Cultural identities of immigrants: Their formation in the pre-migration period and their transformation during adjustment to the host country

Eugene Tartakovsky*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

6 Scopus citations

Abstract

This chapter summarizes the results of a series of studies conducted among adolescents emigrating from Russia and Ukraine to Israel. These studies examined the emigrants' cultural identities in the pre-migration period, investigated changes in the cultural identities from the pre-migration period and throughout the first three years in the receiving country, and tested the effects of ethnicity and perceived discrimination on cultural identities in the pre-and post-migration periods. The studies focused on Jewish high school adolescents who emigrated from Russia and Ukraine to Israel without their parents as part of an emigration program organized by the Israeli government. These adolescents underwent a selection procedure in their countries of origin in order to qualify for the program. Once arriving in Israel, they lived in boarding schools; thus, they were available for the study during both the pre-migration period as well as for three consecutive years after their immigration. Russian and Ukrainian adolescents studying in public high schools who did not plan emigration served as a comparison group. The results obtained indicated that in the pre-migration period, emigrants partially detach from their homeland and strongly affiliate with the country of provisional immigration. In the post-migration period, immigrants' identities varied following changing social circumstances. The studies' results confirmed that the cultural identities of immigrants are subjective constructs which depend little on primordial factors such as ethnicity, but are nevertheless susceptible to substantial variations under the influence of social factors, such as perceived discrimination.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationImmigration
Subtitle of host publicationPolicies, Challenges and Impact
PublisherNova Science Publishers, Inc.
Pages231-254
Number of pages24
ISBN (Print)9781624170300
StatePublished - Feb 2013

Keywords

  • Attitudes towards a country
  • High-school adolescents
  • Identification with the nation
  • Immigrants
  • Perceived discrimination

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