Adversities Faced by First-Generation Immigrants

SOAN 279. As an immigrant, I take pride in the work my family has done to establish themselves as both caregivers and citizens in a new environment. In my Social Research and Methods course, I chose to examine not only my experience as an immigrant, but the experiences of other first-generation immigrants who were students at Ohio Wesleyan University. My qualitative semester research examined various adversities faced by first-generation immigrants using collected interviews and observations, for which I received a grade of A-.

American demographics indicate that America is a cultural cornucopia; generations of diverse backgrounds have assimilated into American society over the years, and streams of immigrants from all over are still pouring into the country. The latter, the immigrants known as “first generation”, face more socio-economic, political, and culturally-related problems than their offspring , the “second/third generations” because they are required to integrate their families into American society. Integration into American society is evaluated based on the following indicators: language, socioeconomic status, political participation, residential location, social interaction with members of host country. While integrating into a new society, multiple sociological phenomena such as the following can be observed: impression management, role conflict, stereotypes, and maintaining cultural norms. As of 2013, national data shows that 40,377,860 of the American population are foreign-born; 13.1% of the aforementioned value became naturalized citizens that same year. Clearly, a significant number of the populace is considered an immigrant and as a result, significant efforts should be made to understand the adversities they face when assimilating into American society. As a first generation immigrant from Romania, I take great interest in how other cultural groups assimilate into American society. The process of assimilation can be blocked through administrative hurdles as well as socio-economic tensions between the in-group, “Americans”, and the out-group, “immigrants” whom most people casually refer to as “foreigners” despite the derogatory meaning behind the phrase. Being a first generation immigrant, I had the opportunity to interview and observe similar individuals and obtain authentic, personal histories of their struggles as they and their families tried to fulfill the American Dream.

PDF of research available upon request.

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