Beyond Expectations

Onoso Imoagene

• Publisher: University of California Press
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9780520292314
• eBook ISBN: 9780520965881
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Emigration & Immigration
• Index: Social Sciences

In Beyond Expectations, OnosoImoagenedelves into the multifaceted identities of second-generation Nigerian adults in the United States and Britain. She argues that they conceive of an alternative notion of "black" identity that differs radically from African American and Black Caribbean notions of "black" in the United States and Britain.Instead of considering themselves in terms of their country of destination alone, second-generation Nigerians define themselves in complicated ways that balance racial status, a diasporic Nigerian ethnicity, a pan-African identity, and identification with fellow immigrants. Based on over 150 interviews, Beyond Expectations seeks to understand how race, ethnicity, and class shape identity and how globalization, transnationalism, and national context inform sense of self.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 Setting the Context: Immigration, Assimilation versus Racialization, and the African and Nigerian Diasporas in the United States and Britain
• 2 “You Are Not Like Me!”: The Impact of Intraracial Distinctions and Interethnic Relations on Identity Formation
• 3 “It’s Un-Nigerian Not to Go to College”: Education as an Ethnic Boundary
• 4 Forging a Diasporic Nigerian Ethnicity in the United States and Britain
• 5 On the Horns of Racialization: Middle Class, Ethnic, and Black
• 6 Feeling American in America, Not Feeling British in Britain
• Conclusion
• Appendix A: Notes on Method
• Appendix B: Ethnic Identification Information
• Notes
• References
• Index