1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910817525703321

Autore

Gu Chien-Juh

Titolo

The Resilient Self : Gender, Immigration, and Taiwanese Americans / / Chien-Juh Gu

Pubbl/distr/stampa

New Brunswick, NJ : , : Rutgers University Press, , [2018]

©2017

ISBN

0-8135-8608-9

0-8135-8607-0

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (198 pages) : illustrations, tables

Collana

Asian American Studies Today

Disciplina

305.40951249

Soggetti

Resilience (Personality trait) in women

Sex role - United States

Women - United States - Identity

Women - Taiwan - Identity

Immigrant women - United States - Social conditions

Taiwanese Americans - Social conditions

Taiwan Emigration and immigration Psychological aspects

United States Emigration and immigration Psychological aspects

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Contents -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Immigration, Culture, Gender, and the Self -- 3. Searching for Self in the New Land -- 4. Negotiating Egalitarianism -- 5. Performing Confucian Patriarchy -- 6. Fighting for Dignity and Respect -- 7. Suffering and the Resilient Self -- Appendix: Demographic Information of Subjects -- Acknowledgments -- Notes -- References -- Index -- About the Author

Sommario/riassunto

The Resilient Self explores how international migration re-shapes women's senses of themselves. Chien-Juh Gu uses life-history interviews and ethnographic observations to illustrate how immigration creates gendered work and family contexts for middle-class Taiwanese American women, who, in turn, negotiate and resist the social and psychological effects of the processes of immigration and settlement.  



Most of the women immigrated as dependents when their U.S.-educated husbands found professional jobs upon graduation. Constrained by their dependent visas, these women could not work outside of the home during the initial phase of their settlement. The significant contrast of their lives before and after immigration-changing from successful professionals to foreign housewives-generated feelings of boredom, loneliness, and depression. Mourning their lost careers and lacking fulfillment in homemaking, these highly educated immigrant women were forced to redefine the meaning of work and housework, which in time shaped their perceptions of themselves and others in the family, at work, and in the larger community.