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America in the Hand, Homeland in the Heart: Transnational and Translocal Immigrant Experiences in the American West
ELLIOTT R. BARKAN
Centering immigration in western history, the author analyzes immigrant oral histories and provides an alternative conceptual model of immigrant experiences following a critical review of transnationalism, that of translocalism. It posits, over time, that most immigrants have retained limited ties with their homelands, which nevertheless shaped their adaptation and cumulative contributions.
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SINCE AT LEAST THE EARLY 1990s, scholars have been trying to come to terms conceptually with the extraordinary dimensions of the new immigration triggered in the United States by the immigration reforms of 1965, 1978, 1986, and 1990 and how it compares with the waves of newcomers a century ago. Both eras have profoundly affected the American West, although one would not know this from the scarce treatment of immigration in many histories of the West.1 In fact, studies of contemporary immigration have generally been dominated by social scientists, with only a handful of historians contributing.2 |
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In an effort to analyze the breadth, diversity, and impact of post-1965 immigration and to provide a conceptual model for studying the inflow of peoples, there have been extended discussions concerning contemporary transnationalism. From these, six things have become clear. First, there is still no complete consensus on what transnationalism represents. Second, many writers are seeking consensus by offering a slew of variations that add more complexity even as they strive for more specificity. Third, some scholars employ the term "transnationalism" as the equivalent of "internationalism" and others feel it encompasses multinational corporations, blurring—not clarifying—its application to immigration; most, however, concentrate on the post-migration phase and the immigrants' putatively extensive links between their homelands and new host societies. Fourth, a growing number of investigators are now exposing the ambiguities and ahistorical approaches initially used to describe transnationalism. Fifth, while its excessive features are being reassessed, transnational scholars continue to elaborate upon it, overlooking viable alternative approaches to immigrants' adaptation.3 Finally, most research on transnationalism involves East Coast communities. Since far too many western histories give, at best, lip service to immigration into the West, their authors insufficiently appreciate just how central it has been to western history and how social science conceptualizations might significantly strengthen their understanding of its enormous role. |
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This essay is not an extended review of the literature on transnationalism. Rather, there is a four-fold purpose here: 1) to outline several approaches to transnationalism; 2) to discuss the imprecision of the concept; 3) to make the case for an alternative model that might better account for those myriad immigrant actions that do not measure up to the more common definition of transnationalism; and 4) to focus on the twentieth-century American West with a selection of representative oral histories.4 These oral histories will illustrate my central argument: immigrant experiences actually span a full spectrum of newcomer responses—from disengagement from one's society of origin at one end to extensive, transnational engagement in homeland affairs at the other. In between these two contrasting alternatives lies "translocalism"—an array of moderate actions more indicative of how I find most immigrants responding to issues, norms, values, and events linking the two arenas (hostland, homeland). |
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