American Dreaming, Global Realities

Rethinking U.S. Immigration History
Author: Edited by Donna R. Gabaccia and Vicki L. Ruiz
An introduction to the best from the new directions in U.S. immigration history
Paper – $39
978-0-252-07305-2
Publication Date
Paperback: 01/01/2006
Cloth: 11/13/2006
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About the Book

Representing a selection of the finest new research on immigration, American Dreaming, Global Realities explores the ways in which immigrant lives and those of their children are shaped by transnational bonds, globalization, family ties, and personal choice, and the ways in which they engender a sense of belonging and a sense of themselves as "Americans."

American Dreaming, Global Realities considers a plurality of very specific historical, economic, regional, familial, and cultural contexts. This history reveals resistance and accommodation, both persistent older traditions and Americanization, plus the creation of new cultural forms blending old and new. The twenty-two interdisciplinary essays included in this collection explore the intricate overlapping of race, class, and gender on ethnic identity and on American citizenship.

About the Author

Donna R. Gabaccia is Mellon Professor of History, University of Pittsburgh. She is the author of We Are What We Eat: Ethnic Food and the Making of Americans and other books. Vicki L. Ruiz is a professor of history and Chicano/Latino studies at the University of California at Irvine, and the author of From Out of the Shadows: Mexican Women in Twentieth Century America and other books.

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Reviews

"This collection . . . reflects the many achievements in historiography that have arisen since the introduction of the categories of class, gender, ethnicity, and race. . . . All [twenty-two essays] are of high quality and the annotations guide readers to further literature."--Dirk Hoerder, Journal of American Ethnic History

"This fine collection draws together diverse works that illuminate major themes in recent immigration scholarship. . . . As this nation debates immigration policy, this collection can help us see how past policies developed and how they affected those peoples whose dreams included America."--Annals of Iowa

Blurbs

"Marked by a rare coherence and clarity of vision, this elegant collection is a focused attempt to come to grips with some of the thornier issues that have confronted immigration historians in the past decade: how to practice comparative history, how to reconcile historians' emphasis on nation-states with the transnationalism paradigm of social scientists, and how to make race and class meaningful analytical categories rather than tired clichés."--Dorothee Schneider, author of Trade Unions and Community: The German Working Class in New York City, 1870-1900

"Ruiz and Gabaccia demonstrate clearly why they are such important leaders in this field. In addition to their own fine scholarly contributions, American Dreaming, Global Realities presents a precise, careful, and panoramic vision of conceptual issues appropriate for a variety of audiences."--Nora Faires, history and women's studies, Western Michigan University