments that attempted to erase national distinctions, he wrote,

[O]ne must admit that the divisions between nation and nation are founded on real differences of outlook. Till recently it was thought proper to pretend that all human beings are very much alike, but in fact anyone able to use his eyes knows that the average of human behaviour differs enormously from country to country....Yes, there is something distinctive and recognizable in English civilization....And above all, it is your civilization, it is you . However much you hate it or laugh at it, you will never be happy away from it for any length of time.

Each people or nation has a particular framework of life out of which it operates. Each has its own history, culture, and institutions that link its members together. And it is within this imbedded structure that individuals understand who they are both as human beings and also as members of a community.

NATIONAL IDENTITY

Just as individual identity begins with creation by God, so may national identity. This claim was more commonly accepted in antiquity, and it is easier to understand today in religious cultures where metaphysics is more commonly discussed in a serious way; it is difficult for secular Westerners to contemplate.

Yoram Hazony, in a 2016 essay in Mosaic entitled "Nationalism and the Future of Western Freedom," argues that one of the first sources for the idea of the nation is the Hebrew Bible. In the establishment of Israel, "The Bible...puts a new political conception on the table: a state of a single people that is united, self-governing, and uninterested in bringing its neighbors under its own rule."

Hazony seems to share with Catholic philosopher Jacques Maritain a common definition of "nation" — it is a people united around a shared language, tradition, history, culture, and (often) religion. These elements have an inherent, unifying force that brings a people together. A people united by these forces, and at the same time shaped in mind and heart by these very forces, will form a political body working toward its common good.

A people can be united in this way without sharing the same religion, though the situation is more complex. There are Iraqi Muslims and Iraqi Christians, for instance, and yet they are both Iraqi. But even in such cases, the same model of evolution and formation of a people still holds. In Biblical terms, then, we see that the metaphysical source of a nation is made up of two horizons, the vertical and the horizontal: the vertical being the bond between a given people and God; the horizontal being the bonds among the people, such as language, tradition, history, culture, and religion. Without the vertical bond, the horizontal bonds disintegrate.

This idea of a "nation" is not the same thing as a "state." The nation is the people, and as Jacques Maritain says, "The people are the very substance, the living and free substance, of the body politic. The people are above the State, the people are not for the State, the State is for the people." He continues, "The State is a part and an instrumental agency of the body politic." Put simply, the state is the governing mechanism of the nation — that is, the people.

The clearest example of such national formation is ancient Israel. The Israelites were told by Moses not to worship the gods and idols of the surrounding nations — their one and only object of worship was to be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He instructed them:

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD; and you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. And these words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart; and you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. [Deuteronomy 6:4-7]

This instruction, called the shema , is foundational for Jewish identity. While the commandment requires repeating it in prayer twice daily, observant Jews say it three times each day. The Mosaic laws include elements such as food and its preparation, physical as well as ritual cleanliness, and so on; the Lord's instructions are built into every aspect of life, every social interaction, and every institution. The nation of Israel had its own language, religion, and sense of history, passed from parent to child. The children of Israel knew who they were. They were not Egyptians, nor were they Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Hivites, Perizzites, or Jebusites. They were the sons of Abraham. They knew because their Creator told them so.

Thus the question of one's nation can be seen in large part as a metaphysical question, though this idea of a nation is nearly always misunderstood. This view of a nation is no abstraction; it's rooted in physical reality. A people needs a land of its own, a place to practice its traditions and nurture a sober national identity.

This idea of the nation is not aggressive and is not based on the biology of the people; it is not a matter of race. The nation is not defined by its conquests but by its own character. It stands out not as deserving to dominate others or command the world but as possessed of its own distinct identity.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, this older ideal of the nation became confounded with a more militaristic and imperialist form of the idea — a conquering nationalism that asserts its own superiority, partly due to the conflation of nation and state, and the desire of the state for supreme power over the body politic. That idea of nationalism found its ultimate expression in Germany and Japan during the Second World War, and came at least implicitly to be understood as the inevitable direction of any confident nationalism.

In the post-war era, therefore, the idea of a national identity has been an uncomfortable one for many, and defenses of nationalism are often met with concerns about resurgent fascism. But the false dichotomy of global citizenship or Nazism stifles important conversations about national identity. After the violence of the 20th century, it is unnecessary to remind ourselves that nationalism can be taken too far. But it is undeniable nonetheless that there are unique national characters, based on crystallized wisdom that is the product of centuries, even millennia, of lived history.

Because of these unique characters, not everyone wants a borderless world. There are large numbers of people in the Western world who celebrate their national identities and their nation's sovereignty, and think there is value in a nation being distinct from other nations. The fault line between the largely elite class of people who prefer a more global approach and those who prefer to maintain a national identity is one of the most important social dynamics of our time. This was clear in the Brexit vote that shocked the world in the summer of 2016 and again in the U.S. presidential election later that year.

Even among those who defend a healthy nationalism, there are misunderstandings about religion's role in the building of a national identity. Philosopher Roger Scruton, for instance, pits religion and national identity against each other in a Wall Street Journal essay, "The Case for Nations." He writes, "In the world as it is today, the principal threat to national identity remains religion, and in particular Islam, which offers to its most ardent subscribers a complete way of life, based on submission to the will of God." This misunderstands both national identity and religion. Religion is a part of any national identity, at the metaphysical and cultural levels. The urge to separate the two and pit them against one another is a very recent phenomenon, and misleading at best. In the United States and most other Western countries, where there is no official religion, there need not be any conflict between loyalty to the nation and observance of a religion that subscribes to a particular way of life and demands humility before God.

In fact, a firm basis in religion is what allowed liberalism to grow in the West. Classical, secular liberalism grew organically out of the Christian world and is based on a Christian metaphysical tradition that recognizes the dignity of each human person as a child of God. This dignity is the foundation of the individual rights that government exists to defend. This classical liberalism espoused the idea that religion cannot be imposed; the right to worship as one pleases is one of the foundational rights of modern liberal nations (though one that is not evenly protected everywhere). The power of the church and the state were to be separated. In the classical secular society, there was a legitimate place for religion in the public square. Religion was not viewed as a threat to the social order but an integral part of it. Without the basic morality and the obedience to a higher authority that religion teaches, liberal democracy would not be possible.

The contemporary secular order, on the other hand, which is based on positivist humanism and is devoid of the metaphysical, too often denies even the legitimacy of religion.

FREEDOM AND TOLERANCE

Believers' adherence to a metaphysical framework has become controversial in today's secular world. This is increasingly true in the United States, though the problem is most stark in Europe. Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger confronted this issue and its consequences for contemporary secular Europe in a lecture on April 1, 2005, the day before St. Pope John Paul II died. Entitled "Europe's Crisis of Culture," the speech addressed the roots of Europe's ongoing identity crisis. It clarified the sources of Europe's Muslim assimilation problem in the larger civilizational clash between European nations and their Muslim populations. (The same analysis applies to the United States, though to a lesser extent thanks in part to the greater religiosity of native-born Americans.)

According to the future Pope Benedict XVI, the source of Europe's problem can be traced by this logical sequence: The Enlightenment and secularism matured organically in Christian Europe; Europe denied its Christian heritage, espousing a universal secular culture; this universal secular culture broke down national identity and imposed an identity that was "determined exclusively by the Enlightenment culture," a culture with internal contradictions and an "ill-defined or undefined concept of freedom." Most significantly, this culture excludes God from the public conscience in the name of tolerance.

But the experience of Europe shows that banishing God from the public square does not create a more tolerant world. Instead, it absolutizes "a pattern of thought and of life that are radically opposed...to the other historical cultures of humanity." Despite what the secular thinkers have argued, Cardinal Ratzinger says, people of other religions "do not feel threatened by our Christian moral foundations, but by the cynicism of a secularized culture that denies its own foundation." He clarifies, "It is not the mention of God that offends those who belong to other religions, but rather the attempt to build the human community absolutely without God."

Cardinal Ratzinger goes on to ask whether this Enlightenment-inspired secular philosophy can be universally valid, as it claims. He shows that it cannot. While the current thinking may be secular, it grew in Christian soil. Despite having severed its roots, "depriving itself of the regenerating forces from which it sprang," it is not infinitely adaptable; it cannot be transplanted into Muslim ground. Enlightenment culture is based on Enlightenment philosophies, which "are characterized by the fact that they are positivist and, therefore, anti-metaphysical , so much so that, in the end, God cannot have any place in them" (emphasis added).

Given the metaphysical foundations of human identity discussed above, it should be clear that, despite its lofty rhetoric about tolerance, a Western, secular, anti-metaphysical society is not a hospitable place for a large mass of immigrants who come from cultures where the metaphysical is the very foundation of understanding human nature and the universe. Ratzinger articulates the exact nature of the problem:

The real opposition that characterizes today's world is not that between various religious cultures, but that between the radical emancipation of man from God, from the roots of life, on one hand, and from the great religious cultures on the other. If there were to be a clash of cultures, it would not be because of a clash of the great religions — which have always struggled against one another, but which, in the end, have also always known how to live with one another — but it will be because of the clash between this radical emancipation of man and the great historical cultures.

In other words, it is a clash between the secular West and the world that has not capitulated to an anti-metaphysical worldview.

This radical emancipation is profoundly isolating and against man's nature. In the Summa Theologiae Secunda Secundae Partis , St. Thomas Aquinas writes that, by virtue of our creation into the relational spheres discussed above, we owe devotion and honor first to God as our Creator and sustainer, then to parents and kinsmen because of the bonds of love and life we share with them, and finally to our country and fellow citizens because of the metaphysical bonds we share as a people. The anti-metaphysical philosophy of our time breaks these bonds and isolates the individual from his Creator, from his immediate family and kinsmen, and even from his fellow citizens.

This modern anti-metaphysical philosophy atomizes individuals and breaks the links that make a nation cohere. This break forces man's natural tendency toward devotion to center itself on the state — which exacerbates man's isolation, as the state is incapable of providing man with meaning greater than himself. This is happening to everyone right now in the secular West, not just immigrants.

THE PRICE OF GLOBALIZATION

Throughout history, people have traveled from country to country, trading with one another over long distances, returning home with the goods, habits, and even the idols and religions of far-off peoples. People knew that crossing a border was not a neutral event. They were fearful of change, knowing some changes become assaults on the spheres that define their identity. They expected that the exchanges of goods and ideas would sometimes lead to conflict. Whether they were superficially about religious differences, greed for land and treasure, or lust for power, fundamentally the clashes were always about identity: people fighting to maintain who they were and to reject what they were not.

Our current civilizational clash is also about identity, but the terms of the conflict are different. Though many argue that globalization has improved the world economically, it came with a price that no old-fashioned trade route ever demanded from a people: the breakdown of national barriers. The universal secular ideal assumes that all people are more or less the same, deep down — or would be if they were better informed. Likewise, the modern ideal of a world without borders denies that there are profound differences between peoples. In attempting to break down barriers to bring people together, it denies the validity of the differences that define cultural and individual identity, and demands that they be set aside in the interest of a peaceful, unified, global society. But this denial leads to a far deeper conflict than the acknowledgment of difference ever did.

Invalidating differences invalidates people, diminishing the human person's dignity and identity. Demanding that Jews and Catholics, for example, conform to an anti-metaphysical social structure does not make them better neighbors. Instead, it breaks the bonds between them and their God, and so between one another. As discussed above, the bond between a person and his God gives that person his foundational identity, on top of which everything else is built. That relationship may look a little different for the Jew and the Catholic, and they may confront obstacles on their way to being neighbors in light of those differences, but their personal identities centered on their relationships with God are absolutely necessary to living peacefully together. And that is because respecting their differences reinforces their human dignity. They become healthier people knowing who they are and what they believe, which leaves them better able to respect and love others who are not like them.

In an anti-metaphysical culture, these differences are denied. And so for devout immigrants, this clash of cultures becomes a personal identity crisis. An immigrant has already left family, community, and state, moving and attempting to adapt to a new community and state. More often than not in the modern world, the immigrant is also crossing a civilizational boundary from a society steeped in metaphysics to one that is disdainful of it. Therefore, in order to assimilate to his new world, most if not all of the spheres that make up his identity must be broken down, including not just his national identity, but also, to some extent, the individual's relationship with his Creator, of which his national identity is a part. These ties are the very foundation of a believing person's identity, which is part of why immigration is so wrenching for the individual immigrant.

To take an example from literature, in Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov , Dmitri has been unjustly convicted of murdering his father, so his brothers plot to help him escape to America. But Dmitri tells his brother:

I hate this America even now! And maybe every last one of them is some sort of boundless machinist or whatever — but, devil take them, they're not my people, not of my soul! I love Russia, Alexei, I love the Russian God, though I myself am a scoundrel! But there I'll just croak!

Dostoevsky's Dmitri typifies the ontological drive for personal and national identity. People flourish when they know who they are; they need to know who they are, and they are dehumanized when it is taken away from them. Dmitri's reaction can be confusing to modern readers who know only the universal secular philosophy of the self, with its infinitely plastic identities shaped wholly by one's own will.

But there is a metaphysical difference between being tethered to a nation and being unmoored from everything familiar. With one's people, there is a sense of belonging and purpose; without one's people, a person is a speck, floating alone in a global system, attempting to create a meaningful life from scratch.

THE IMMIGRANT EXPERIENCE

My life has embodied this identity crisis. I've lived in America for 39 years since immigrating as a child, and I have spent those years trying to understand the world around me and who I am within that world. There is an Arab proverb my mother often repeated: "He who renounces his origins renounces himself." It was a cause of strife between us as I struggled against my Iraqi heritage. The more she embedded herself within the Middle Eastern subculture here in the United States, the harder I struggled against my roots. I pulled and pulled until I became rootless. I spent years in that state, testing and probing the world around me for answers. In the end, I had to go back to my origins — to my ties to family, religion, culture, and nationality — to understand myself.

A person cannot remain untethered, and so I sought to attach myself to my new community and country. But in order to become American, I had to change what I did, what I thought, and even how I thought about what I did , and how I thought about what I thought .

What did it mean to be an American? It went beyond learning to speak English, and dressing and acting like an American girl, all of which could be mimicked easily without changing my identity. To really be American required absorbing the cultus , the heart of culture.

What is the American cultus ? What does America worship and believe in? This is a religious question; it explains why a person's religion shapes how and to what extent an individual assimilates. Each religion carries with it a particular way of knowing about God, man, and the world; religion gives man an epistemology. To become internally American requires an epistemological shift.

To understand what is meant by an American epistemology, consider the words of the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

One has to think about God, man, and the world in a particular way in order to believe these statements. If one's understanding of God, man, and the world are orthogonal to this, or in any way contentious with this worldview, it will be difficult to fully assimilate without undergoing an epistemological shift.

Abraham Lincoln beautifully articulated the positive formulation of this straightforward fact. On July 10, 1858, in a speech in Chicago, he spoke of the Americans who were not connected by ties of blood to the nation's founders:

We have besides these men — descended by blood from our ancestors — among us perhaps half our people who are not descendants at all of these men. They are men who have come from Europe — German, Irish, French and Scandinavian — men that have come from Europe themselves, or whose ancestors have come hither and settled here, finding themselves our equals in all things. If they look back through this history to trace their connection with those days by blood, they find they have none, they cannot carry themselves back into that glorious epoch and make themselves feel that they are part of us. But when they look through that old Declaration of Independence they find that those old men say that "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal," and then they feel that that moral sentiment taught in that day evidences their relation to those men, that it is the father of all moral principle in them, and that they have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood, and flesh of the flesh of the men who wrote that Declaration, and so they are.

This beautiful sentiment, however, is the other side of the coin of a more complicated fact about American identity. It raises the question of how Americans themselves understand the words of the Declaration of Independence, and so understand their own national character. When that character comes to be understood as defined by a shallow idea of freedom, as opposed to Lincoln's deep idea of it, it presents to traditionalists — both those who are native to America and those who immigrate here — an ethic to which it is difficult to assimilate.

My parents made it clear that my family didn't espouse the American version of freedom and individualism, as they understood it. We are different. We don't wear immodest clothes, or wear makeup and have boyfriends in elementary school. We don't go to American churches that worship in ways we disagree with. And we don't get too involved with institutions whose values run contrary to ours.

It wasn't that the concept of the equality of man as articulated in the Declaration of Independence was scorned or regarded with suspicion by my Iraqi Christian subculture. To the contrary, not only was it in line with our Christian beliefs, but we embraced it gratefully, knowing it was the reason we could live peacefully in this country. But there were two hurdles. First, it seemed to most of us that there was some kind of disconnect between the words of the founders and the extreme atomization we saw in the culture; things we regarded as beyond the pale were considered matters of individual freedom. The document guaranteed liberty, but many people seemed to believe that it meant there were no limits to freedom. That interpretation was a stumbling block to my family and others in my subculture.

Second, there were residual effects coming out of the Middle Eastern culture dominated by the Islamic conception of the human person, where non-Muslims were considered kuffar  — unbelievers who could be killed with impunity. Not only were Christians used to their dhimmi status as second-class citizens, but most were also very attuned to the assimilation hurdles within the Arab subculture here in America, as Christians and Muslims struggled in different ways to adapt to this country.

The looser the American culture became, the more firmly my parents pressed into their Middle Eastern subculture. The harder I tried to fit into the American world around me, the tighter their restrictions became. My U.S. history teacher at school taught us that the American founders had certain ideas, and those ideas created a particular country — our country, America. I knew that if America was going to continue to be America, then we needed to think as they did. We could not live in America but continue to think like Iraqis. There lay the existential rub.

But my parents were adamant. "We are not Americans!" they insisted. "We are Christian Iraqis. We work hard, we pay taxes, we vote, we obey the law and become good citizens — but we are not Americans." For them, it was metaphysical warfare: We abide, but we do not assimilate.

RICHNESS IN DIFFERENCE

This feeling of being "strangers in a strange land," and the refusal to submit to a culture that denies the truth as one knows it, is not limited to immigrants. It is increasingly becoming true for all people living in America who find themselves on the believers' side of the metaphysical war.

The last few years have seen devout Christians legally persecuted and run out of business for living in accordance with their beliefs. Even religious orders are not immune from the diktats of the secular state; the Little Sisters of the Poor had to go to the Supreme Court to win an exemption to live their faith. These native-born bakers, florists, and nuns were forced to choose between their faiths and the demands of the universal secular culture — an all-too-familiar experience for so many Eastern immigrants.

So what is to be done? In The Benedict Option , Rod Dreher goes so far as to suggest that believers establish their own separate communities, wholly apart from the rest of the corrupted, anti-metaphysical culture. But this is not much better than my parents' retreat into their own subculture.

In his 1943 essay "On the Primacy of the Common Good: Against the Personalists and The Principle of the New Order," Charles De Koninck wrote that we live in an age where "the singular person and his singular good [is] the primary root, [is] an ultimate intrinsic end, and consequently [is] the measure of all intrinsic good in the universe." Devout native-born Americans sense the spiritual vacancy of this secular dogma just as immigrants from metaphysically driven cultures do. They too feel beleaguered by the bread and circuses of the surrounding culture — a social and intellectual regime foisting counterfeit identities on the devout. They are called bigots for believing in a sexuality grounded in holy scriptures. The women among them are deemed backward for wanting to stay at home to raise their children. They are accused of persecuting women because they affirm the right to life for the unborn.

The situation immigrants and devout native-born Americans face could serve as a bridge between these communities. Bonds can be created between these groups based on their shared values, like the relationship between an individual and God, and the belief that this vertical relationship is necessary if the horizontal relationships of family, friends, and countrymen are to be maintained. These two communities, even despite their differences, can come together to rebuild the metaphysical structures of society on the local level.

There are spaces in American society where the work can be done to regain our identities, and where believers can live faithfully and unapologetically. This work will occur from the bottom up, in the middle layers of society. This is where the ties between people and their communities will be reestablished and religious communities will regain their strength. As people recover their faith in local institutions, they will more easily see how hollow the promises of the universal secular culture are. And they will rediscover the richness to be found in recognizing both our differences and the important things we all share as Americans.

It is through such a recovery of American identity that our capacity to assimilate immigrants can also be revitalized. Assimilation has proven so difficult lately not because our culture is too cohesive and self-confident but because it has lost the capacity to tell its own story coherently. Immigration will become easier, not harder, when we become more self-assured as a people with a firm national identity rooted, as all national identities are, in metaphysical as well as in historical and cultural commitments.

Luma Simms is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

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Immigrant Identity and Experiences in U.S. Higher Education Research: A Systematic Review

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• International Journal of Multicultural Education 23(2):45-69
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The lost identity of immigrants in america.

When people are leaving their country because of safety reasons, they should be comforted in the US where they do not have to deal with these problems. Instead, they are made into outcasts. Because of this feeling of exclusion, some immigrants have tried to Americanize themselves to become more like the norm. This is not what should be happening. Rather, we should be accepting of our differences and embracing them. People living in the United States need to understand that immigrants coming into this country struggle with making a living. But, they is another side to this argument: the fear of Americans to accept immigrants because of the danger they could inflict. With the history of the U.S. including the bombing of the World Trade Center, the Boston Marathon bombing, and many more, Americans fear immigrants. Also, some US citizens do not like immigrants coming into their country because they could take the jobs that they want.  In the article, “Immigrant Perceptions of U.S.- Born Receptivity and the Shaping of American Identity,” < https://www.rsfjournal.org/doi/pdf/10.7758/RSF.2018.4.5.03. > The authors research how immigrants feel less American because of certain characteristics such as language and race

Surveys and interviews were conducted to reveal the feelings of these immigrants. This study was inspired by the concept of what American Identity is composed of. The authors of the article describe American identity as the beliefs of “individualism, hard work, freedom, equality, and the rule of law,” but also by characteristics such as, “language, skin color, native birth, and religion” (Jones-­Correa et al. 1). Researchers were looking for results that reveal how race and language impact immigrants’ feeling of exclusion in American society. They performed this test through numerous surveys. South Asian Indian immigrants and Mexican immigrants completed the surveys and were asked how their identification as Americans impacts their decisions within their communities and in the nation (52).  In the interviews, immigrants were asked how their race affects their identity as an American (56). They concluded that characteristics do indeed impact immigrants’ views on their own identification and reveal their feelings of being marginalized because of these characteristics (65).

This study was done using many surveys and interviews and in specific locations and immigrant groups to retrieve their results. They surveyed immigrants in Atlanta and Philadelphia. They studied in these two metropolitan areas because the places have large amounts of naive blacks and whites along with many immigrants from India and Mexico (54). They studied Mexican and South Asian Indian immigrants. The first reason they choose these two groups is that they are the two biggest groups in the US. Secondly, Mexicans have a lower status and Southern Asian Indians have a higher status. Lastly, Mexicans are the most affected by undocumented citizenship and Indians identity is mistaken for many other races like Muslim, Arabic, Mexican, or Native American (52-53).

This graph displays the legal status of immigrants in the US, which depicts that 30% of foreign-born citizens have permanent legal residency and 26 % of immigrants are undocumented.

http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/immigration/chart-2002.gif

In this study, they conducted interviews via phone with about 500 people per group. The requirements to be eligible for an interview were that one has to be 18 years or older and must live in either Atlanta or Philadelphia. They were asked about their age, race, where they live, if they are employed, and how much education they have received. Although all these questions are valuable to the study, the most important question was, “In general, how strongly do you think of yourself as American?” (55).

Through this study, they found that specifically race and language impact an individual’s identity in America and these specific aspects impact his/her decision to return home. In an interview with an Indian immigrant man, the interviewer asked where the man and his parents originated and he responded with distress. He wondered why he was being asked because since he lives in the US, why would he be categorized as something other than American.

He was, then, asked if he thought it was because of his skin color and he states, “…if I’m not American, what am I? Because I have grown up thinking I am American. And all of a sudden, I feel like I’m being surrounded by people that don’t think that” (56).

His response accurately portrays the feelings of immigrants in America because even if they have been living in America their whole life or just a short amount of time, they are still Americans. Because of their race or language or whatever it may be, they are looked at as outcasts or someone who does not belong. Another example of this marginalization is from an Indian immigrant mother, who was angry at a comment a boy made to her son. While playing ball, a boy her son’s age said, “I don’t like you all people here you should go back to your country” (57). This boy was born in the US but is not treated as an American because of his race.

There were many limitations within this study. First, they only surveyed two immigrant groups in two places. This will result in a stereotype for all immigrants. To conclude that race, language, and other characteristics determine an immigrants identity in America, they should study all groups around America to eliminate bias and error.

After reading this article, my understanding of the struggles of immigrants has increased tremendously. My eyes have been opened to now seeing how Americans treat immigrants and how this treatment makes them feel excluded. Americans have marginalized immigrants so much so that they have tried to become more Americanized, which aggravated me to hear. No one should have to change who they are because of what others think of them. Also, people should not be making another uncomfortable and lonely to the point to where the person feeling different wants to change to be more like the norm. We, as a country, need to make a change to make all feel at home and comfortable with who they are and where they come from.

Flags from all around the world make up one large flag to symbolize the human race as a whole working together to better the world.

http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2011/POLITICS/08/26/deportation.policy/t1larg.immigrationflags.gi.jpg

Jones-Correa, Michael, et al. “Immigrant Perceptions of U.S.-Born Receptivity and the Shaping of American Identity.” RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of The Social Sciences. p. 48-80.

Immigrants: Identity Development and Counseling Issues

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• Farah A. Ibrahim 4 &
• Jianna R. Heuer 5  

Part of the book series: International and Cultural Psychology ((ICUP))

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Worldwide immigration has increased significantly, partially due to globalization of economies, and partially due to the desire for a better life. Immigrant identity development as a counseling issue is explored in this chapter. The issues immigrants face in developing a new identity due to migration are presented, specifically, one key variable, i.e., the development of a strong ethnic (or personal and social identity) is explored, along with how racism, exclusion, and lack of support and services, can negatively affect the process of adaptation to host culture. Models of adaptation, along with counseling interventions from the literature are explored. Additionally, overlooked subpopulations within immigrants are reviewed, along with actions needed for social justice interventions for immigrants.

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Ibrahim, F.A., Heuer, J.R. (2016). Immigrants: Identity Development and Counseling Issues. In: Cultural and Social Justice Counseling. International and Cultural Psychology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-18057-1_6

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8 Challenges of Growing Up as a Second-Generation Immigrant

Things about having immigrant parents that no one talks about..

Posted January 10, 2023 | Reviewed by Gary Drevitch

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• As a child to immigrant parents, you might have automatically blamed yourself for their struggles.
• If you were born to immigrant parents, you might have lived "between" two cultures all your life.
• Overcoming the trauma of being the second generation of immigrants is not only possible but essential.

Second-generation immigrants often wish their parents had been different. You may long for parents who share your intellectual level, values, and political or spiritual beliefs. In this post, we will discuss some of the challenges of having immigrant parents, including the ones that are often tabooed.

1. The Heaviness of Unspoken Guilt . Children naturally blame themselves for their parents' pain. Your unwarranted guilt is worse as a second-generation immigrant when you know that your immigrant parents came to a new country to "give you a better life.” As a child, you might have automatically blamed yourself for your parents' struggles because you thought you did something wrong or did not help enough. So you studied harder, did more housework, counseled them, and may even have become their emotional punching bag.

Unconscious guilt can manifest itself in unexpected ways. Even now, you may have trouble taking care of yourself and managing money. You may work too much and feel guilty when you relax or have fun. Despite your success, you feel like an imposter. You are wary of being vulnerable even in close friendships and romantic relationships .

2. Rootless Without Home. If you were born to immigrant parents, you might have lived "between" two cultures all your life. Unlike your parents, your sense of self does not revolve around your heritage from the old country. But neither is it a purely Eurocentric integration into the new country.

You may have been conditioned to behave a certain way toward your relatives but a very different way toward your friends. You have not had the opportunity to explore and solidify your identity if you constantly hide one or more aspects of your personality to fit in, like a chameleon. Even now, you could be struggling with identity confusion, having difficulty deciding on important life goals such as a career or a romantic partner.

3. The Intellectual Divide. You may find that while other families may have stimulating discussions about current events, your parents seem rooted in the past and unable to see beyond their narrow perspective. Your parents may have shown no understanding of diversity, feminism, the dark side of capitalism, etc., and so there are no intellectual or political discussions about these issues at home. The intellectual distance between you and your parents can make even the most mundane conversations tedious, if not painful.

You may feel compelled to challenge your parents when they say or do things against your values. However, if you try to correct them, they may become defensive and either avoid you or become combative.

Although you respect and love your parents very much, you may find it difficult to relax and be yourself around them. You feel existentially alone in your own home, but you have no one to talk to about it because it is such a taboo.

4. Not Seen for Who You Are. Your immigrant parents may not have been exposed to global perspectives that would help them understand your place in the world. They think you are "good" because you have good grades or a steady job, but that misses the point. They do not know how to appreciate your ability to think independently, your willingness to stand up for what you believe in, your commitment to social justice, or your courage to defend the truth.

When it comes to our own family, it can be exceedingly hurtful to hear that we are "too much" (too emotional, too dramatic, too demanding, too intense, too sensitive). The pain of not being recognized by, or even being rejected by, our own family can cause immeasurable suffering that lasts a lifetime, even if we try to rationalize it by saying that we are materially well provided for.

5. Trapped in Codependency. It is sadly common for parents and children in immigrant families to develop an unhealthy level of codependency. You may feel obligated to put your parent's needs before your own, blame yourself for their problems, worry about them constantly, feel responsible for their happiness , and neglect your own needs. Part of you wants to rescue or help your parents, but you're also angry and resentful because their needs stunted you.

6. Constant Disapproval. Your immigrant parents may judge who you're with, what you do, whether you're single, married, polyamorous , etc. Worse, you know that many of your so-called "choices" in fact just represent who you are. Parents may reject you because this new information contradicts what they are sure they know. Their unconscious bias hurts you, even if they don't mean to. Their casual comments, facial expressions, or punitive silences may reveal prejudices even when they say nothing.

7. Navigating Life with " Learned Helplessness ." If you were born into an immigrant family, you might have witnessed or experienced institutional discrimination , microaggressions , and racism too early, too soon, perhaps even as a child. Psychologists use the term "learned helplessness" to describe the effects of being regularly exposed to systemic oppression and injustice without being able to do anything about it. You may have internalized the idea that no matter how hard you try, you will ultimately get nowhere. This can affect your self-esteem and your ability to pursue goals as an adult. You may also feel powerless in the face of injustice or corruption. You cannot just dismiss them or pretend they do not exist, but you're paralyzed by an overwhelming sense that it is impossible to change the world.

8. Unmet Emotional Needs. Your immigrant parents may have struggled, but they never modeled what it was like to show or express feelings. What if grief kept them from working? What if they let out all their emotions and cannot control them, leading to a depressive breakdown? Because of these fears, they felt they had to suppress any burgeoning emotions. So, when you show vulnerable feelings such as shame or sadness, they do not know what to do. They may try to silence your feelings, so they do not have to face their own. They may tell you it's "bad" to show emotion , or punish or silence you to keep you from being expressive and spontaneous.

Furthermore, with a general lack of mental health awareness, your immigrant parents may misunderstand your depression as laziness, your eating disorder as defiance, your ADHD as a character flaw, etc. They may be unfamiliar with the idea of seeing a therapist or psychiatrist, let alone paying for such services.

Internalized beliefs that it is unacceptable to express feelings, have emotional needs, or be vulnerable can prevent you from developing meaningful relationships or finding fulfillment in life.

Discovering Strength and Peace as a Second-Generation Immigrant

You wish you had parents with whom you could have open, honest conversations about life and the world. But you are silenced for your loneliness because it feels wrong to be ungrateful. Transgenerational trauma can have devastating effects. But since we can't blame our parents forever, we must heal ourselves. Consider these questions: How do you approach authorities? What's your money mindset? Do you feel guilty when you outshine your siblings or parents? How well can you express vulnerabilities with intimate partners?

You may feel guilty or fearful when it's time to separate yourself from your parents' values, even if you logically know your feelings have no logical basis. If you follow your heart, you are afraid to break theirs. But if you ignore the existential call to be yourself, you may become physically or emotionally ill.

As you enter your second half of life, overcoming the trauma of being the second generation of immigrants is not only possible but essential. You can thrive by embracing repressed emotions and gifts. By acknowledging your history and struggles, sharing your true feelings, and overcoming generational trauma , you can build bridges between yourself and your family and contribute to your community.

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Imi Lo, MA, is a consultant and psychotherapist with masters degrees in Mental Health and Buddhist Studies. She is the author of Emotional Sensitivity and Intensity and The Gift of Intensity and runs Eggshell Therapy and Coaching.

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• Published: 07 March 2023

Who do you think I am? Immigrant’s first name and their perceived identity

• Karin Amit   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-8791-5232 1 &
• Pnina Dolberg   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9737-2200 2  

Comparative Migration Studies volume  11 , Article number:  6 ( 2023 ) Cite this article

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The current study focuses on immigrants’ perceived identity—that is, the way immigrants think the locals perceive them—and examines the link between the first name (ethnic or local) they use in everyday social encounters and their local identity and belonging perceptions. The study model was tested on data obtained from an online survey filled out by 837 immigrants who arrived in Israel from the Former Soviet Union (FSU) or Ethiopia as children or adolescents (1.5 generation). The main findings indicate that immigrants expressing a higher sense of belonging to the host society and using a local first name report higher levels of perceived local identity. FSU immigrants reported higher levels of perceived local identity compared to Ethiopian immigrants. However, contrary to our expectations, the first name played a more significant role among Ethiopian immigrants. Possible explanations for our findings lie in the different naming practices related to the two immigrant groups and in the different social and economic position they hold in the host society. Implications of the first name immigrants use in social encounters are discussed.

Introduction

The first name serves as an identity marker for the individual and for those who interact with him or her (Alford, 1987 ; Dion, 1983 ). Naming a child represents an important cultural decision and reflects the identity that parents or other members of the family or community expect for the newborn (Gerhards & Hans, 2009 ; Girma, 2020 ; Sue & Telles, 2007 ). Immigrants with an ethnic first name are automatically identified as “others” in social encounters and may consider changing their name. The immigrant’s decision whether to keep or change the ethnic first name may stem from the desire to minimize labeling and discrimination (Bursell, 2012 ; Khosravi, 2012 ), to preserve the affinity to the culture and community of origin, or to better integrate socially, economically, and culturally in the host society (Kim, 2007 ).

Drawing upon concepts of symbolic interactionism which can be traced back to classical sociological theories as the “looking glass self” (Cooley, 1964 ), we share the view that individuals develop their identities through interactions with others and through their interpretation of how other people see them (perceived identity). In social encounters, immigrants are singled-out as “others” by various ethnic and cultural markers that make them recognizable (Liu & Kramer, 2019 ; Tuppat & Gerhards, 2021 ).

Names serve as prominent markers in social interactions, and therefore naming practices may provide an excellent opportunity to study complex social processes related to identity formation and social perceptions. However, despite the great potential that the study of naming has, this field has not received sufficient academic attention (Sue & Telles, 2007 ). In this paper, we focused on the first name immigrants use (ethnic or local) in social encounters and examined the link between this decision and their perceived identity.

First names as identity indicators

A person’s first name is given by his or her parents, family members, or religious or social authority, according to the customs of the culture in which he or she lives. Individuals’ first name acts as an identification marker for those who interact with them (Alford, 1987 ; Dion, 1983 ; Weitman, 1987 ). Alongside onomastic studies, focusing on linguistic approaches to names (Kirwin, 2001 ), psychological and social studies focus on the social context in which names are formed (Gima, 2020 ; Sabet & Zhang, 2020 ; Sue & Telles, 2007 ).

The idea that names, identities, and the self are all intertwined is not new (Thompson, 2006 ) and may be explained by classical sociological theories. According to the theory of symbolic interactionism (Denzin, 2008 ; Stryker, 2001 ), focusing on how individuals interact with one another to create symbolic worlds, an individual’s first name may signal different layers of identity in everyday social encounters. Naming practices may serve as channels to form identities by ascribing a symbolic meaning to them (Grima, 2020 ). We argue that the first name an individual uses in a social interaction is an important symbolic representation of his or her identity, and that for immigrants, the first name plays a much more significant role.

Immigrants’ first name and acculturation

Within a society, an individual’s first name can designate him or her as a member of a certain ethnic or immigrant group. By adopting ethnic names or alternatively local names that are widespread in the host society, ethnic communities can differentiate or acculturate themselves (Gerhards & Hans, 2009 ; Sue & Tellers, 2007 ).

Immigrants’ first name serves as a cultural integration indicator in studies examining cultural, social, and economic assimilation of immigrants. Some of these studies present macro level historical trends of assimilation by analyzing trends of name choices over decades using official statistical data (Abramitzky et al., 2020 ; Carneiro et al., 2020 ). Other studies, focusing on immigrants’ parental decision related to naming their children, point to the reasoning behind the parental decision as well as to the implications it has for their children’s integration into the host society. A study exploring the naming patterns of first-generation Ethiopian-Americans in the United States found that Ethiopian–American parents chose names perceived as less problematic for integration, by selecting either Biblical names or ethnic names that are short and easy to pronounce. In addition, as Black immigrants, parents chose names that would enable them to draw symbolic boundaries between their children and African Americans (Grima, 2020 ). Other studies found that greater exposure to U.S. culture increased the chances of giving an English name to a child, and that parents were more inclined to give English names to their daughters than to their sons (Sue & Telles, 2007 ). In Germany, it was found that parents’ first-name choices have a clear link to their children’s integration into German society (Gerhards & Hans, 2009 ).

Whereas many studies have focused on the first name given to immigrant children at birth, fewer studies have focused on the immigrants’ decision whether to use an ethnic first name or a local one and the implications of such a decision. This decision may stem from various reasons. One reason mentioned in the literature is to minimize discrimination. In studies conducted in Germany and Sweden, immigrants with ethnic first names reported significantly more exposure to discrimination compared to immigrants with local or common first names (Bursell, 2012 ; Khosravi, 2012 ; Tuppat & Gerhards, 2021 ). Studies conducted in Sweden and Australia show that changing a foreign name to a local-sounding or neutral name is associated with a significant increase in invitations for job interviews, earnings, and economic integration (Arai & Thoursie, 2009 ; Bursell, 2012 ; Chowdhury et al., 2020 ).

The immigrant’s decision to use a local or ethnic first name may also stem from the desire to preserve the affinity to the culture of origin or alternatively from the desire to assimilate into the new culture (Ainciburu & Buttazzi, 2019 ; Kim, 2007 ). Based on Berry’s ( 2001 ) acculturation model, we can argue that immigrants who use a local first name in everyday social encounters act in line with the assimilation pattern, whereas immigrants who use their ethnic first name act in line with the pattern of separation. These polar opposites on the assimilation-separation dimension are termed Cultural Preference and are tested while examining relevant parameters in both origin and destination cultures (Carlson & Guler, 2018 ).

The current study focused on the immigrant’s decision to use an ethnic first name or a local name in everyday encounters and the implications of this decision for his or her sense of belonging to the host society and identity as reflected by others. We chose to focus on immigrants arriving at the host country as children or adolescents, classified in the migration literature as 1.5 generation (Rumbaut, 2004 ). The 1.5 generation immigrants differ from first- and second-generation immigrants in that they are generally more immersed in the host society culture than the first generation. However, unlike the second generation, they frequently have to re-negotiate their identities in relation to others in the host society (Amit, 2018 ; Dolberg & Amit, 2022 ; Li, 2021 ).

Sense of belonging and perceived identity

The question of identity and belonging is central in the process of immigrants’ integration into a new society. Immigrants’ identity can be defined as how they perceive themselves in relation to groups or social categories in the host society or in the country of origin (Tajfel, 1982). When people are confused about where they belong, as in the case of immigrants, the question of identification becomes more acute (Bauman, 1996 ). As identity is the result of the encounter with otherness (Burgat, 2003 ), a sense of belonging can be re-defined as the willingness to become involved with the other, and the concern with achieving competence in cultures (Ossewaarde, 2007 ).

For many years, new immigrants have been expected to let go of previous social identities, while they develop a sense of local identity and belonging to their new society. However, immigrants do not shed their former identity or cultural attachment with their home country (Lerner et al., 2007). Many immigrants build transnational networks that cross national borders, allowing multiculturalism, hybrid identities, and mixed cultural formats to emerge and thrive (Clarke et al., 2007 ).

The importance of identity representation can be traced back in the classical sociological theory of “looking glass-self” presented by Cooley in 1902 ( 1964 ). According to this theory, individuals’ identities are formed through social interactions, and the image of an individual is reflected in others’ reactions to him or her—that is, in his or her perceived identity. Thus, we know who we are by understanding how others see us. This central notion is apparent in other social theories in the field of sociology and communication (Liu & Kramer, 2019 ).

Several studies have addressed the concept of perceived identity in the context of migration (Amit, 2012 ; Heilbrunn et al., 2016 ; Perkins et al., 2014 ). In an Israeli study predicting local identity, it was found that the most significant factor was Israeli identity as perceived by others, indicating that the more the immigrants feel that native-born Israelis define them as Israeli, the more Israeli they feel (Amit, 2012 ). Another Israeli study comparing FSU and Ethiopian immigrants found an inconsistency between the Ethiopian immigrants’ self-definitions (mostly Jewish) and their perceptions of how the majority group perceives them (mainly Ethiopian). This inconsistency shows that many Ethiopian immigrants feel that the Israeli majority population is still not ready to accept them as part of society. The findings regarding FSU immigrants were more consistent: The majority of FSU immigrants who identify as Israelis believe that the majority group perceives them as such (Heilbrunn et al., 2016 ).

Migration studies addressing the concept of perceived identity and “otherness” in intercultural encounters have ignored a key identifying marker in these encounters—the immigrant’s first name. Immigrants are singled out as “others” based on both phenotypic and cultural markers (Liu & Kramer, 2019 ). Whereas phenotype markers stress physical dissimilarities such as skin color, cultural markers are represented by linguistic gaps and cultural values (Hecht et al., 2005 ). The immigrants’ first name can serve as a prominent cultural marker that manifests “otherness” in social encounters. Our study aimed to predict immigrants’ perceived identity by their sense of belonging to the host society and the first name they use in everyday social encounters (ethnic or local name). Before presenting our predicting model in more detail, we provide general background about the Israeli case and our study groups.

The Israeli case

The Israeli population is ethnically diverse, and around 35% of Israelis are foreign-born immigrants. Footnote 1 As a “returning diaspora,” Israel welcomes immigrants descended from Jewish ancestry and grants them citizenship upon arrival (Semyonov & Lewin-Epstein, 2003 ). This study focused on two distinct immigrant groups descended from Jewish ancestry: immigrants from the FSU and Ethiopia.

The FSU immigrants are Israel’s largest immigrant group, with more than one million arriving after the collapse of the FSU in 1989. Their immigration was primarily prompted by economic and political uncertainties in their home countries (Remennick, 2013 ). The FSU immigrant population is characterized by high human capital and strong professional credentials. However, in order to integrate into the local job market, many of these immigrants were forced to downgrade their employment status (Gorodzeisky & Semyonov, 2011 ), among other things due to poor social and cultural capital (Bourdieu, 2018 ) as immigrants in Israel. Previous studies have highlighted the importance FSU immigrants ascribe to their Russian culture and identity (e.g., Prashizky & Remennick, 2016 ; Remennick, 2003 , 2013 ). The sense of belonging to Israeli society was found to be lower among FSU immigrants compared to French immigrants, and it was explained by differences in the levels of religiosity and in the motivation to immigrate between the groups (Amit & Bar-Lev, 2015 ). The significant role of identity and immigration motives as determinants of the sense of belonging to the host society among FSU immigrants has been found in other Israeli studies as well (Amit, 2018 ; Raijman & Geffen, 2018 ).

Approximately 150,000 people of Ethiopian descent, both foreign and Israeli-born, currently reside in Israel (CBS, 2021 ). Most Ethiopian immigrants arrived in Israel during the 1980s and 1990s in two major migration waves out of religious and personal insecurity motives. The Ethiopian community in Israel is characterized by relatively low human capital: many of the newly arrived immigrants lacked formal schooling and had little acquaintance with modern educational and job norms (Shabtay, 2001 ). Ethiopian immigrants are the least integrated community of all immigrant groups in Israel in terms of education and economic standing (Amit & Chachashvili-Bolotin, 2018 ). Racial prejudice may have hampered their integration as they are a visible black minority. However, in studies comparing the sense of Israeli identity between different immigrant groups in Israel, the Ethiopian immigrants expressed high levels of Israeli identity compared to FSU immigrants, mainly due to their level of religiosity (Amit, 2012 ). A recent study on 1.5 generation Ethiopian immigrants presented this generational group as socially and politically active, struggling for the right of their minority to be included in the collective space (Sharaby, 2021 ).

In order to address naming practices among immigrants in the Israeli context, a short presentation of Israel’s integration policy is needed. In the first decades following the establishment of the State of Israel, Israel followed a strict assimilation policy in line with the “melting pot” model, which exerted pressure on immigrants to change foreign first and last names to Hebrew names (Landman, 2016 ; Stahl, 1994 ). Often, the names were changed forcibly (Matras, 2008 ). Over the years, the implementation of the “melting pot” model has become less meticulous (Landman, 2016 ; Zilberg et al., 1995 ). However, it has been found that the Israeli public view was less tolerant than the official policy, and there is still an expectation of assimilation posed by native-born Israelis (Elias et al., 2000 ; Horowitz et al., 1998; Lissitsa et al., 2002 ). In addition, over the years, formal and informal pressure to change names has been applied mainly on immigrants from weak and vulnerable groups such as Ethiopian immigrants (Landman, 2016 ; Stahl, 2001 ). In the words of Stahl ( 2001 ), “The pressures still exist, but have lost some of their aggression” (p. 173).

Changing the first names of immigrants in Israel is common, and contrary to what is customary in some countries, there is no legal restriction on changing a first name (Nadav et al., 2008 ; Stahl, 2001 ). In a report based on an analysis of data from the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, Krenzler ( 2004 ) presents the names chosen by FSU parents for their children as an expression of changes in cultural orientation and a distinction between immigrants who are Jewish and non-Jewish. In a recent book by Landman ( 2021 ), the Israeli parents’ considerations related to choosing their child’s name are presented. However, the immigrants’ own decision to use an ethnic or Israeli first name and the implications of such a decision are less explored in the Israeli context.

Of note, nowadays, the vast majority of the first names of the Jews in Israel are Hebrew names, including biblical and modern Hebrew names (Demsky, 2018 ; Walsh & Yakhnich, 2021 ). On the other hand, young immigrants with Jewish origins who have arrived in Israel in the last decades, in most cases had first names that were common in their communities in the countries of origin: Ethiopian Jews usually named their children with names that had personal, familial, and community meaning (Walsh & Yakhnich, 2021 ), and FSU Jews tended to use Russian names identified with the family or the Jewish community (Lawson & Glushkovskaya, 1994 ). Therefore, in most cases, the first names of the immigrants who arrived in Israel in recent decades are different from the names used in Israel.

The literature on changing the first names of immigrants arriving in Israel from the FSU and Ethiopia in recent decades is scarce. Most of it is based on qualitative research with a small sample of immigrants, and some of the information comes from cultural heritage websites, internal community papers, online immigrants’ communities, and fine literature (Moore-Gilbert, 2014 ; Prashizky & Remennick, 2022 ; Walsh & Yakhnich, 2021 ). These sources show that the names of most Ethiopian immigrants were officially changed to Hebrew names by immigration authorities upon immigration to Israel (Walsh & Yakhnich, 2021 ), whereas many young FSU immigrants were ashamed of their foreign name, and chose to change it, encouraged by their social environment (Gvion, 2011 ; Moore-Gilbert, 2014 ; Prashizky & Remennick, 2022 ). To the best of our knowledge, no Israeli study has examined the immigrants’ own decision to use an ethnic or Israeli first name in everyday social encounters on a large sample, using a quantitative method and while controlling for identity and socio-economic variables.

The present study

In our research model, the main dependent variable was the immigrants’ perceived identity. Our proposed model was based on predicting this variable by the immigrant’s sense of belonging and the first name they use in everyday social encounters (ethnic or local name). Our hypotheses were as follows: Immigrants’ sense of belonging to the host society (henceforth, sense of local belonging) will be positively linked to the sense of perceived Israeli identity (H1), whereas immigrants holding an ethnic first name will report lower levels of perceived Israeli identity (H2). FSU immigrants will report lower levels of sense of local belonging compared to Ethiopian immigrants (H3; Amit, 2012 ; Amit & Bar-Lev, 2015 ). However, compared to Ethiopian immigrants, who are a visible minority, FSU immigrants will report higher levels of perceived local (Israeli) identity (H4). Due to this visible difference between the two immigrant groups, the Israeli first name will play a more significant role for FSU immigrants (H5) (Fig.  1 ).

The research general predicting model

This study was based on an online survey addressed to immigrant respondents, who immigrated to Israel aged 18 or less. Respondents were recruited using a non-random sampling method, a suited method to address this specific immigrant group. Footnote 2 Out of 1582 participants who started filling out the online survey, 1178 completed it. After selecting immigrants from the FSU or Ethiopia who arrived in Israel since 1989 and were aged 18 or less upon arrival, our final sample included 837 respondents: 728 FSU immigrants and 109 Ethiopian immigrants. As specified in the introduction, the population of Ethiopian immigrants in Israel is significantly smaller than the population of FSU immigrants, and thus it was more difficult to recruit respondents from this group.

The sample was obtained from immigrant social networks and websites (e.g., Facebook groups of immigrants in Israel, social networks of immigrant social activists). A link to the survey in Hebrew was available on these websites for a month in 2020, and immigrants randomly responded to the survey. The survey was anonymous, and respondents expressed their consent to answer it. Although using online surveys has certain disadvantages in terms of response rate and representation, it also has advantages in terms of the study setting and study population, especially when targeting a unique population (Nayak & Narayn, 2019 ). In our case, this sampling method was the most suited one for our specific study population, 1.5 generation immigrants belonging to two distinct origin groups, and for our research questions.

The average age of immigrants in the final sample was 36.82 years (SD = 5.16) and about 80 percent were women. The over-representation of women in surveys (mail and online surveys) is noted in previous studies (Smith, 2008 ). In addition, studies on changing ethnic first names among immigrants indicate that the changing dynamics are more apparent among women than among men (Gerhards & Hans, 2009 ; Sue & Telles, 2007 ), suggesting that women will show more interest in a survey dealing with the issue of changing immigrants’ names. The average age at migration was about 8.3 years (SD = 4.4), and on average, the immigrants in our sample were in Israel for 28.5 years (SD = 3.5).

The online survey was comprised of closed-ended questions on a broad variety of topics, and included socio-demographic items, items related to naming practices, and items related to social and cultural aspects, including perceived identity and sense of belonging.

The main dependent variable in our study was perceived Israeli identity . This variable was based on the following question: “To what extent do native-born Israelis perceive you as an Israeli?” and answers to this question were rated on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (not at all) to 5 (to a great extent). This question was used in previous studies (Amit, 2012 ).

Two additional explanatory variables were sense of local belonging and first name. The Sense of Local Belonging index constructed by Amit and Bar-Lev ( 2015 ) comprises three variables rated on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (not at all) to 5 (to a great extent): Israeli identity, feeling at home, and tendency to stay in Israel. Reported Cronbach’s alpha reliability coefficient for this index (Amit & Bar-Lev, 2015 ) was high (R = 0.79), and was found to be high in the present study (R = 0.72).

First name —A dichotomous variable was created: using an ethnic or mixed name (1) vs. using an Israeli local name exclusively (0) in everyday social encounters.

The independent variables were as follows:

Economic status Answer on a 1–5 Likert scale to the question: “Is your financial situation better or worse compared to other people in Israel?”.

Education The highest obtained formal education on a scale of 1–7, ranging from “no formal education” to third academic degree.

Migration age Age at migration.

Ethnicity (group) Distinction between the two major groups: FSU immigrants (0) and Ethiopian immigrants (1).

In addition, age and gender were accounted for as independent variables.

Furthermore, apart from the variables entered in our main model, the survey included items related to naming practices. The respondents were asked a number of questions such as the nature of their original first name (ethnic, Hebrew, other), whether anyone had suggested they change their ethnic name, and if so, when and who. We asked the respondents who kept their original names (i.e., have ethnic or mixed names) why they chose to keep their names.

Analysis method

To evaluate the predicted model, we employed Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) with AMOS 5 software (Byrne, 2001 ). We examined the measurement model first, then the structural model, following Anderson and Garbing’s (1988) “two–step” technique. The structural model provides maximum likelihood estimates of all identified model parameters, and evaluates the degree to which the model reproduces the observed variance–covariance matrix in terms of a chi–squared goodness–of–fit statistic (Bollen & Long, 1993 ). This method enabled us to test the fit of the correlation matrix (Byrne, 2001 ; Dion, 2008 ). Our main general model suggests that immigrants’ background variables (age, gender, economic status, education level, age at migration, and ethnicity) explain immigrants’ sense of local belonging and the tendency to use an ethnic or Israeli local first name. The immigrants’ sense of local belonging and the tendency to use an ethnic or Israeli local first name, in turn, explain their perceived Israeli identity.

The descriptive findings obtained from the survey, presented in Table 1 , show that the two immigrant groups in our study significantly differ in many of their characteristics. FSU immigrants were about 3 years older than Ethiopian immigrants. On average, FSU immigrants in our sample arrived in Israel when they were more than 8 years old and were in Israel for about 28.5 years, whereas Ethiopian immigrants were less than 7 years old upon arrival and were in Israel for about 27.5 years. The study also identified significant differences between the groups in socioeconomic variables: FSU immigrants were more educated and with a higher economic status compared to Ethiopian immigrants. However, the study found no significant difference between the groups in the percentage of males participating in the survey.

The descriptive findings related to naming practices indicate that only two respondents out of the entire sample answered that their local Hebrew name was their original name, and both were FSU immigrants. Most FSU immigrants (58.0%) and Ethiopian immigrants (82.6%) indicated that a name change has been suggested to them after immigrating to Israel. This difference was found to be significant (χ 2 (1)  = 24.158, p  < 0.001). A quarter (24.7%) of the FSU immigrants and half of the Ethiopian immigrants (46.7%) indicated that someone suggested they change their name immediately after their immigration; 16.9% of FSU immigrants and 22.9% of Ethiopian immigrants during their first year in Israel; and 25.9% of FSU immigrants and 30.2% of Ethiopian immigrants during their school years. Regarding the person who first suggested the name change (respondents could mark more than one answer), 14.5% of FSU immigrants and 19.2% of Ethiopian immigrants indicated that it was a representative of immigrant reception institutions; 28.8% of FSU immigrants and 61.4% of Ethiopian immigrants indicated it was a representative of the educational system. A substantial percentage of the FSU immigrants felt that the suggestion to change their first name was “a general non-binding proposal” (34.1%), whereas many of the Ethiopian immigrants felt it was “a proposal that included an attempt to persuade” (25.6%), or “a clear and decisive demand” (13.3%). Thus, Ethiopian immigrants perceived the proposal to change their name more as a demand than a suggestion compared to FSU immigrants (χ 2 (1)  = 6.801, p  < 0.05). The main reason for keeping the original first names among FSU immigrants was that they liked their name (33.5%), whereas among Ethiopian immigrants the main reason was that their name had a special emotional or familial significance (37.6%).

The differences between the groups in their subjective identity perceptions present a complex picture. There was no significant difference between the groups in their sense of belonging to Israel or in the first name they use (ethnic/Israeli). However, when examining the questions composing the sense of belonging index, it appears that the index components operate in opposite directions for the two groups of immigrants. Ethiopian immigrants felt more at home in Israel than FSU immigrants and were planning to stay in Israel to a greater extent. However, Ethiopian immigrants felt less Israeli than FSU immigrants. In addition, FSU immigrants expressed significantly higher levels of perceived Israeli identity compared to Ethiopian immigrants. This last finding indicates that in comparison to FSU immigrants, Ethiopian immigrants felt that native Israelis perceive them as less Israelis.

The correlations between the central research variables are presented in Table 2 . Perceived Israeli identity was positively correlated with sense of belonging (r = 0.41, p  < 0.01). Thus, in general, immigrants who thought that native Israelis perceive them as Israelis expressed higher levels of belonging to Israel. Perceived Israeli identity was also positively correlated with education level (r = 0.10, p  < 0.01) and economic status (r = 0.18, p  < 0.01), and negatively correlated with age at migration (r = − 0.14, p  < 0.01). Thus, immigrants with higher levels of education and economic status, and who immigrated at an earlier age, thought that native Israelis perceive them as Israelis to a greater extent. The study found no significant correlation between sense of belonging, age at migration, and education level.

We used Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) to further understand the factors explaining immigrants’ perceived Israeli identity. Our model suggests immigrants’ perceived Israeli identity can be predicted by the immigrants’ sense of belonging and the first name they use in everyday social encounters (ethnic or local name). The results indicate that the model fits the data well: the fit indices exceed 0.90, and the RMSEA is significant ( p  = 0.04). The standardized coefficients of the model are presented in Table 3 and in Fig.  2 .

Predicting perceived Israeli identity by sense of local belonging and first name- Graphic results from the SEM model (trimmed model)

The significant results (trimmed model) are presented in Fig.  2 with specification of the main statistical measures: regression weights and multiple correlation coefficients. In general, the model predicts 31 percent of the variance of immigrants’ perceived Israeli identity. Sense of belonging and first name, the mediator variables in the model, significantly predicted immigrants’ perceived Israeli identity (β = 0.42 and β = − 0.07, respectively). Thus, our model confirms hypotheses H1 and H2. The background variables predicted 6 percent of immigrants’ sense of belonging and only 2 percent of the immigrants’ first name. Gender did not have any correlation = with perceived Israeli identity according to the model. The immigrants’ sense of belonging was positively explained by age (β = 0.24) and economic status (β = 0.10), and negatively explained by migration age (β = − 0.08). We expected that FSU immigrants would report lower levels of sense of belonging compared to Ethiopian immigrants (H3), but this link was not significant. Using an ethnic first name was negatively explained by age (β = − 0.11) and immigrant group (β = − 0.07), thus, surprisingly, older immigrants and Ethiopian immigrants were more likely to use Israeli names than ethnic names, compared to younger immigrants and FSU immigrants, respectively. Therefore, contrary to our hypothesis (H5), the Israeli first name does not play a more significant role for FSU immigrants.

We found direct positive links between the background variables of immigrant group, migration age, education, and economic status and the dependent variable—perceived Israeli identity. These links indicate that, as expected in our hypothesis (H4), FSU immigrants expressed higher levels of perceived Israeli identity while Ethiopian immigrants expressed lower levels (β = − 0.23). Immigrants arriving in Israel at an older age expressed lower levels of perceived Israeli identity (β = − 0.21) and a lower level of sense of belonging (β = − 0.08). Both education level and economic status had a positive direct link to perceived Israeli identity (β = 0.06 and β = 0.08, respectively).

This study focused on the first name immigrants use (ethnic or local) in social encounters and examined the relation of this decision to their perceived local identity, that is, to their interpretation of how the locals see them. The general model tested in the study identifies factors related to immigrants’ local sense of belonging and their tendency to use an ethnic or local first name in everyday social encounters, which in turn explains their perceived local identity. The model was tested on Ethiopian and FSU immigrants who arrived in Israel as children or adolescents (1.5 generation).

While the concepts of identity and belonging are central in the migration field, the concept of perceived identity, which is based on classical sociological theories (Cooley, 1964 ), has received less attention from migration scholars. The few migration studies addressing this concept point to the significant link between perceived identity and local self-identity, alongside differences in this relation between immigrant groups (Amit, 2012 ; Heilbrunn et al., 2016 ; Perkins et al., 2014 ). Our findings reinforce what emerges from this literature. In accordance with our first hypothesis (H1), we found that the immigrants’ sense of local belonging positively predicts the sense of perceived Israeli identity. In addition, we found differences between the two immigrant groups in their perceived local identity: FSU immigrants express higher levels of perceived Israeli identity compared to Ethiopian immigrants. Thus, although Ethiopian immigrants feel Israeli, they believe that locals do not see them that way. Their sense of otherness can be attributed to being a visible minority (Heilbrunn et al., 2016 ).

Previous migration studies addressing the concept of perceived identity have overlooked a key identifying marker in social encounters—the immigrant’s first name. In line with our second research hypothesis (H2), we found that immigrants using an ethnic first name in everyday social encounters report lower levels of perceived Israeli identity, compared to immigrants who use a local one. Studies examining name change among immigrants in different countries have found that using a local or a common first name was associated with less exposure to discrimination (Bursell, 2012 ; Khosravi, 2012 ; Tuppat & Gerhards, 2021 ). Differences in the attitude of the environment to a local first name versus an ethnic first name were found even when only the immigrant’s last name was ethnic. Chinese immigrants in Australia with a “white” first name and a Chinese last name were invited for more job interviews than immigrants with a Chinese first name and last name (Chowdhury et al., 2020 ). Hence, using a local first name leads to a different perception of the immigrant by the locals, and as our study found, it is reflected in the immigrants’ perceived local identity.

In our model, the two factors together, sense of local belonging and first name, explained a significant part of the variance of the immigrants’ perceived local identity (31%). The main contribution of the present study is in adding and identifying the link between an immigrant’s first name and his or her perceived identity, and pointing to one’s first name as a significant social marker. Therefore, whether immigrants use an ethnic first name or a local name may have implications for the immigrants’ interpretation of their otherness. In addition to the literature examining the issue in the context of discrimination and stigma (Bursell, 2012 ; Chowdhury et al., 2020 ; Khosravi, 2012 ; Tuppat & Gerhards, 2021 ), the present study shows that the use of a local or ethnic first name may be linked to the way immigrants think they are perceived by locals in all areas of life. Moreover, adopting a local name may convey a message of motivation for integration to locals (Chowdhury et al., 2020 ). According to our study, immigrants sense that the locals understand this message.

The present study compared two immigrant groups: FSU and Ethiopian immigrants. Based on previous studies where Ethiopian immigrants expressed higher levels of Israeli identity compared to FSU immigrants, mainly due to their level of religiosity (Amit, 2012 ), we hypothesized that FSU immigrants would report lower levels of sense of belonging to Israel compared to Ethiopian immigrants (H3). This hypothesis was only partially supported. The sense of local belonging index included several factors: Israeli identity, feeling at home in Israel, and plans to stay in Israel (Amit & Bar-Lev, 2015 ). When comparing these factors in the univariate model, it was found that although the Israeli identity of FSU immigrants was significantly higher than that of Ethiopian immigrants, Ethiopian immigrants felt more at home in Israel and expressed higher levels of intentions to stay in Israel than FSU immigrants. The intention of FSU immigrants to leave Israel although they feel Israelis was found in previous studies and was explained by their lower religious affiliation (Amit, 2018 ). Ethiopian immigrants are more connected to their religious identity and as a less educated and skilled group, are faced with less economic opportunity abroad, thus are less inclined to leave Israel.

Yet, when comparing the overall index of sense of local belonging as well as the link between the immigrant group to the index in the multivariate model, no significant difference was found between the groups. A possible explanation is that there has been a change in the integration of FSU immigrants in Israel and in their sense of Israeli identity. Of note, the current study focused on 1.5 generation immigrants, who spent most of their years in Israel. Since the average age of the respondents who immigrated from the FSU was 37.20 (SD = 4.99), and their average age of immigration was 8.60 (SD = 4.40), it is plausible that over the years, their Israeli identity has strengthened, as can also be seen in recent qualitative studies (Dolberg & Amit, 2022 ; Remennick & Prashizky, 2018; Prashizky, 2019).

Based on previous studies (Amit, 2012 ; Amit & Bar-Lev, 2015 ), our fourth hypothesis was that FSU immigrants would report higher levels of perceived Israeli identity compared to Ethiopian immigrants, who are a visible minority. This hypothesis was supported. That is, while ethnic group was not linked to sense of local belonging, it had a significant link to perceived Israeli identity. The respondents who immigrated from Ethiopia have also lived in Israel for many years, their average age was 34.32 (SD = 5.57), and their average age of immigration was 6.79 (SD = 3.88). Yet, being a visible minority, it seems that time since their migration did not play a meaningful enough role in their perceived identity.

Due to this visible difference between the two immigrant groups, we expected the Israeli first name to play a more meaningful role for FSU immigrants (H5), as using a local name can more easily conceal the otherness of FSU immigrants. However, contrary to our hypothesis, no significant difference between the groups was detected in the univariate analysis, and according to the multivariate model, Ethiopian immigrants are more likely to use Israeli names than ethnic names. This finding may be explained by the Israeli naming practices and their consequences. More formal and informal pressure to change first names was put on Ethiopian immigrants than on FSU immigrants, as Ethiopian immigrants come from a weaker and smaller community (Landman, 2016 ; Stahl, 2001 ). Thus, many Ethiopian immigrants grew up with an Israeli local name and probably found it more difficult, even technically, to change their name later on in life. In order to better understand the naming practices and the name change dynamics in each immigrant group, a complementary study using qualitative research methods is needed.

Another unexpected finding was that using an ethnic first name was negatively explained by age, thus, older respondents tended to use Israeli names more than the younger ones. This finding can also be explained by the changing dynamics of naming practices in Israel. The study respondents immigrated to Israel between the ages of 0 and 18 (1.5 generation) since the beginning of the 1990s. Hence, our sample included adult immigrants who immigrated in the early 1990s and younger ones who immigrated in recent years. The findings can be seen as an expression of the change that has taken place in Israel in terms of the pressure on immigrants to integrate. While in the early 1990s pressure was still exerted for rapid integration, including symbolic expressions such as the change of first name, this pressure has decreased over the years (Landman, 2016 ).

As our study is the first to address the relation between the first name immigrants use in everyday social encounters and their perceived local identity, it may be defined as an exploratory study. The use of a quantitative research method on a large sample while applying structural equation modeling allowed us to test variables explaining the intriguing social indicator, perceived identity, and thus to reinforce a theoretical model which is grounded solidly in the well-established tradition of sociological theory (symbolic interactionism). Our study pointed out a significant and complex relation between the first name immigrants use, their country of origin, their sense of local belonging, and their perceived local identity.

Our findings may have implications for practitioners working with immigrants as well as for policy makers. Our main dependent variable was perceived local identity, that is, the way immigrants believe they are perceived by the locals. Specifically, our study examined the way adult immigrants, who arrived as children and adolescents (1.5 generation), perceive the attitudes towards them from the surrounding Israeli society. This social indicator represents the immigrant’s perception of otherness but also places the responsibility on the locals and their attitudes toward immigrants. As apparent from the findings, the immigrants’ perceived local identity is more strongly attached to the immigrants’ sense of local belonging than to the name he or she uses in social encounters. The findings also indicate that for visible and racial minorities (in our case, for Ethiopian immigrants), using a local name does not necessarily lower the sense of otherness, and is not strongly linked to the sense of local belonging. Thus, forcing or even just encouraging immigrants to use a local first name, an informal practice common in several migration countries, may not affect their sense of national belonging.

This study has several limitations. The first limitation concerns the significantly higher rate of women in the sample. Previous research has found that in general women are overrepresented in surveys (Smith, 2008 ). Furthermore, studies on changing ethnic first names among immigrants show that the changing dynamics are more noticeable for women than for men, due to relative conservatism in giving and changing boys’ names (Gerhards & Hans, 2009 ; Rossi, 1965 ; Sue & Telles, 2007 ). Nevertheless, the overrepresentation of women was apparent for both FSU and Ethiopian immigrants in our study. Future studies should try and obtain a more gender representative sample. Another limitation concerns the binary definition of the first name the immigrant uses regularly as either local or ethnic (or mixed). We understand there may be other combinations of naming such as shortening names, informally using a local name similar to the original name, using an international name that does not ring as an ethnic name, etc. These complex dynamics can be examined more thoroughly in a qualitative study using in depth interviews to better understand the meanings of name change for the immigrant.

Despite its limitations, the study has several major contributions: First, the study focused on the concept of perceived identity, specifically perceived local identity, an issue that has received less attention in the study of migration. Second, perceived local identity was found to be correlated to variables which have not been tested before: sense of local belonging and the immigrant’s first name, while taking into account differences between groups of immigrants. The main contribution lies in research attention to the immigrants’ first name (ethnic or local) as a significant marker of the immigrants’ perceived identity. As the current study raises this relation for the first time, further research is needed, in Israel and other migration countries, on the implications of first names for immigrants’ identity perceptions.

Availability of data and materials

The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Around 75% of Israel's current population, of nine million people, are of Jewish ancestry, 20% are Arabs, and 5% are categorized as “others” (CBS, 2021 ).

There is no official data set related to our research. Based on the sample restrictions (immigration under the age of 18 and after 1989) we have calculated that the oldest can be around age 50 and the youngest older than 18. In our sample, the age range is 18–49 (FSU 22–49; Ethiopian 18–48) and the average age is mid-30 s.

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Amit, K., Dolberg, P. Who do you think I am? Immigrant’s first name and their perceived identity. CMS 11 , 6 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40878-023-00328-1

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• Perceived identity
• Immigrants’ first name
• Sense of belonging
• 1.5 generation

How Cultural Identity Defines An Immigrant’s Experience

Aidan Shen , Reporter | April 14, 2023

The United States is a melting pot of cultures due to a high immigration rate. Second-generation immigrants are those who were born and raised in the United States but have parents who were born and raised elsewhere.  

Unlike their first-generation immigrant parents, who struggle to integrate and pick up a new language and culture, they have a unique experience.  

With a new experience comes challenges, like managing their cultural traditions and values with those of their parents while adjusting to living in a different nation with foreign cultural customs.

The pressure for second-generation immigrants to adapt into American culture while making sure they don’t lose their cultural identity is one of the toughest obstacles they are faced with.  

Many second generation immigrants feel conflicted between adjusting to the American way of life and sticking to their parents’ cultural expectations.  

For instance, children of first generation immigrants could experience pressure to perform well academically while their friends might place more importance on sports or socializing.  

As a result, they may feel alienated from their classmates, losing both their connection to their original country’s culture and American culture.  

However, some Sea Kings don’t feel the same pressure that many others do. Junior Mark Lin, whose family is originally from Taiwan, China, said that although he experienced the difficulty of socializing with others and crossing the cultural barrier between friends, “adapting to the environment is more important [to me] than sticking to a culture stubbornly.” This is not to say that one shouldn’t embrace their culture fully, but to keep an open mind to make the most of your experiences.

Language barriers may pose challenges for second-generation immigrants. They may not be as fluent in English if they grew up speaking their parents’ native language, which can lead to misunderstandings and communication breakdowns.  

Furthermore, language barriers may make it difficult for them to maintain cultural bonds and familial relationships.  

Second-generation immigrants may face discrimination and prejudice as well. Because of their ethnicity or cultural upbringing, they may be perceived as “foreign” despite being born and raised in the United States.  

Luckily, Lin also stated that he has been to places considered more conservative and still didn’t experience prejudice or hate due to his ethnicity.  

Second-generation immigrants have several advantages and strengths growing up with two or more additional examples of culture in their life.  

Growing up in a multicultural atmosphere may broaden their perspectives and make them more tolerant and welcoming of others.  

Being bilingual or multilingual is useful in the current globalized society.  

Immigrants of the second generation usually serve as a bridge between the generation that their parents came from and the bulk of American society.  

They might be able to speak for their communities and inform their peers on customs and practices unique to their groups.  

Also, they might be able to find a balance between their aspirations and their parents’ expectations, creating a unique identity that includes both their cultural heritage and American identity.  

A great example of a Sea King who speaks for her own community through her experiences as a second generation immigrant is senior and president of BTC, Ainsley Schmitz .

“Becoming [BTC] president was so rewarding, being in a position to give back… and raise more awareness for people of similar backgrounds,” Schmitz said.

The experience of being an immigrant in the second generation is unique and challenging, but it is also one that is full of opportunities and positive traits.  

They must strike a balance between their cultural identity and the linguistic challenges, bigotry, and expectations of American society.  

But their multicultural upbringing might have encouraged them to adopt more hospitable and understanding perspectives.  

They also serve as a bridge between their parents’ generation and the majority of American society by supporting their communities and infusing their cultural histories into their identities.  

Given that the United States is a nation of immigrants, it is crucial to comprehend the viewpoints of second-generation immigrants to build a society that is more diverse and inclusive.

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“Let us define ourselves”: forced migrants’ use of multiple identities as a tactic for social navigation

• Dieu Hack-Polay 1 , 2 ,
• Ali B. Mahmoud 3 , 4 ,
• Maria Kordowicz 2 ,
• Roda Madziva 5 &
• Charles Kivunja 6  

BMC Psychology volume  9 , Article number:  125 ( 2021 ) Cite this article

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The article examines how and why multiple identities are altered, used and discarded by forced migrants.

The research is located in the constructivist paradigm. We used thematic analysis to analyse data gathered through interviews with nineteen forced migrants.

We found that, though individual migrants can make deliberate choices about which identities to be associated with, they are constrained in the process by external socio-economic factors that lead them to adopt identities that are perceived to be advantageous to navigate the new social system. Moreover, the construction of forced migrants’ identity includes significant contextuality, transactionality and situatedness.

Conclusions

Our research contributes to the literature on migrant identity practice concerning the stigma associated with forced migrant status and the extent to which migrants appraise their reception in exile as undignified. Additionally, examining migrant identities allows the researchers to apprehend the diverse facets of identity as far as migrants are concerned. Future research may draw a larger sample to examine other impactful dimensions of identity fluctuation, e.g. gender, education, social media, the extent of prior trauma, etc.

Peer Review reports

Recent data by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) shows that nearly 80 million individuals worldwide have been forced to leave their homes, leading to nearly 26 million refugees, of whom, around half, aged younger than 18 years old [ 1 ]. For forced migrants, countries of origin are places of violence, cruel wars, and conflicts. They can face hazardous dangers and threats to one’s or their family members’ lives embodied by political persecution, religious intolerance, and pressure to join militias, sexual violence, etc. [ 2 ]. Earlier scholarship into migrant identity negotiation has examined the subject drawing on the experiences of people from diverse cultures, e.g. the Somali community, Syrians, unaccompanied minors [ 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 ]. However, the key strength of our work is that it draws attention to the link between migration and race, given the centrality of race in driving British public attitudes towards immigrant groups. Migration scholars [ 8 ] have drawn attention to the ways in which race and racism relate to migration. Focusing on the UK context, these authors have conceptualised ‘race as a political project rooted in colonialism and imperialism,’ and how race is increasingly used to categorize immigrants, especially those from the global south as the ‘other’; hence different and inferior [ 8 ]. U Erel, K Murji and Z Nahaboo [ 8 ] go further to show how the race-migration nexus makes visible multiple and co-existing stratifications that emerge through racialization instead of a singular in-group/out-group continuum upon which all migrants (and settled communities) are mapped’. Indeed, race and migration are connected in complex ways, and this has a significant impact on how different groups of migrants realise full integration into British society. Existing research [e.g., [ 9 , 10 ] shows that public attitudes towards immigrants in Britain (as in Europe) are framed along racial and ‘ethnic hierarchies’ with the most preferred groups being those who are white, English-speaking and from Christian countries and the least preferred being those who are non-white, Black and Muslims. Particularly with regards to Black immigrants, the Fundamental Rights Agency, in their 2019 report, observed that across Europe black Africans increasingly face widespread and entrenched prejudice, exclusion and hurdles to inclusion and integration are multi-faceted [ 11 ].

Therefore, exploring individual perceptions of identity would contribute to a greater understanding of forced migrants’ lived experiences. In this article, we use the term forced migrants to encapsulate migrants that were coerced into leaving their country of origin, e.g. persecution, political unrest or environmental upheavals [ 12 ]. This study examines how forced migrants negotiate and articulate multiple identities, including the strategic deployment and concealment of ethnic and refugee identity, as they navigate different political, emotional and social spaces. The overarching research question was: How do individual perceptions of identity affect the lived experiences of forced migrants?

The continuing refugee crisis in Europe [ 13 ] and the flow of forced migrants continuing to attempt to cross into Europe and the United States suggests that forced migration remains a burning issue. This has fuelled the growth of research on the psychological and social processes experienced by migrants themselves [ 14 ]. It further raises questions around identity shifts as forced migrants attempt to navigate new [and often harrowing] experiences and societies. It is well chronicled that cultural distance can lead others to misinterpret and misunderstand migrants’ motives for embracing, rejecting or juggling new identities [ 15 , 16 ]. For instance, previous research shows that when individuals of an ethnic minority or sub-group prefer a hyphenated cultural identity, it can sometimes be crucial for the dominant ethnic group to acknowledge this identity during intergroup interactions [ 2 ]. Since biculturalism ought to be a cultural asset for cohesive societies [ 17 ], it is, therefore, vital that ethnic minorities’ desired identities are accurately understood and recognised [ 2 ], especially amidst the challenges facing the integration of migrants in the host countries [ 18 ]. Our work investigates the extent to which some forced migrants use identity for gain, for instance, to receive psychological and social benefits from articulating different socio-cultural and national identities in the host country. In doing, we aim to create greater insight into the relationship between identity and social navigation.

The paper is organised as follows: The first section of our paper examines the critical literature surrounding migrants and identity. We then detail the methodological framework used to conduct this research. We then present the results with commentaries before a critical discussion of our findings and study strengths and limitations. Finally, we draw conclusions that summarise the key perspectives and identify future research possibilities.

Literature review and theoretical foundations

G Valentine and D Sporton [ 19 ] argue that ‘the twin forces of the global economy and global conflicts’ have accelerated and transformed international migration patterns in the twenty-first century, raising questions about how such mobility might shape processes of identification and/or identity formation. R Jenkins [ 20 ] notes that identity, as ‘our understanding of who we are and of whom other people are,’ has come to be something that is ‘managed’. The argument is that identity—in the age of migration—is not an inherited, ascribed, nor achieved status that matters, but the status that one ‘maintains’ in any given place and time in the process of fitting oneself into a community of ‘strangers’ [ 21 , 22 ].

A Giddens [ 23 ] coins the phrase ‘identity project’, noting that in late modernity, the self ‘has to be reflexively made’ in order to be able to respond to the anxieties raised by rapid social change. Here the argument is that self-identity can no longer be taken to be ‘something that is just given’ but has to be understood to be ‘something that has to be routinely created and sustained in the reflexive activities of the individual’ [ 23 ]. The main reason for this, as A Giddens argues, is that modern societies no longer offer stable ‘anchor points’ for the self, consequently leading to the construction and reconstruction of the self as a response to and way of coping with the uncertainties [ 23 ]. This means that, for an individual to maintain regular interaction with others in the day-to-day world, they must constantly integrate events that happen in the external world and classify them into the ongoing story about the self’. For this paper’s purpose, we define identity as the story about the self [ 24 ]. Further, the notion of how life events can shape people’s identities in the era of globalisation has gained much currency in the migration field, where identity construction is seen as involving lived experiences as well as a mental state susceptible to sustain significant life changes that involve place, people, culture, and so forth [ 25 , 26 ].

Meanwhile, it has been noted that migrants are significantly more exposed to identity change than other social groups [ 25 , 27 , 28 ]. The flight of forced migrants into exile results in a loss of identity. Moreover, their arrival is often marked by uncertainties that raise questions about belonging and identity. This often leaves mental scars and sometimes physical footprints, which alter the way their life course evolves and even the manner in which they talk about themselves. Giddens argues that ‘What to do?’ ‘How to act?’ and ‘Who to be?’ are questions affecting everyone in modern societies, prompting an identity crisis in each of us [ 23 ]. Therefore, if we view forced migration as inextricably associated with modernity—as other authors [ 25 , 29 ] tend to accept—then Giddens’ point is relevant to analysing the identity issues regarding forced migrants [ 23 ]. However, for forced migrants, the magnitude of identity crisis is more pronounced given the spatial, demography, temporal, economic and cultural dislocation.

Thus, as SS Kebede [ 26 ] argues, in the context of forced migration, forming and reforming identities are part of the struggle to ascertain belongingness to a new socio-cultural domain. This assertion entails occasionally dramatic deconstruction and reconstruction of self and its association with various communities and identities [ 26 , 30 , 31 ]. In examining the process of deconstruction of forced migrants’ identity, JW Berry’s concept of mutuality in acculturation is helpful [ 32 ]. JW Berry [ 32 ] argues that mutual contacts and interactions affect migrant and host groups’ acculturative choices and desired outcomes. J Arends-Tóth and FJRVD Vijver [ 33 ] examined mutuality in acculturation in the Dutch context. They found mutual agreement (at least in the public sphere) between native Dutch and Turkish minorities about the need for minorities to integrate [ 33 ].

However, in the private domain, migrant minorities expressed a preference for identity pluralism. This shows that that identity construction can be domain-specific and contextual [ 33 , 34 ]. MM Doucerain [ 34 ] particularly identifies dynamics within the individual, home country and the wider new social environment as the key contextual factors that influence acculturation and identity formation. The process can be painful and disconcerting since deconstructing the self implies dismantling deeply rooted assumptions that make the self and define its relationships with the group. MK Kumsa [ 31 ] sees this process as shifting spaces of belongingness. Reconstructing oneself may entail cultural and societal aspects that may not neatly fit the ‘old engine’ (the old self), causing a struggle to fit and sometimes ‘halfway’ working of the new parts. From JD Pugh and MK Kumsa perspectives [ 25 , 31 ], this is about negotiating identity, an essential pre-requisite to the (re)definition of self and to belonging. H Zagefka and R Brown found that immigrants who displayed a relative fit had a greater chance of acceptance into German society, reinforcing the view that belonging derives from immigrants’ appraisal of the host society's expectation and developing ‘acceptable’ identities [ 35 ].

At the same time, it has been long established that forced migrants increasingly embody multiple and fluid identities in different spaces and times. For example, in their exploration of Somali refugees’ experiences in the UK, G Valentine and D Sporton show that identity construction or formation does not necessarily occur in a vacuum but is relational in nature, being attained through interaction with others and in and through different spaces [ 19 ]. Thus, they observe that ‘one identity category may be used to differentiate another in specific spatial contexts, and particular subject positions may become salient or irrelevant in particular spaces’ [ 19 ]—see also MM Doucerain [ 34 ], J Arends-Tóth and FJRVD Vijver [ 33 ] and M Navas, MC García, J Sánchez, AJ Rojas, P Pumares and JS Fernández [ 36 ]. However, the major challenge with regards to embodying multiple and shifting identities, as G Valentine and D Sporton [ 19 ] argue, lies in that a given identity is not just something that an individual can claim; instead, it is also dependent, at least to some extent, on an individual’s identity being accepted or recognised by others.

Such assertions are supported by R Madziva [ 37 ], who in her research with Christian asylum seekers from the Muslim majority countries notes that, although Pakistani Christians increasingly emphasised their Christian identity above their ethnonational identity in their narratives of the self, immigration officials, on the contrary, took Pakistani as a proxy for Islam. In this context, as R Madziva argues, visible identity (bodies) played a ‘significant role in blurring religious boundaries and nullifying the distinctiveness of the participants’ Christian identity’ [ 37 ].

This resonates well with the arguments of JD Pugh [ 25 ], T Polzer Ngwato [ 38 ] and M Navas, MC García, J Sánchez, AJ Rojas, P Pumares and JS Fernández [ 36 ] that identity formation or reformation in exile entails efforts to render certain identity characteristics visible or invisible (and to some extent audible and inaudible) depending on place but also as influenced by the identities of people the forced migrants encounter or enter into personal conversations with. However, earlier scholarship into migrant identity negotiation has examined the subjective experiences of migrants [ 3 , 27 , 39 ] but has mainly focused on group experience, for instance, the Somali community, Syrians, unaccompanied minors, and others. While some research has also considered individual experiences [ 4 ], we argue that more research is needed to increase our understandings of how individuals navigate forced exile from an identity perspective.

In this article, we endeavour to explore the experiences of forced migrants from diverse backgrounds and of different nationalities that the first author interviewed in the UK. In the same perspective as AB Kuyini and C Kivunja [ 40 ] and G Valentine and D Sporton [ 19 ], we focus on the ‘multiple, shifting and sometimes contradictory ways in which individuals identify and disidentify with other groups’ and with their fluctuating emotional investment in different subject positions. In so doing, we seek to show how our participants worked hard to try to minimise the signs of difference that set them apart as the ‘other’ as a strategy to reduce social distances between themselves and the host population. This indicates the subjectivities attached to the notion and expression of identity, which is formed by the social actors through their stories and lived experiences [ 41 ]. This means that the contingencies of a given time and space can lead a social actor to willingly espouse a variety of selves [ 42 , 43 ].

As this research set out to understand the identities forced migrants construct from their lived experiences, we located it in the interpretivist methodological paradigm. This was an appropriate paradigm for our work because it espouses the assumption of a subjectivist epistemology. As M Crotty [ 44 ] explains, this epistemology holds that the real world does not exist separately from our understanding of it. Instead, we know what we know because of our interactions and experiences with real-world phenomena [ 44 ].

Another reason why the interpretivist paradigm was chosen for this research is that it also assumes a relativist ontology. As EG Guba and YS Lincoln [ 45 ] explain, this ontological theory of interpretivism is relativism. Relativism is the belief that reality is subjective and differs from person to person [ 45 ]. The third reason we located this research within the interpretivist paradigm was that its methodology assumes experiential-naturalistic-inductive processes in gathering, analysing, and interpreting data.

The fourth reason for choosing this paradigm is its assumption of value-laden axiology. This assumption holds that whatever knowledge we gain through research is value-laden because researchers assert their values and beliefs when they choose what to research, how to conduct the research, and how to interpret the data [ 46 ], as was indeed the case in deciding our research design and data analysis strategies as outlined below.

We designed this empirical research to use the thematic analysis approach. Yin’s explanation informed our choice of this method—that an empirical inquiry examines a contemporary phenomenon thoroughly and within its real-world context [ 47 ]. The thematic analysis allows the researcher to grasp the participants’ narratives and extract vital meanings from their real-life experiences as relayed in their own words [ 48 ]. This objective of gaining a deep understanding of the subject was indeed the impetus for the present study, which sought to learn about the identities that forced migrants to construct in their new countries. The method was most suitable for this research because thematic analysis helps ‘interrogate the various meanings that subjects attach to phenomena’ [ 48 , 49 ]. As pointed out by AB Kuyini and C Kivunja, ‘moving to another country is associated with loss at different levels, and issues of identity, power/influence and knowledge habitus are all at play [ 40 ]. These issues tend to be exacerbated when such migrations are forced, as in the case of the forced migrants interviewed in this research. Thus, this analysis method was fit for our research because we set out to understand migrants’ perceptions of their identities in their new countries.

In our research, we decided to include only forced migrants into the UK who had resided in the UK for a minimum of 3 years. We envisaged 3 years as a reasonable time for the immigrants to have enough experience about identity issues in their new country. Participant selection applied a convenience-sampling, snowballing strategy. The snowball approach was unlikely to have a confounding impact on the data by the fact that it was difficult for the researchers to know which forced migrant has been involved in the use of multiple identities. Thus, the initial participants contacted became aids for the researchers to identify and filter suitable participants who closely met our selection criteria. Following this strategy, one of the authors approached an acquaintance, a former work colleague who introduced the first participant (female) who, through her network, led the researcher to other respondents meeting the three-year UK residence criterion. Applying this strategy, we interviewed 19 forced migrants, who provided narrative data. However, the participants were unrelated. It was suggested to the first contact that the researchers wanted someone who was not related to them (e.g. husband or sibling) and preferably from a different country. This was to minimise bias and to enable us to collect a variety of experiences. As indicated earlier, the migrants interviewed had been in the United Kingdom for over 3 years at the time of the semi-structured interviews. The interviews were conducted in early 2018 in London. They lasted one hour on average and were recorded manually. Most participants were millennial (79%) men (58%), and all came from Sub-Saharan African countries. The participants’ details are shown in Table 1 below:

The interview questions were framed in a way that the participants could provide independent answers not alluded to by the interview question. For example:’Have you ever pretended to be someone you are not?’. The questions used common terms that led the participants to tell their stories themselves.

All interviews were recorded and transcribed, and separately and then collectively analysed by the researchers thematically. The analysis started with transcript re-reading for data familiarisation. We then engaged in open coding so that individual transcripts were systematically reviewed through a process of iteration to derive the themes and meaning emerging from the contents. To improve the rigour of the procedures employed in this study [ 50 ], we offered all the participants the chance to review the interview transcripts and revise them (if needed). Out of all of the participants, only half chose to revisit the interview transcripts. The data analysed through open coding, as the researchers reviewed the transcripts to ascertain the meaning of the participants’ narratives. We aimed to make sure that we had an in-depth understanding of how participant tell their stories, namely, what identities, behaviours, activities, events, relationships and shared meanings are conceived through language [ 51 ]. A coding structure was developed, which captured the distribution of narratives of the participants and aspects of perspectivization [ 52 ]. We colour-coded the data to capture similar ideas to produce five broad categories: identity denial, identity borrowing, identities as situated choices, identity as a social integration strategy, and identity as psychological healing. It helped us identify the converging and diverging themes through iterative discussion that were then refined to arrive at two final analytical themes: Constructing new identities as psychological healing and identity fluctuation as a social navigation tactic.

Confidentiality and anonymity were critical to address since participants had personal stories. The disclosure of which to others could affect their confidence as social players in the community or willingness to participate in future research in the field (see [ 37 ]). The interviewees made statements connected with previous life and religious practices, which contrasted with norms in the new communities, and these aspects required researcher sensitivity to protect the subjects’ identities and privacy. Thus, the researchers have protected participants’ identities by using pseudonyms to present data and discuss the findings. Informed consents to take part in the study were obtained from the participants. Each participant was asked for his/her personal consent to participate in the research and was given assurance. They were reassured that if they did not participate, there would be no negative consequences. Furthermore, each participant was asked for consent to let us tape-record the interview. The study was approved by Crandall University’s Research Ethics Committee. All methods were performed in accordance with the relevant guidelines and regulations.

The analytical process enabled the researchers to capture the meanings and perspectives framed around interpretative repertoires, ideological dilemmas and subject positions. We present the participants’ key statements to document the frames of analysis.

Constructing new identities as psychological healing

The issue of human displacement in the African context is clearly captured in the volume edited by M Utas [ 53 ] “African Conflicts and Informal Power”, which presents case studies from a variety of African countries, settings and institutions, and showing armed conflicts and wars as the common factors that displace people. To a large degree, all the migrants we interviewed fled violence and persecution in the country of origin. They saw their arrival in the United Kingdom as a flight to a safe haven. The migrants’ narratives support this assertion well. Accounts provided by P1, P2 and P3—support this feeling that was prevalent in the migrants’ narratives:

Leaving beautiful Sudan was extremely painful. The military conflicts drove us out. We had to find a safe place to be. I didn’t stay in the first African country I reached (South Africa) because foreigners were not welcome there— (P1). I went through three different countries before landing here in UK. When I fled The Sierra Leone due to civil war; Cameroon is where I went for safety. But Cameroon also started to have civil wars; so I came to UK through Libya (P2). My uncle was shot and died alongside his three children. Only his wife survived but then it was terrible. She was sexually assaulted several times by soldiers. Seeing what the rebel soldiers were doing in town, I used all monies I had to pay those who could help me leave because I fear the same fate— (P3).

Having escaped from war-torn and life-threatening environments, their arrival in the UK marked the beginning of a new ‘social navigation’ process. As argued by H Vigh [ 54 ], the concept of social navigation makes it possible to focus on how individuals move within changing social environments. Here we seek to show these migrants’ expressed efforts to survive and forge a future for themselves in a new and increasingly changing environment, characterised by racism and discrimination. For their first steps in the new community, the migrants did deliberately change their identities from time to time to have their dignity protected by other selves that they saw as positive identities. However, most participants showed unease about the pity that locals appeared to exhibit towards them. In some instances, the migrants received less favourable treatment and other times more favourable treatment than the average person; in most cases, the migrants resented the ‘patronising’ [in P6’s words] aspects of the way they were dealt with. Two of the participants’ narratives translate well this sense of belittling of the migrants in the host country:

As long as I claim to be and mimic British accent, straight away people are kinder. Then they do not consider as foreign as much. You can then have some meaningful conversation with them — (P4). When women see you as a foreigner, automatically they think you want to be with them for immigration reason. When you say you are British, they trust you more because they believe in your genuine love — (P5) When people in my church knew I was a refugee, there was a huge sense of pity. Some people offered me clothes and even small amounts of money. I felt uncomfortable. Some others kept their distance. I hate being the constant focus of attention. I prefer that people don’t know my refugee background. That’s better and I live with more dignity and pride — (P5).

In their study with African asylum-seeking women, M Clare, S Goodman, H Liebling and H Laing [ 55 ] note how ‘participants used two interacting repertoires, ‘rejecting pity’ and ‘being strong’, to resist inferior positions. Thus, they argue that ‘by constructing themselves as strong and not needing pity, participants positioned themselves as in control of their lives’.

In our study, the migrants’ narratives conveyed their sense of discomfort because they felt that they were viewed only as immigrants instead of full members of the new communities. These feelings were widely shared and were well mirrored in the narratives of P6, P7 and P8.

Situated and contextual migrant identities

Our participants were individuals who inhabited a social space of ‘restricted possibilities’ [ 7 ]. Their navigation of the social space reveals their struggles to escape confining structures and circumstances as they moved under the influence of multiple forces. Thus, when asked to state whom they thought they were, the participants pointed to context-related identities. They showed awareness of both the multiple forces restricting them and the identities carried. However, they were also conscious of the situatedness of these selves, meaning that the identities were expressed differently depending on time, place and social entourage, and so forth. For instance, the migrants would claim certain national or linguistic identities in a social setting and other identities in different milieus. These constant fluctuations were opportunity-driven, both psychologically and materially, for example, to command respect and dignity or find employment or better housing. The following participants’ narratives exemplify this situation:

Really, I try to tailor my person to various environments. If I stay the same me in every place, I will miss out on many opportunities. With a certain group of people, I’m a Sudanese because I cannot hide that. But with other groups I introduce myself as from another origin otherwise if they knew my Sudanese backgrounds their attitude towards me will change and exclude me — (P1). To go through a transformation process, even if it’s temporary and artificial, helps to penetrate many local groups to seek integration — (P10). It’s great I work and mingle with lots of Black people originally from the Caribbean. I feel pretty much like belonging here when I mingle with people like that. People don’t see me as a foreigner — (P2).

Thus, as H Vigh [ 56 ] argues,’We act, adjust and attune our strategies and tactics concerning the way we experience and imagine and anticipate the movement and influence of social forces’. Indeed, these migrants were engaged in the process of calculation and recalculation as they sought to integrate into British society.

Identity fluctuation as a social navigation tool

Writing within the context of young urban men in the West African country of Guinea-Bissau, H Vigh [ 56 ] notes that people who live in unstable environments use different tactics and invest a great deal of time in calculating how to use their different positionalities and identities to achieve the most out of their ever-changing environments. Our participants lived in a stable society, but their migrant/refugee identity made their circumstances uncertain; thus, they used different tactics to get the most out of their situations. To this end, some degree of identity concealment appeared in all the interviews—though with varying degrees. The most despised identity was that of a ‘refugee’ in the migrants engaged with identity fluctuation because they had a sense of greater acknowledgement by the host society. The participants honest their opportunity-driven concealment of certain ‘negative’ identities as expressed by some migrants. P9, P5 and P4 explained:

Here, people don’t like refugees. The general view is that refugees are here for the welfare benefits. I don’t mention the term refugee when I speak. No one needs to know about my refugee status. I present myself as everyone else — (P9). But if I’m isolated because others don’t accept me because they think I’m not making efforts to fit in, that’s not good for my health. I live here for the present. For how many months or years, I do not know; I need to make connections with the locals to survive — (P5). When you say you are British, they trust you more and think you’re serious about future relationship. But you want other people to connect; that’s important. I suppose you have to adjust — (P4).

Identity dilemmas were pervasive in the migrants’ daily lives because of conflicting but often overlapping and intertwined identities. Many contradictions could be observed between the migrants’ deep cultural and socio-political assumptions and their choices to face reality. An ethical dilemma was about whether to disclose the actual identity or to conceal it. The ideological dilemmas had greater psychosocial ramifications and contradictions because these were profoundly embedded in religious values as well as physical harm. Another dilemma was about self-importance in their national identity, which sharply differed from the transactional mutation into new selves, which were more favourable.

The migrants claimed novel identities in their drive to successfully negotiate the new social space and cultural landscape. However, there were significant barriers to keeping a single identity type.

Telling the truth about your identity’s damaging to your life as that distances you from others — (P11). I believe that if I didn’t show myself as a British person, I wouldn’t have the job I have. If I say I‘m British in a Sudanese community, my fellow Sudanese will reject me because they might think I am a renegade and I deny my own culture. You’ll not be accepted everywhere with your heavy African accent — (P1). At the end of the day, we are here. You don’t even know if you’d go back home one day. So, while you are here it’s good to show local people that you are interested in being here and serving this country. So, you’ve got to change — (P6).

P6 and P1 have congruent behaviour, which is reflected through their narratives. P1’s dramatic shift in religious identity was striking. The participant holds the view that Muslim identity is incongruent with British culture. This necessitated his suppression of Islamic value in several social contexts. He adopted a Christian first name because he did not so as not to feel and be labelled as an outsider. P7 (male) and P12 (female), two Muslim migrants, like P1, justified their identity shift:

Deep down I knew if I had shown her (a girl he met) that I was a devout Muslim she wouldn’t go out with me because she likes to have a drink. You know socially a drink is important for Western people — (P7). People are scared to be with Muslim girl. They don’t understand Islam. They think you’re so different they can’t engage with you. I stopped covering my head and wearing African clothes because I felt that both girls and boys in the school avoided me. I then started to make more friends — (P12).

Similarly, P3 did not feel comfortable talking about her experience of witnessing sexual assault and being subject to humiliation. She strictly avoided talking about her asylum status for fear that she could be asked to explain what happened, triggering the memories she desperately wanted to forget. As she explained:

Only his wife [her uncle’s wife] survived but then it was terrible. She was assaulted several times by soldiers — (P3).

This participant sought the confidence of the locals to narrate her actual story but was confronted with several barriers. Many participants shared these efforts to distance themselves from the ‘negative’ refugee identity. P7 and P13 explained:

I want my new life to be a truly new life — (P7). The term refugee made me lose lots of good things in life. When you meet a boyfriend the idea in people’s mind is that you’re looking to have British papers. They don’t think about the emotion you have as a human being. Some community members jeer at you when they learn that you’re a refugee. I’ve moved home several times due to that — (P13).

The subject position espoused by the migrants

As has been shown, our participants wished to assume particular identities, especially those that gave them advantages and acceptability within their new environment. However, as G Valentine and D Sporton [ 19 ] argue,’a given identity is not just something that can be claimed by an individual, however; it is also dependent, at least in part, on an individual’s identity being recognised or accepted by a wider community of practice’. Indeed, many of the participants’ identities were both self-constructed and externally imposed by the new country’s socio-political system. The participants adopted different subject positions, which exemplified a variety of identities and attitudes. P1 and P3 saw themselves as forced migrants, which was self-constructed but also forced upon them by the host society. The experience of leaving familiar cultures of the home countries and the pessimism surrounding possible return confined them to the acceptance of their new situation as forced migrants. This subject position was equally attributed to them by host country structures where migrant status was often equated to outsiders and being disadvantaged. P1 and P5 show how the participants constructed this position or how the host society labelled them.

You know I’m a refugee from Sudan. I fled because of the ethnic conflict. And I had to run for my life. I am talking to you as a refugee. As an African, you want to be proud. But being a refugee changes all this —(P1). I come from Sierra Leone. We tried to bring dad over when we were safe in Britain. I’m a refugee. I don’t think I’d go back to Sierra Leone —(P5).

The migrants did not always select the subject position. Nevertheless, in a number of cases, it was bestowed on them by the social structures that sought to ostracise them. P3 well expressed this external construction of identity:

Knowing I was from there (Sierra Leone) would equate to people knowing that I was a refugee. I didn’t want people to always ask me what happened that I had to flee my country —(P3).

It can be noted that the subject positions adopted were those of ambiguity as they attempt to be simultaneously members of multiples communities, both host and home countries.

It’s not possible for me to forego The Gambia. Social media now let me live Gambian culture better than a few years ago when there was no Facebook, WhatsApp and skype. Even if I feel like I belong in London, I am still Gambian at heart and by blood — (P2). Some other times I say I’m Sudanese. My fellow Sudanese will reject me. In Sudanese communities, I speak with my real Sudanese accent. I’ve been a Muslim all my life in Sudan. This is part of my culture —(P1). Denying my Sierra Leonean roots occasionally is just a pretence. It’s a long time now; but my spirit dwells also in Sierra Leone —(P5).

At the same time as being still full-time members of the native communities back home, the participants appropriated subject positions as subject positions aspiring or full members of the host collectivities. The migrants were aware that successful negotiation of the new social and cultural space depended upon demonstrating a commitment to the host society:

On some occasions, I’d say that I’m a British person and apply myself to mirror the local intonation. That way, people embraced me better —(P8). I started feeling more comfortable here when I gained British citizenship. I then present myself as a British person, I don’t see myself as a liar. British citizenship opened doors —(P15).

The main findings are discussed in the following section, linking key areas of analysis with relevant literature.

The analysis below focuses on showing how the data contribute to answering our central research question: How do individual perceptions of identity affect the lived experiences of forced migrants? D Hack-Polay [ 57 ] views self-and external categorisations as the main factors that support the management of identities, which cause contradictions in the behaviours of the subjects who seek new identities. The research examined the way in which the forced migrants steer multiple identities [ 40 ], which often signified the discarding or suspension of a certain identity in favour of more beneficial ones was transactional and situated. The findings support the view that identities are not bicultural but far more complex and relational- including differences between migrants, refugees and those settled for longer or shorter time periods [ 4 ].

The above quotes not only provide an insight into the conflict and war situations prevalent in the sending countries but also make it conceivable why forced migrants often take desperate measures and dangerous journeys to cross the Mediterranean Sea into Europe. Our participants’ attempts to fit into the new societies are influenced by their past experiences, compounding their apprehensions about exclusion in the host countries. In our study, the migrants’ narratives conveyed their sense and awareness of the ‘anti-asylum-seeker racism’ [ 58 ] prevalent in the UK, hence their discomfort as they felt that they were viewed only as (bad) immigrants as opposed to full members of the new communities.

The migrants in our research believed the intermittent or sometimes frequent suspension of the native (or original) selves in the host communities was a purposeful strategy to evade deleterious identities attributed to them. The migrants could then normalise their everyday lives and develop social routines. ‘Refugee’ identity was thus perceived as a liability [ 28 , 39 , 41 ]. Western media have substantially engaged in developing undesirable connotations about the ‘refugee’ identity through much negative coverage. Labelling can be conceptualised as exclusionary to migrants [ 27 , 59 ]. Alterations in their migrant identity may be geared at escaping socio-cultural exclusion [ 21 , 24 ]. Setting aside native identities was circumstantial for most migrants, i.e., in the public sphere, because those identities were highly pathologised. The original identities were, therefore, perceived as liabilities and not social capital [ 60 ]. The original selves were, however, deployed in private spheres or within migrant enclaves [ 57 ].

To safeguard the temporary or espoused identities, the participants refrained from identifying themselves as migrants or foreigners when interacting with the new collectivity. Though the migrants accepted that it was unethical to misrepresent their identities, they felt coerced to do so by the social system and institutional structures. They did not doubt the legitimacy of espousing new and circumstantial identities as this is a matter of social, psychological and economic survival. This afforded them a degree of dignity in their new communities. The participants perceived ‘migrant identity’ as counter-productive [ 19 , 27 , 61 ]. British-ness, in contrast, appeared to be a desirable identity in the participants’ eyes. The positions that the migrants took differed based on their perceived social value [ 34 ]. Within migrant circles, the participants deployed their actual migrant identity. However, when interacting socially or economically with the host communities, British identity was favoured temporarily by many migrants for the purpose of successful negotiation of the host environment and sense of belongingness [ 39 , 62 ].

The forced migrant participants largely rejected the ‘refugee’ identity when interacting with the new community due to the negative connotation attached to it. Negative identity could lead them to experience undignified treatment in the new social context, resulting from ‘othering’ [ 63 ]. The perceived stigma associated with ‘refugee’ identity has been widely studied in the field of help-seeking behaviour, particularly in the context of the barriers to accessing mental health services in the host country, due to cultural beliefs or the fear of mistreatment [ 64 , 65 ]. Several current global campaigns and policies for the benefit of refugees often call for more dignity for this group. Such campaigns include “Dignity not Destitution” [ 66 ] and “Respect for All” [ 67 ]. Drawing on our participants’ narratives, this could be interpreted as a positive wave of interventions, shaped by present identity narratives, given that the anxiety of the profanation of their dignity impacts significantly on the forced migrants’ appropriation and discarding of identities.

In total, identity fluctuation became a significant social navigation strategy for our participants. However, the exaltation of espoused identities (particularly citizenship) meant accepting the utilitarian role of adopted selves [ 68 ]; even pathologised identities in contemporary British society, e.g. foreigners, refugees, immigrants, deprived, and so forth, could become useful depending on context. All the participants in the study are from Africa, and several of the example transcripts discuss their race. Race, thus, appears to be a factor strengthening the participants’ rejection of the pathologised ‘refugee’ identity, whose perceived adverse effect could be compounded in an already racialised British society. Therefore, to a large extent, the migrants were led to use identity fluctuation, especially new migrants’ rights became restricted in the UK and much of the European Union. Often, gaining citizenship status assisted the change of identity socially and psychologically. For example, the forced migrants narrated how they laboured hard to acquire minority British accents to disguise their foreignness. Indeed, C Antaki, S Condor and M Levine [ 69 ] argue that identity can be situated in conversational interaction, whereby speakers can draw on fluctuating identities in order to invoke both group distinctiveness and similarity, arguably as a mode of social navigation.

Further, the longer our participants lived in the new communities, the more the forced migrants moved towards hybridity of identity. This correlates with the bicultural perspective on identity presented by C Ward, C Ng Tseung-Wong, A Szabo, T Qumseya and U Bhowon [ 24 ]. They found that hybrid and alternating identities served as valuable tools in the struggle to find a place in a multicultural context [ 24 ]. Identity fluctuation happened in much of the migrant social realities, namely behaviours, language, religion, social interactions, values and drinking and eating habits, and so forth. In several cases, migrants engaged in identity ‘change’ because they saw it as an imperative action for social integration. Some scholars [ 68 , 70 , 71 , 72 ] contend that, in different cultural contexts, people generally show a penchant for identities associated with the dominant culture. To a large extent, social media (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, etc.) helped the participant negotiate different identities [ 73 ]. Nevertheless, they remained close to their native ones as they maintained ties ‘back home’ through live participation in festivals, meetings and similar left-behind cultures.

The participants saw language as an important identity factor, maintaining that common phrases, adages and accents, must fit or support the re-engineered self in order to penetrate the new social order. For R Mitchell, F Myles and E Marsden [ 74 ], there is a gap between first-generation and subsequent generations of migrants in terms of host language competence as the second language develops considerably to the detriment of the migrant’s native langue (especially in second generations). To substantiate this, D Bhugra and MA Becker [ 28 ] claim that the second generation of forced migrant offspring realised that cultural transformation was imperative for survival. This enabled them to develop greater English language competence than their first-generation parents.

Religion could aid the socialisation process [ 37 ] and represent a remedy for social exclusion and isolation; the host cultural paradigm exercises some dominance over time. Some authors [ 57 , 71 ] found that the migrant population—and minorities more broadly—lean towards the dominant culture over time. The participants in our study largely attempted to retain the religious identity they arrived in exile with. However, close ties with the original religious identity also diminished in the long term. Like P1 and P14, many participants perceived having ‘social times’ with locals as forced compliance with the host country’s cultural patterns, using these as strategies to create opportunities [ 25 , 61 ]. This supports TL Pittinsky, M Shih and N Ambady [ 75 ], concerning the notion that identities are situated. The erosion of original cultural norms is explained by MM Gordon [ 76 ] in what the author termed the Anglo-conformity assimilation model. This model casts light on the coercion that migrants face to conform to the locality as a condition for social, economic and political inclusion (see also [ 32 , 77 ]). Non-compliant migrants, however, will experience more difficulties in ‘gaining recognition and surviving’ [ 16 , 40 ]. Social integration necessitates a systematic appraisal of host realities by the migrants in order to establish where to position themselves [ 78 , 79 , 80 ].

The way in which the migrants experienced identity oscillation was clearly inherent to the migrant integration process. In this process, identities that enjoyed a positive perception in the eyes of the migrants were espoused to facilitate the migrants’ navigation of the new social context, leading to the expectation of social promotion [ 40 , 57 ].

Narratives provided by the migrants aided the explication of the range of identities and socio-cultural routing strategies. Our research extends the literature regarding responses that migrants develop that may cause conflict between the migrant groups and locals. The findings highlight the way in which migrants in a given society articulate varied approaches geared at testing the beliefs the hosts hold about newcomers. Such an analysis of epitomises is the complexity of the identity issue [ 81 ]. This equally exemplifies the extent to which new identities develop organically, are context-dependent and evolutionary. These are also affected by the context leading to the forced migrants leaving their countries, typically socio-political conflict. Our study participants were from nine countries that have experienced varying degrees of conflict. Within the scope of this paper and for the purpose of brevity, the details of the nature of these conflicts have been omitted. Instead, we have elected to provide context for those that the participants mentioned explicitly as part of their reasons for leaving their country to explain how these pre-exile circumstances shaped their identities in the host countries.

The investigation started with the overarching research question about how individual perceptions of identity can affect the lived experiences of forced migrants. The findings show that forced migrants navigate their new cultural and institutional settings by articulating identities that are unconsciously or consciously espoused and expressed. Fluctuating identities are necessitated by constraints of the host environment that may tend to use the migrant status as a basis for exclusion of the newcomers. This finding elucidates our overarching research question, portraying the forced migrants’ perception of refugee identity as a liability. This demonstrates that identities, in many respects, derive from conscious construction. Whether provisional or permanent, setting aside native identities among migrants socially and psychologically situated [ 21 , 24 ]. The construction of normality (or at least a new normal) constitutes the main basis for the migrants’ repudiation of pathologised migrant identities or the appropriation of desirable identities as reminiscent survival tactics for sense-making in readiness to fill novel social and economic roles.

The formation of the new identity is a process of reality construction that goes on until the migrants develop effective social navigation of the host terrain. As they become settled, their original selves are re-evaluated in the light of novel constraints, temporarily suspending old identities and appropriating more contextually valid identities (see [ 35 ]). In this perspective, there develops an inferiority-superiority belief that endorses the supposed superior or desirable identity that is significantly more opportunity-driven. Identity fluctuation was found to be contingent upon the context, thus rejecting the argument of fixed identities [ 34 ]. This indicates the plausibility of the argument that the appropriation of sporadic selves is largely situated in time and space. Our research represents a novel contribution to the literature on migrant identity practice. A paucity of scholarship connects the notion of the stigma associated with forced migrant status and the extent to which forced migrants appraise their reception in exile as undignified. This study remedies some weaknesses in the literature; ascertaining identity fluctuation may not be unidirectional, indicating that shifting towards positive identity is not the only position people take. Identity fluctuation is geared at the opportunity from economic, social and economic standpoints. Examining migrant identities from an interpretivist perspective allows researchers to apprehend the diverse facets of identity as far as migrants are concerned. This endeavour requires multiple research frameworks to elucidate migrants’ complex identity shift exercise or choice of identity (which we termed identity fluctuation in the study). Additionally, our inquiry was not explicitly intended to examine how migrants’ race, gender and identity could interact—adding another limitation that should be acknowledged here. Future research could explore this intersection, drawing on large samples that would allow multi-group analyses and employing quantitative (or mixed-) methods that would offer the support of inferential statistics to judge the variance in the forced migrants’ perceptions of identity as a result of the interaction with relevant moderating variables, e.g. gender, generational cohort, education, social media, extent of prior trauma, and many more.

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All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article.

Abbreviations

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

Participant

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DH collected the data and completed the part of the literature review. ABM contributed to the data analysis and writing the methodology section as well as proofreading formatting the manuscript. MK contributed to the literature review and the discussion. She also ensured that the introduction and the research questions were well framed. RM contributed to the literature review and the discussion section. She also reviewed the methods section to ensure accuracy and coherence. CK contributed to the methodology and the implication as well as the general conclusion of the manuscript. All authors reviewed and commented on subsequent drafts of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Hack-Polay, D., Mahmoud, A.B., Kordowicz, M. et al. “Let us define ourselves”: forced migrants’ use of multiple identities as a tactic for social navigation. BMC Psychol 9 , 125 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-021-00630-6

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Mental Health Impact of Straddling a Dual Identity as an Asian American

Verywell / Madelyn Goodnight

“Difficulty of balancing two different cultures” has been shown to be associated with mental health problems among 1.5 and 2nd-generation Asian American young adults.

As a child of Chinese immigrants, I grew up with a dual identity: one at home and one at school. I didn’t feel like I belonged in either, only desperate to impress whoever was around me at the moment. I was lost between two worlds, facing the dilemma of choosing who I truly was every time I stepped through the doors of my home.

At home, my parents were in survival mode. They worked hard and long hours to make ends meet. There was no time or space to emotionally and mentally connect. Their priorities were putting food on the table, ensuring the mortgage was paid on time, and paying for our extracurricular activities. They gave their blood, sweat, and tears into providing their children with a better life than they had.

Whenever we met up with extended family, I never felt Chinese enough. I was born in Canada, and even though I looked like them, they assumed my cultural knowledge was diluted because I didn’t grow up in the motherland. Relatives visiting from Hong Kong would use their broken English with me. Then they would ensure someone ordered sweet and sour pork to satisfy my Western palate.

As a child of Chinese immigrants, I grew up with a dual identity: one at home and one at school. I didn’t feel like I belonged in either, only desperate to impress whoever was around me at the moment.

I didn’t like being put in a box and stereotyped as a “banana” (yellow on the outside and White on the inside). I wanted to prove to them that I understood my heritage. So I would act as Chinese as I could, responding to their questions in fluent Cantonese, addressing all the elders by their correct titles, requesting a traditional dish, and refusing to touch the sweet and sour pork.

I continued pretending to be someone I wasn’t, even outside of my family. Every time I left for school, I would put my armor on to avoid showing the Chinese side of myself. I wanted to blend in, to look and act like those in my predominantly Caucasian school. I'd get furious at my mom if she packed anything my classmates would consider weird or smelly for my lunch.

I was self-conscious about my language skills and tried hard to speak English without an accent. I aimed for perfection when it came to writing without grammar errors. If a Cantonese word slipped from my mouth in front of my class, I would be mortified.

I rarely shared with my friends about my family and what happened over the weekend because I knew they wouldn’t relate to going for dim sum with relatives or binge-watching Chinese dramas. Instead, I’d say something generic like, “It was great. I did some shopping and had some activities (which were Chinese school, math class, and piano, but I wouldn’t specify).”

In high school, it was no longer just what I said and how I behaved. I started changing my appearance to fit in. I wore colored contacts, dyed my hair, put makeup on, and dressed according to what was in the teen magazines to look more Caucasian.

It was during these years that I struggled with depression and anxiety. The two identities I had created between school and home became so polarized that I felt like I had little control over my life.

As I entered adulthood, I started questioning my values and where I stood between my Eastern and Western upbringing. It was when I became a parent that I started experiencing an internal battle between collectivistic and individualistic values that affected my parenting and life decisions. 

Collectivism

Collectivism prioritizes the needs of the family above individual concerns, whereas individualism values personal identity and uniqueness.

What do I want to preserve for the next generation?

What values, beliefs, and priorities do I want to instill in my kids?

Which ones do I want to shed?

Respect the Hierarchy or Flatten It?

In East Asian culture, it’s a common practice to follow a hierarchy where each individual has a defined role in the family and is expected to behave within it. The relationships consist of the respected and the respectful.

Within an Asian family structure, decision-making is traditionally held by the father followed by the eldest son. The mother is expected to take care of the children and support her husband. Daughters are below sons on the hierarchy.

Family members are expected to honor this patriarchal hierarchy and any deviation from it is considered disrespectful, disgraceful, shameful.

Acceptance and obedience of this hierarchy is expected in order to maintain harmony in the family and in society, and these deeply entrenched cultural norms can be a source of inner conflict for many Asian American children and adults.

It has been shown this type of family hierarchy is a key cultural factor that negatively influences the mental health of Asian Americans.

Speak Up or Stay Silent?

Difficulty communicating with parents has shown to be a common source of stress for Asian American young adults.

Growing up, my father preached “respect your elders” and demanded it because of his position on the family hierarchy. However, I believed rules were meant to be broken. 

In school, I was taught to think critically and encouraged to ask questions. Speaking my mind and voicing my individual opinion were considered strengths. So I challenged his opinions every time I didn’t agree. My disrespectful behavior created a disconnect between us. 

I urged him to respect me as an adult and to stop treating me like a child. It was difficult to be around him because he wasn’t able to validate my emotions. Whenever I started sharing a bit about what was going on in my life, he would offer unsolicited advice which made me feel like I was not good enough. 

Growing up, my father preached “respect your elders” and demanded it because of his position on the family hierarchy. However, I believed rules were meant to be broken.

Over time, silence took over whenever we were in the same room. I couldn’t build trust because I was unable to have open and honest discussions with him. I didn’t feel safe fully expressing myself so conversations were limited to simple matters.

As the youngest in the family and a female, the hierarchy created a power differential that made me feel like my opinions weren’t valued, and therefore, I wasn't valued. I was desperate to be heard and seen; I knew staying silent and bottling my emotions were wreaking havoc on my mental health. However, whenever I gathered enough courage to speak up, I was either scolded or ignored. It didn’t matter if I spoke in Cantonese, used my years of conflict management experience or approached it with an empathetic lens because the more I tried, the more my emotions were invalidated. Eventually, disappointment became the expectation and silence won over. 

For many years, I struggled to make confident decisions because it depended on the approval of my parents or someone in an authority position.

Can You Really Choose Your Family?

Family obligations based on strong family values have been identified as a common source of stress that affects the mental health of Asian American young adults.

Negative relationships are related to an increased risk of cardiac events and poor family dynamics have been shown to be associated with reduced pain tolerance and slower wound healing times.

When I scroll through social media feeds, there are often messages about cutting out toxic people in your life , surrounding yourself with those who elevate you, and prioritizing self-respect and personal boundaries .

A 2015 study found that 80% of individuals who cut ties with a family member reported feeling “freer, more independent, and stronger.”

However, I was raised to believe that familial ties serve as the foundation of my culture. Maintaining harmony within the family is of utmost importance even if it means turning a blind eye to mistreatment, ignoring issues, and sacrificing happiness. 

The sense of obligation has amplified as my parents enter their 70s. The differences between us have caused us to grow socially apart, not physically. I see them regularly. 

I hold my tongue not because I’m afraid of the consequences but because I, too, value keeping the peace. I’ve accepted them for who they are. I’ve come to terms that they will never change, and it is what it is. 

Although I decided to maintain the relationship with my parents, it doesn’t mean the harm I experienced was acceptable. The decision is deeply personal to the individual’s situation and should not be taken lightly. Cutting ties may be the most appropriate choice given where the individual is on their journey. Furthermore, the decision can change over time as the relationship evolves. 

Ultimately, I’ve grown to appreciate the stability in our relationship even though often no words are exchanged. There’s a sense of comfort we can count on each other and our presence is fulfilling enough.

I hold my tongue not because I’m afraid of the consequences but because I, too, value keeping the peace.

Saving Face or Showing Vulnerability?

In a collectivistic family, success brings honor and failure brings shame. Success is defined as an increase in status and power or financial gains. From divorce, job loss, relationship issues, major debt, and mental illness, failure means anything that threatens this definition of success.

Sweeping problems under the carpet are often how Asian families deal with their issues. Social stigma, shame, and saving face have been shown to prevent Asians from seeking behavioral health care.

Over many years of self-work, I confronted my insecurities, deconditioned myself of harmful beliefs, and sought therapy for my mental health. From writing about my daily struggles as a mother, and the conflict with my parents to my less-than-perfect marriage, I’m on a mission to bring those issues to the surface despite growing up in a culture that hid them. 

Therefore, the dual identity crisis has significant effects on the mental and emotional health of Asian Americans. Taking care of your mental health can help you manage stress and anxiety with lifelong coping skills, gain awareness and clarity about your thoughts and feelings, recover more quickly and fully from emotional triggers, know and communicate your needs better, and improve relationships. Desiring healing and getting help are signs of courage and strength, not shame or dishonor.

Choosing your own healing and seeking support can be a powerful act of love and service for our family, our ancestors, and ourselves.

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By Katharine Chan, MSc, BSc, PMP Katharine is the author of three books (How To Deal With Asian Parents, A Brutally Honest Dating Guide and A Straight Up Guide to a Happy and Healthy Marriage) and the creator of 60 Feelings To Feel: A Journal To Identify Your Emotions. She has over 15 years of experience working in British Columbia's healthcare system.