A Place to Call Home
(2 votes, average: 5 out of 5)June 10, 2009 by Sarah Blaskovich
The success of women immigrants is ‘remarkable,’ according to a new study.
When women immigrants come to America—“the land of opportunity”—a new study shows that their journeys are laced with unforeseen challenges. And still, these women often emerge more resilient, potentially more business savvy and more nurturing to their families, according to inferred statistics released in May 2009 by New America Media (NAM).
“They came to the United States seeking a better life for their children,” says Kimberly Greder, an associate professor at Iowa State University whose studies focus upon Latino immigrants. “They came to the United States out of desperation. Many of the mothers are now happy they are here—they see the economic and education opportunities for their children. In some instances, [they experience] increased safety and a healthier environment for their children to grow up in.”
Women immigrants also often have a different perspective on what it takes to succeed, and some arrive ready to roll up their sleeves and do whatever it takes to provide for their families and escape the economic hardships back home. And further, most do it with selflessness: 50 percent say they come to help their children find success; 18 percent say they come to keep their families intact; 17 percent say they want to make money to take care of their families. (The remaining 15 percent cited “other,” which isn’t measurable.) The focus, the study finds, is that women immigrants work to help others succeed—thus, making them feel successful.
“This journey has activated women,” says Sandy Close, executive director of NAM. “Women immigrants reveal that they came to America not in search of streets paved with gold—making money was surprisingly low on their list of priorities—but because they saw the United States as a place to build better futures for their children and to make permanent homes for their families.”
Building a New Life
For Rwanda immigrant Louise Uwacu, an escape to North America saved her from the genocide she witnessed in the mid-1990s. She remembers it with hesitation: “One day, I was a teenager doing all the crazy, stupid things young people do. Then boom. One day, we started hearing bombs. When we could, we left the city, and I saw bodies and bodies all along the road. It is only when you come out of Rwanda that you realize how many more bodies there must have been on all the other streets in which we did not pass through.”
She landed in Montreal, Canada, in 1998, with $30 in her pockets. “I came for the American dream,” she says. “I had never heard of the Canadian dream, so it never crossed my mind to separate my destiny from that of all North America.” She says the strife in Rwanda and the opportunities presented in North America pushed her to do anything she imagined possible. She recently authored a book called The Nightmare of a POSITIVISION, which recounts her struggle and shows why success was her only option.
“I wrote the book to find a way to make my life not be about genocide,” she says. “[It’s about] what I have become and what I intend to do for our world to compensate for all the atrocities my people have shown you.”
Improved Life Skills
The study by NAM shows that women, many like Uwacu, have become more assertive at home and in public since arriving to new ground. Also, Greder’s research shows that many women immigrants—Latinos specifically, from her research—make home ownership an important goal. And through it all, 90 percent of all immigrant women, according to NAM, have kept their families intact. (In comparison, about one-third of families already in the United States are single-parent households.)
The findings show that women have achieved lofty goals in America, and their success is “remarkable.” The influx of immigrants who have started their own businesses is also growing, Greder’s experiences show. The migration to a new land has brought women to the forefront of financial and familial decision-making, thus creating an extremely empowered female group.
“Women are the key figures in determining whether or not the new immigrant populations will find themselves [both literally and figuratively] ‘at home’ in the American city in a lasting way,” according to the report. “Women immigrants, clearly, have much to teach and much to offer the country where they seek to make a family home.”
Why Women Immigrants Come to the United States
A recent study indicates that all of the reasons women said they immigrated to the United States are generally positive ones—regardless of ethnicity or age.
38%: To join family members already in the United States
22%: To make a better life for their children
17%: To get a job and make money
7%: To pursue a higher education
5%: To get asylum as a political refugee
5%: To be able to send money home to my family
2%: To become an American citizen
SOURCE: Women Immigrants: Stewards of the 21st Century Family, a February 2009 study by New America Media. In the data above, the percentage points equal 96 percent. The responses from the remaining 4 percent of interviewees weren’t available.
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