James P. Smith, RAND
Introduction: Immigrants often do not come with much, but they do bring their human capital. Since schooling is the most basic index of their skill, how much education migrants had before they arrived, how much they were able to add while in the United States, and how that schooling helped their performances in the American labor market are critical questions in determining their eventual economic success or failure. In part because of this, education may also be crucial in influencing who decides to migrate to the United States.
This influence may be even more direct if migrants come …

Takeyuki “Gaku” Tsuda, University of California – San Diego
Abstract: Based on a close content analysis of 16 Japanese television programs and shows (recorded on videotape) that featured the Japanese-Brazilians and aired in the early 1990s,5 I argue that Japanese media coverage of nikkeijin migrants can become a catalyst for change to a limited extent by challenging some engrained Japanese ethnic perceptions and providing self-reflexive criticism of Japanese society while at the same time rather unreflexively and implicitly reinforcing these traditional attitudes and prejudices. For instance, although the programs and shows I examined made a serious effort to discredit some ethnic …

April Linton, University of California – San Diego
Abstract: Under what circumstances will parents and educators value bilingualism enough to see to it that children attain or maintain it? This paper explores the extent to which contextual conditions can help answer this question. I define and test several models of the influence of demographic, economic, and social context on the likelihood that a school district will adopt the dual-language option. The focus is exclusively on Spanish- English programs (over 90 percent of the total). Spanish-speakers are the largest non-English-language group in the United States. More than half the people who generally …

Wayne Cornelius, University of California – San Diego
Marc R. Rosenblum, University of New Orleans
Abstract: With nearly one in ten residents of advanced industrialized states now an immigrant, international migration has become a fundamental driver of social, economic, and political change. We review alternative models of migratory behavior (which emphasize structural factors largely beyond states’ control) as well as models of immigration policy making that seek to explain the gaps between stated policy and actual outcomes. Some scholars attempt to explain the limited efficacy of control policies by focusing on domestic interest groups, political institutions, and the interaction among them; others …

Hoyt Bleakley, University of California – San Diego
Aimee Chin, University of Houston
Abstract: Research on the effect of parental human capital on children’s human capital is complicated by the endogeneity of parental human capital. This study exploits the phenomenon that younger children learn languages more easily than older children to construct an instrumental variable for language human capital. Thus, among U.S.-born children with childhood immigrant parents, those whose parents arrived to the U.S. as younger children tend to have more exposure to English at home. We find a significant positive effect of parent’s English-speaking proficiency on children’s English-speaking proficiency while the …

Gustavo Cano, University of California – San Diego
Introduction: The term “transnationalism” is now commonly used by a growing cluster of social scientists. However, some scholars assert that the term is hopeless: it generally ends up explaining nothing new, it seems to have no future, or even worst, its regular users seem not to agree on the definition of the term, and the debates that it generates generally takes social scientists nowhere.
This paper deals with this situation from two perspectives. Firstly, I point out the theoretical problems that “transnationalism” presents as an interdisciplinary concept. I identify different subjects and transnational fields …

Jeffrey H. Cohen, Pennsylvania State University
Leila Rodriguez, Pennsylvania State University
Abstract: In this paper, we investigate the ways in which migrant households in rural Oaxaca, Mexico use remittances. We use data from a survey and ethnographic research in 12 rural communities in the central valleys of the state to examine three investment strategies: those made in the local (village) commercial economy, those made in the agricultural/dairy sector, and those made in Oaxaca’s tourism industry. In our discussion, we examine the challenges that surround such local efforts and ask whether such patterns increase dependency, or create opportunities. Finally, we ask, can the …

Jon E. Fox, University of California – San Diego
Introduction: Large numbers of ethnic Hungarians from Romania have been working illegally on and off in Hungary since the regime changes in 1989-1990. In 2001, Hungary passed legislation, the so-called “Status Law,” that granted the transborder Hungarians the right to work in Hungary three months out of each calendar year. But in preparation for joining the European Union in May 2004, the law has been gradually dismantled in accordance with the EU’s strictures against ethnic-based entitlements. Over the last decade and a half, ethnic Hungarian migrants have received mixed signals from Hungary. …

Deborah A. Boehm, Center for Comparative Immigration Studies and Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies
Abstract: In this paper, I discuss findings about gender subjectivities and gender relations among transnational Mexicans in San Luis Potosí, Mexico and Albuquerque, New Mexico. Drawing on ethnographic data, I outline the transforming roles of women and men within a community of Mexican “transmigrants” (Glick Schiller, Basch, Blanc-Szanton 1995: 48). I will argue that masculinity is both reconstituted and compromised by immigration to the United States, which in turn, simultaneously liberates and puts new controls on women, redefining femininity and what it means to be a woman. In …

Fernando Lozano Ascencio, Center for Comparative Immigration Studies
Abstract: Este trabajo se propone examinar algunas expresiones del discurso oficial mexicano sobre el papel de las remesas en el desarrollo nacional y sobre la necesidad de invertir productivamente estos recursos, como estrategia de combate a la pobreza y el rezago social. Se presenta un recuento de la evolución del flujo de remesas a México entre 1990 y 2003, a partir de la información del Banco de México, así como resultados de varias encuestas recientes –levantadas tanto en México como en Estados Unidos– que describen las características de los individuos que envían y …