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Cited by 18Migration, Refugees, and IntegrationRacial and Ethnic Identity ResearchDiaspora, migration, transnational identity

Economic Americanness and defensive inclusion: social location and young citizens’ conceptions of national identity

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Warikoo, Natasha, Bloemraad, Irene·2018·Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies
DOI 10.1080/1369183x.2017.1329006
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Abstract

What does it mean to be ‘American’? Drawing on in-depth interviews with 76 undergraduates attending elite universities and 72 teenaged citizen children of immigrants living in mostly low-income households, we identify understudied economic narratives of Americanness: as future-oriented economic opportunities for elite undergraduates or stratified notions of current economic condition among immigrant-origin teens. We also find, depending on social location, that economic notions of Americanness overlap with other boundaries: whiteness for some immigrant-origin youth, and civic membership for elite undergraduates. Elite students place themselves at the centre of Americanness; immigrant-origin youth, even though they are U.S. citizens, sometimes place themselves outside these symbolic boundaries. Still, youth in more disadvantaged social locations sometimes appropriate markers of Americanness in strategies of what we call ‘defensive inclusion’, employing symbolic boundaries of hard work, multiculturalism and birthplace to contest perceived social boundaries of race and class that might exclude them from the core of ‘Americanness’. Our findings suggest that researchers should include measures of economic national identity in future survey-based work and examine discursive practices of defensive inclusion in fieldwork.

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  • Racial self-identification aligning with majority racial identity becomes a resource for affective and sociolegal benefits; misaligning becomes an additional barrier to claiming inclusion and accessing rights and services.

    “In this sense, racial self-identification, when it aligns with a country's majority group's racial identity, can become a resource for accessing affective and sociolegal benefits; conversely, when it misaligns with majority identities, it becomes an additional barrier to claiming inclusion and accessing rights and services (Karimi and Wilkes 2024;Warikoo and Bloemraad 2018).”

    From Wages of whiteness contra refugee in the twenty-first century: Afghan and Ukrainian women’s self-identification as (non)refugees in Canada (2026) · cites this paper as Warikoo and Bloemraad 2018

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Authors
Warikoo, N., & Bloemraad, I.
Affiliations
  • Harvard University (US)
  • University of California, Berkeley (US)
Corresponding author
Warikoo, Natasha
ORCID
Venue
Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies
Publisher
Informa UK Limited
Published
2017-05-24
Volume
44
Issue
5
Pages
736-753
ISSN
  • 1369-183X (ISSN-L)
  • 1469-9451
DOI
10.1080/1369183x.2017.1329006
OpenAlex
W2620486973
Cited by
18
References
51
Citations by year
2026: 1 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 2 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 3 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 1 · 2017: 1
FWCI
2.80
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
cc-by
Locations
  • Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies (publishedVersion)
  • Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) (Harvard University) (submittedVersion)
  • Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) (Harvard University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
Funders
  • Harvard University Milton Fund
  • Russell Sage Foundation
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Migration, Refugees, and Integration
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Racial and Ethnic Identity Research
  • Social Sciences › Demography › Diaspora, migration, transnational identity
Keywords
Americanness, national identity, immigrant children, youth citizenship, social location, whiteness, social boundaries, race and class, multiculturalism, birthplace, immigrant youth, low-income households

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