Middle-class Taiwanese immigrants\u27 adaptation to American society: The interactive effects of gender, culture, race, and class

Through an examination of middle-class Taiwanese immigrants\u27 ethno-gender identities, this study demonstrates the interactive effects of gender, culture, race, and class on immigrants\u27 adaptation to American society. It addresses the limitation of previous approaches focusing on only one type of factor. Of particular importance are gender effects on immigrants\u27 adaptation, which have often been ignored. Due to immigrants\u27 unique status and experiences, I propose the concept of \u27ethno-gender identity\u27 to describe their gender identities. Through their negotiation with their ethnic tradition and conditions in the host society, immigrants form their ethno-gender identities. Using the method of in-depth interviewing, thirty immigrants, seventeen women and thirteen men, were interviewed for about one and a half hours on average. Because immigrant children play an important role in shaping the immigrants\u27 ethno-gender identities, ten Taiwanese Americans were also interviewed. Generally speaking, the immigrant women feel content with American life not only because of their middle-class status and professional achievement, but also because culturally they are allowed to have more individual freedom and choice than they could have had in their homeland. Their ethno-gender identities are the results of the diverse choices and freedom they have had in developing their careers and personal lives. The effects of racial oppression, compared with what they gain culturally and economically as women in America, are not recognized. In contrast, for the immigrant men, American life is precarious and difficult. They often feel racial oppression, especially in maintaining their economic status through work. They worry that racial oppression could undermine their economic achievements. Due to anxieties about their job performance and economic status, they feel less connected to American society than the women; they remain \u27sojourners.\u27 Employment problems combined with cultural attitudes toward masculinity in America challenge their identities as men. With their unique cultural and social conditions like immigrants\u27, the middle-class American-born Taiwanese form their ethno-gender identities. Feeling oppressed by Chinese gender rules, the American-born women tend to break with their ethnic tradition to pursue an individual-oriented gender identity supported by American culture. However, feeling oppressed by and striving to resist the dominant white-male power, which disparages their masculinity, the American-born men tend to keep their ethnic tradition in forming their gender identities. Due to these findings, we see how, in forming their ethno-gender identities, middle-class Taiwanese immigrants and the American-born Taiwanese negotiate with their ethnic tradition and with cultural values, racial oppression and economic conditions in America, which shows the interactive effects of gender, culture, race, and class on their negotiation and hence their different levels of connectedness with American society