Mary Caraway

I see immigrants as falling into various categories, each determined by what motivated them to travel to America.  Some leave their homeland to escape political tyranny or for economic advancement.   I plan to research William Bradford and his fellow “Pilgrims.”  What made them leave their Old World was a freedom they desperately longed for; freedom to worship their God according to the dictates of their hearts.  I will describe their history in England and their unique immigrant experience in the New World.  In my research, I will look for their experiences with “culture shock” and what the assimilation process was like for them.

Jason K. Collins

For my research report I would like to do it on the author Anzia Yezierska.  After reading soap and water for the class assignment, I jumped ahead and read the book bread givers and could not put it down until I finished it.  I was very moved by her story of overcoming adversity not only in society but by her tyrannical father.  In addition it is a great story that shows not only how immigrant children can overcome obstacles in their path, but it also is great for female empowerment.

Alana Elkins

Rhonda Fisher

I am interested in researching the settling patterns of early American immigrants in a specific state, region or location. For instance, Fredericksburg, Texas is known for its German ancestry and Miami, Florida is known for its Cuban ties. I would like to research a specific geographic area (to be decided – ideas?) in an attempt to discover the “immigrant history” of the area and the culture that results from a specific group or mix of immigrants. I would also like to investigate what attracted these immigrant groups to certain areas.

Ashley Fonteno

For my research report I would like to look at the literature of Anzia Yezierska. This would include a review of works including, Bread Givers and Soap and Water, a career review and bibliography. I would like to do this report because after reading some of her work I was impressed with the immigrant narrative. Yezierska raises questions like, is it ok for the immigrant to simply assimilate? Should we all as humans have the same rights and benefits regardless to ethnic background? Is it ok to discriminate on any level and if so what? I hope that by this I can get a better understanding of her immigrant narrative and some of the hardships that immigrants endured in the new America.

Tami Gilley

I would like to do my research over the author Bharati Mukherjee, a National Book Critics’ Circle Award winner born in Calcutta, who offers a unique perspective on both the opportunities and disillusionments experienced as an arriving immigrant in the United States.

Andrina Giusti

My paper proposal is about the generations that are now living in the United States who are close to their cultural values, but also have been working and living professionally here. With a generation of young adults who have parents who may be professional and stable Americans with an equal embrace to their cultural roots, my paper would explore the ways in which the children who live and work in the United States and have cultural parents who are balanced, react when they want to marry or how they have reacted to interracial or intercultural unions. For example Vietnamese and Chinese, Indian and Persian, Caribbean and European, Puerto Rican and African-American. I would like this topic because it will be the choice I will explore when I have children and decide to marry interracially. My parents are interracial themselves, and each of them are strongly balanced in their cultural origins. I would like to explore the lives of some other youth my age or older, who have married interracially or interculturally and how parents have reacted to these multi-ethnic unions, within American culture.

Christina Holmes

To examine the reasons why people of color, mainly African Americans, chose to “pass,” and or consider themselves as “other.”  

Ashley Kauppi

I would like to do my research report on Native Americans because that is part of my heritage. I want to look at the struggles they have faced as a minority to overcome the dominant culture, the government, and also their own struggles as a people to gain a voice of their own.

Lindsey Kerckhoff

I would like to write about how Syrian Jews choose to assimilate.  I recently read an article I mentioned in class about how they refuse to let their children marry outside or their group and it made me really want to learn more about them.  I would like to focus on the ones living in America. 

Julie Matuszczak

I am interested in researching the works and career of Polish writer Czeslaw Milosz.  I have learned that he is a Nobel Laureate and the fact that he is from the same ethnic group greatly intrigues me.  I will do a career review and bibliography of his works in hopes to find relevance in the achievements of a Polish man to that of my aspirations.

Mallory Rogers

For my research report I would like to look in to the different ways of celebrating Hispanic History Month.  I want to mainly focus on the month’s festivities, rituals, and celebrations, and possible even some of the Mexican writers that have greatly contributed (and still do) to the culture.

Donna Shotwell

I’m interested on doing a report on Canadian immigrants coming to America. The immigrants mostly French decent coming from Quebec in the 19^th century. I know little about Canada and am intrigued to learn more about its people.

Tanya Stanley

Gregory Orfalea descends from the first Arab family who immigrated to the United States.  I would like to research his memoirs and determine if he feels like he represents an immigrant or a minority within America.  One of Orfalea’s short stories, “The Chandelier,” appears in Imagining America:  Stories from the Promised Land.  I have close friends from the Middle East, and I want a sense of their challenges of coming to America.  Since 9/11, I have felt a surge of minority status placed upon Middle-Eastern immigrants and I would like to learn if Orfalea felt he was rejected or accepted by the dominant culture, and I would like to learn what Orfalea’s choices were in accepting or declining the dominant culture.

Robin Tupa

I have chosen to do my research on the author Diane di Prima. Ms. di Prima is a second generation American of Italian descent. She is the author of thirty-two books of poetry and prose. I have chosen her as my topic because we both share the same Italian background.

Cheryl Voskamp

Research Proposal: Indian American women and immigration

            I would like to learn more about the Indian American woman’s experience as an immigrant in the United States.  I read an essay by Santha Rama Rau, “By Any Other Name,” in which she and her sister were mistreated (through name changes and instruction) in the “Anglo-Indian day school” they attended in Zorinabad, India, and it has made me curious to know if the same treatment is a common experience when Indian women come to the U. S.  I plan on initially researching Indian American women authors of short stories, then moving on to look for articles and essays written about the experience.

Tiffany Watson-Mynatt

I want to study the stories told by immigrants that leave their country by military or political force. I want to look at their reactions to the new world and see if they differ from those who come here by choice. The family in “The Visitors” faces possible imprisonment if they remaining Cuba, so they come to the United States. Jewish immigrants faced death. Are there others like these? Are they treated like minorities?

Ashley Webb

For my report I plan on researching Japanese immigrants and the affect of the Pearl Harbor bombing and World War II on these immigrants and even the American-born Japanese. I believe this relates to the treatment of the Middle Eastern culture in America (though this isn’t quite as extreme) after 9/11 and I would like to examine how the old and new cultures react in situations like these. I think Americans fear which side these immigrants and citizens will take, the new country or the old.

Rita Zelaya

I’d like to further explore the problems faced by people living in that in-between stage of the immigrant and minority narrative. Moreover, I’d like to find specific examples of how society pressures them to pick one of the established “boxes” to identify themselves.