Integration Nation

Immigrants, Refugees, and America at Its Best

Susan E. Eaton

• Publisher: The New Press
• Year: 2015
• eBook ISBN: 9781620971420
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Immigration Policy
• Index: Social Sciences

“Eaton has done invaluable work in documenting the revitalization of communities across the U.S. by immigrants and refugees” (David Bacon, author of Illegal People).
 
In recent years, politicians in a handful of local communities and states have passed laws and regulations designed to make it easier to deport unauthorized immigrants or to make their lives so unpleasant that they’d just leave. The media’s unrelenting focus on these ultimately self-defeating measures created the false impression that these politicians speak for most of America. They don’t.
 
Integration Nation takes readers on a spirited and compelling cross-country journey, introducing us to the people challenging America’s xenophobic impulses by welcoming immigrants and collaborating with the foreign-born as they become integral members of their new communities. In Utah, we meet educators who connect newly arrived Spanish-speaking students and US-born English-speaking students, who share classrooms and learn in two languages. In North Carolina, we visit the nation’s fastest-growing community-development credit union, serving immigrants and US-born depositors and helping to lower borrowing thresholds and crime rates alike.
 
Giving a voice to people who choose integration over exclusion, who opt for open-heartedness instead of fear, Integration Nation is a desperately needed road map for a nation still finding its way beyond anti-immigrant hysteria to higher ground.
 
“This useful book provides models for civic organizations that want to tackle immigration challenges, and it paints a vivid picture of some real successes.” —Publishers Weekly
 
“Presents in discrete essays an array of compelling and persuasive regional efforts across the country . . . From Indiana to Georgia to Maine, these intelligent model programs should inspire others.” —Kirkus Reviews

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Author’s Note
• The Other Side of Immigration
• 1. Utah’s Bilingual Boon: A Red State Embraces Linguistic Diversity
• 2. Beyond Brotherly Love: Philadelphia’s Bet on Attracting and Retaining Immigrants Pays Off
• 3. Same New Struggle: Building a Better Southern Strategy in a Changing Mississippi
• 4. What Is Found in Translation? For Bilingual Interpreters, a Path Out of Poverty; for Medical Patients, an Amplified Voice
• 5. Reclamation Space, Reclaiming Lives: In Fort Wayne, Indiana, Immigrants and Refugees Inspire New Hope for an Old Building in a Transformed City
• 6. Wealth for Everyone: A North Carolina Credit Union Serves a Growing Immigrant Population and Creates a Safer, More Prosperous Community
• 7. We Are from Hazleton: A Baseball Celebrity Helps Bring His Divided Pennsylvania Hometown Together
• 8. Gardens Gone Global: In Boise, Idaho, Refugee Farmers Reconnect to the Land and Pass On Old Traditions in a New Place
• 9. Precisely This Patch of Earth: In America’s Heartland, Three Faiths Share Space, Build Relationships, and Create an International Model of Pluralism
• 10. Why Do We Need to Talk About Race So Much? Montgomery County, Maryland’s Educators and Parents Circle In on Culture, Bias, and Learning in Diverse and Changing Schools
• 11. Lifelines in Tough Times: In a Small Georgia City, Health Care Providers Respond to a Demographic Transformation and Create a Vital Community of Support
• 12. Stay Close to All Those Things: Children of the Somali Diaspora Find Their Way on Their Own Terms in America’s (Formerly) Whitest State
• A Way Forward for a Changing Nation
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author