Immigration Stories and the Construction of a Bilingual American Identity

This project seeks to document first-generation, Spanish-speaking Americans\u27 immigration stories by transcribing and translating their oral accounts from Spanish to English, in an attempt to increase understanding between Anglophone and Spanish-speaking populations. The project envisions immigration stories as the basis for a distinct American folklore, at the same time connecting Americans to their ethnic or national roots and distinguishing them from their ancestors, giving them a unique American identity. With this sort of nationalizing myth in mind, the project seeks to create a record of first-generation permanent Americans, painiting a picture of the beginnings of a new Spanish-speaking U.S. identity