Children of African immigrants in Portugal: strategies of identity construction

In my thesis I deal with processes of identity construction among the children of immigrants from Lusophone Africa (Portuguese-speaking African countries) living in Portugal. The group in focus serves as a starting point for an examination of how the new hybrid and syncretic identities are constructed in today's globalized world. The children of immigrants, balancing on the edge of two or more cultures and identities and not fitting in any of the categories through which people normally identify themselves, are an ideal group for the illustration of these phenomena. In the course of my field work I was able to identify three main strategies by means of which the children of immigrants cope with their ambivalent position in society and try to find their place in the world: the strategy of identification with Portugal, the strategy of identification with their parents' country of origin and the strategy of mixed identification. Through the analysis of the functioning of these three strategies I try to find out the factors that determine which strategy each of the informants chooses and what is the impact of this choice on their lives. The results tell us a lot not only about the children of immigrants themselves but about the Portuguese society in general as well