Integrating the new generation
Integrating the new generation
- August 6, 2015
- Study on cultural adaption in immigrant children earns Sanchez NSF fellowship
Daina Sanchez, graduate student in anthropology, has reason to celebrate this summer:
her dissertation examining the cultural adaptation techniques among immigrant children
has earned her the National Science Foundation Fellowship Award, which will fund 18
months of her research.
Specifically focusing on children whose families hail from San Andres Solaga in Oaxaca,
Mexico—her parents’ hometown—Sanchez’ dissertation grew from her undergraduate research
at the University of San Diego.
“Upon entering the anthropology program at UCI, I shifted my focus from studying first-generation
immigrants to studying the children of these immigrants,” Sanchez says. “I shifted
my attention because, although academics have focused on the children of immigrants,
less attention has been given to the experience of the growing number of indigenous
immigrants and their children in the U.S. who may represent a different pattern.”
With the fellowship funds, Sanchez plans to conduct ethnographic research in both
Los Angeles and Solaga over a 12-month period. She hopes to determine the role that
religious and cultural practices play in shaping these children’s identities, as well
as how certain practices and activities affect their notions of belonging—both in
the U.S. and in their parent’s home communities.
“I'm particularly interested in this question because pundits that discourage practices
that keep the children of immigrants connected to their home country argue that it
prevents their assimilation into the American mainstream,” she explains.
To gather data, Sanchez will conduct participant interviews and observation at three
sites: various band and dance practices in Los Angeles, a patron saint celebration
in Los Angeles, and the Virgen del Carmen celebration in Solaga.
Sanchez will receive $25,200 from the NSF fellowship with a project period lasting
through December 2016.
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