Striving in the Suburbs: Education and the Pursuit of Success in a Chinese Immigrant Community 71 views

This dissertation examines the ways that a highly educated and professional-class Chinese immigrant community in the affluent white suburbs of the New York metropolitan area has strived for success in racialized America through education. Drawing on 100 interviews with first-generation immigrants and 18 months of participant observational fieldwork, this ethnography uncovers how this Chinese community defines what it means to achieve and live a successful life—both for themselves and for their children—and how education functions as a modality to achieve not only socioeconomic mobility and stability but also valued social resources such as respect, esteem, and belonging. This study ultimately offers a case of how immigrant communities learn to navigate the racialized forces, discourses, and structures around them and to make sense of their complex position in America.

PHD (Doctor of Philosophy)

race; ethnicity; immigration; education; Asian Americans; ethnography

English

All rights reserved (no additional license for public reuse)

2025-04-17