Remaking the American mainstream : assimilation and contemporary immigration /
Richard Alba, Victor Nee.
- xiv, 359 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm.
Includes index
Winner of Thomas and Znaniecki Book Award 2004 Nominated for Robert E. Park Award 2004 Nominated for Best Book Award in Race, Ethnicity, and Politics 2004 Nominated for Asia and Asian American Section Outstanding Book Award 2004 Nominated for Allan Sharlin Memorial Award 2004 Nominated for PROSE Awards 2003 Nominated for Theodore Saloutos Memorial Book Award 2004 Nominated for Otis Dudley Duncan Award 2003
Includes bibliographical references (p. [295]-349)
1 Rethinking Assimilation 1 2 Assimilation Theory, Old and New 17 3 Assimilation in Practice: The Europeans and East Asians 67 4 Was Assimilation Contingent on Specific Historical Conditions? 124 5 The Background to Contemporary Immigration 167 6 Evidence of Contemporary Assimilation 215 7 Conclusion: Remaking the Mainstream 271
"In this era of multicultural democracy, the idea of assimilation - that the social distance separating immigrants and their children from the mainstream of American society closes over time - seems outdated. But as Richard Alba and Victor Nee show in the first systematic treatment of assimilation since the mid-1960s, it continues to shape the immigrant experience, even though the geography of immigration has shifted from Europe to Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Institutional changes, from civil rights legislation to immigration law, have provided a more favorable environment for nonwhite immigrants and their children than in the past."