拒绝被同化的移民

文/威廉·布兰尼金 译/田虔虔 审订/钱多秀

拒绝被同化的移民

文/威廉·布兰尼金 译/田虔虔 审订/钱多秀

Night is falling on South Omaha2奥马哈是美国内布拉斯加州最大的工商业城市，是道格拉斯县的县治所在，临密苏里河岸。,and Maria Jacinto is patting tortillas33 tortilla墨西哥传统食物，玉米粉不发酵制作的薄饼，可以随意搭配配料、酱料食用。for the evening meal in the kitchen of the small house she shares with her husband and five children. Like many others in her neighborhood, where most of the residents are Mexican immigrants, the Jacinto household mixes the old country with the new.

[2] As Jacinto, who speaks only Spanish, stresses a need to maintain the family’s Mexican heritage, her eldest son, a bilingual 11-year-old who wears a San Francisco 49ers4又称旧金山淘金者队，是一支美国国家橄榄球联盟（NFL）球队，成立于1946年，曾五次赢得超级碗冠军。jacket and has a paper route, comes in and joins his brothers and sisters in the living room to watchThe Simpsons5《辛普森一家》是美国福克斯广播公司出品的一部动画情景喜剧，通过展现霍默、玛姬、巴特、丽莎和麦琪一家五口的生活，讽刺性地勾勒出了居住在美国心脏地带人们的生活方式。.

[3] In many ways, the experiences of the Jacinto family are typical of the gradual process of assimilation6assimilation吸收；接受。that has pulled generations of immigrants into the American mainstream. That process is nothing new to Omaha, which drew waves of Czech, German and Irish immigrants in the early 1900s.

[4] American culture remains a powerful force―for better or worse―that in fl uences people both here and around the world in countless ways. But several factors have combined in recent years to allow immigrants to resist, if they choose, the Americanization that had once been considered irresistible.

[5] In fact, the very concept of assimilation is being called into question as never before. Some sociologists argue that the melting pot7“熔炉”常被用来比喻美国、加拿大及巴西等异质性国家，拥有不同文化背景的移民“熔化”到这些国家的各个种族和民族，彼此渗透交流，最后同化形成一种新的、具备向心力的文化。often means little more than “Anglo conformity”8“盎格鲁化”是民族社会学的一个专业词汇，是指英国向北美移民开始实行的移民政策，即无论文化背景，无论国家，移民要想在美国生存，成为美国公民，就必须盎格鲁化，即使用英语、遵守盎格鲁-撒克逊传统规范、价值观、社会制度，这是由政府推行的、不间断的、完全的族群同化的过程。and that assimilation is not always a positive experience―for either society or the immigrants themselves. And with today’s emphasis on diversity and ethnicity, it has become easier than ever for immigrants to avoid the melting pot entirely.Even the metaphor itself is changing,having fallen out of fashion completely with many immigration advocacy9美国的移民支持团体多为非盈利组织，为移民提供咨询、手续办理等服务和帮助。and ethnic groups. They prefer such terms as the “salad bowl” and the “mosaic,”10相较于“熔炉”，“沙拉拼盘”和“拼花图案”喻指多元文化相互碰撞交流，但保留原有独立性和分离性，兼收并存，不以形成新文化为目的。metaphors that convey more of a sense of separateness in describing this nation of immigrants.

[6] Not only in Omaha but in immigrant communities across the country,there is a process often referred to as“segmented”11segmented分割的，分段的。assimilation, in which immigrants follow different paths to incorporation122 incorporation掺入，并入。in U.S. society. These range from the classic American ideal of blending into the vast middle class,to a “downward assimilation” into an adversarial13adversarial对立的；敌对的。underclass, to a buffered14buffer缓冲；缓和。integration into “immigrant enclaves15enclave飞地（某国或某市境内隶属外国或外市，具有不同宗教、文化或民族的领土）。.”Sometimes, members of the same family end up taking sharply divergent16divergent分歧的；背道而驰的。paths, especially children and their parents.

[7] The ambivalence177 ambivalence矛盾；两重性。of assimilation can cut both ways. Many native-born Americans also seem to harbor18harbor感到。mixed feelings about the process. As a nation,the United States increasingly promotes diversity, but there are underlying concerns that the more emphasis there is on the factors that set people apart, the more likely that society will end up di-vided.

[8] Recent data shows that Latinos has gone from just 7 million to the country’s biggest minority in just two generations. In many places, new Hispanic immigrants have tended to cluster19cluster群聚。in “niche” occupations20近年来美国工作市场日趋灵活、不稳定性增加，人口日益增长的西班牙裔移民多教育水平低、缺乏专业技艺，因此“适合”他们的职业多为低薪、无须高等专业技术或知识。, live in segregated neighborhoods and worship in separate churches.

[9] Their heavy concentrations21concentration密集度。in certain parts of the country, their relatively close proximity22proximity邻近。to their native lands and their sheer numbers give this wave of immigrants an unprecedented23unprecedented前所未有的；没有先例的。potential to change the way the melting pot traditionally has worked. In effect,that allows Mexican Americans to “perpetuate24perpetuate永远保持。themselves as a separate community and even strengthen their sense of separateness if they chose to, or felt compelled to,” said David M. Kennedy,a professor of American history at Stanford University.

[10] To be sure, assimilation today often follows the same pattern that it has for generations. The children of immigrants, especially those who were born in the United States or came here at a young age, tend to learn English quickly and adopt American habits.Often they end up serving as translators for their parents.

[11] But there are important differences in the way immigrants adapt these days, and the in fl uences on them can be double-edged25double-edged同时有好坏两方面影响的。. Gaps in income,education and poverty levels between new immigrants and the native-born are widening, and many of the newcomers are becoming stuck26stuck无法摆脱的。in dead-end27dead-end没有前途的。jobs with little upward mobility28upward mobility（个人、社会群体、阶层）向更高层社会的流动。.

[12] Previous waves of immigrants also arrived unskilled and poorly educated. Although the children of these low-income, poorly educated immigrants may grow up fluent in English,acquire more education than their parents and assimilate in other ways,research shows that “they will lag well behind other students, particularly in college attendance,” said Georges Vernez, director of the Center for Research on Immigration Policy at the RAND Corp29兰德公司是美国一家非盈利全球智库，先以为美国军队提供综合性战略研究及分析著称，继而又扩展到内外政策各方面，逐渐发展成为一个研究政治、军事、经济科技、社会等各方面的综合性思想库。. “Today, for instance,native-born Hispanic youths are 30 percent less likely to go on to college after high school and three times less likely to graduate from college than non-Hispanic white students.”

[13] Since the children of immigrants tend to adapt much faster than their par-ents, the result is often tension and divisions within families. Immigrants who arrive as adults to escape poverty tend to view their lives here as an improvement over what they left behind, but their children often compare their circumstances to those of other Americans and fi nd themselves lacking30lacking缺乏；不足。.

[14] Some gravitate31gravitate吸引。toward a growing gang culture32gang culture帮派文化。帮派（gang）是指一群互相认同的人组成的团体，有明确的领导和内部结构，通常在某一社区宣布主权，进行非法或暴力活动。帮派文化在崇尚自由的美国根深蒂固。that offers them an identity and an outlet for their alienation33alienation异化又称社会异化，是一个社会学概念，用来描述与社区、工作环境中的他人缺乏认同和融合的社会关系或个人心理状态。, according to researchers. In many cases, argues University of Nebraska sociologist Lourdes Gouveia, the problem is not a lack of assimilation to American culture, but too much of it.

[15] “An attachment34attachment依恋，一种表达喜爱或忠诚的情绪联系，存在于人与人之间或人与环境、团体之间。to one’s home country, culture and language can be very positive” for immigrant children in U.S. schools, contends Gouveia. These attachments “help maintain a sense of identity and self-respect when the family drops in status,” as often happens when foreigners immigrate. As a result, the Venezuelan-born Gouveia said, students who are the least “assimilated” often do better in school than other immigrants and sometimes top even the native born.

[16] The United States should not be abandoning a concept―the Melting Pot―that has served the country well for generations, helping to maintain unity through two world wars. The elaboration35elaboration详细阐述。of an American political culture that guarantees freedoms but also respects diversity is inevitably a challenge in an era when so many people of such different backgrounds are coming together.

[17] Noting the increased ethnic diversity in the United States and other advanced countries due to rising immigration, Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam said the consequence in the long run, “successful immigrant societies will create new, cross-cutting36cross-cut横切，交错；跨领域。forms of solidarity and more encompassing37encompass包含，包罗万象。identities and at the end we shall see that the challenge is best met not by making ‘them’ like ‘us,’ but rather by creating a new, more capacious38capacious气度宏大的。sense of ‘we.’” ■

夜幕降临，奥马哈南部一所小房子内，玛丽亚·哈辛托在厨房里为丈夫和五个孩子做晚餐要吃的玉米饼。这个社区大部分都是墨西哥移民，和他们一样，哈辛托一家融合了新老两种文明。

[2]哈辛托只会说西班牙语，她认为保持家里的墨西哥传统十分有必要。哈辛托的大儿子今年11岁，会说英语和西班牙语，身穿旧金山49人队T恤，平时给人送报纸，他走进客厅和弟弟妹妹们一起看《辛普森一家》。

[3]从很多方面来说，哈辛托一家的经历正是一代代移民逐渐融入美国主流社会的缩影。这对奥马哈这座城市来说已经不再新鲜，它从20世纪初以来就吸引了大批来自捷克、德国和爱尔兰的移民。

[4]美国文化依旧强势，且不论其好坏，它至少在方方面面影响着美国本土人民和世界其他国家的人们。美国化曾被视作不可抵挡，但是近年来由于多个因素的综合作用，移民们如果愿意的话，可以选择抗拒美国化。

[5]事实上，同化的概念现在正经受着前所未有的质疑。一些社会学家认为，（美式）熔炉基本等同于“盎格鲁化”，同化对社会或者移民自己来说也不一定总是好事。现今社会注重多样性和民族性，移民们和大熔炉完全划清界限比以往任何时候都容易。就连熔炉这个隐喻本身也在发生变化，它已经完全被众多移民支持组织和少数族裔群体所抛弃。他们现在更喜欢“沙拉拼盘”和“拼花图案”这样的叫法，因为描述起美国这个移民国家，这两个比喻更能传达一种分离感。

[6]不仅在奥马哈，遍布美国的移民社区都存在一种叫做“部分同化”的现象，在这个过程中，移民融入美国社会有不同的途径。有美国传统的最理想化途径，融入庞大的中产阶级；有“向下同化”，即发展为对立的底层阶级；还有所谓的缓冲融合，“移民飞地”。有时甚至一个家庭中不同成员都会遵循截然不同的途径，孩子和父母之间尤其如此。

[7]同化的矛盾可以有两种影响。许多本土出生的美国人对同化的态度也似乎是矛盾的。作为一个国家来说，美国越来越主张多样化，但是有人隐隐担忧，越是强调人们之间的差异性，整个社会最终就越有可能分裂。

[8]近期数据显示，拉美裔移民仅用了两代人的时间，就从原来的700万人口跃升为美国人数最多的少数族裔群体。在不少地方，来自拉丁美洲的新移民都倾向于群集到“对口”的行业，住在本族群社区，去单独的教堂礼拜。

[9]这些新移民在美国一些地区高度聚集，与自己的家乡离得很近，且人数庞大，有可能改变大熔炉传统运作模式，而这在之前是不可能的。事实上，这种现状使得墨西哥裔美国人现在可以“把自己固化为独立的团体，如果愿意或者感到必须的话，甚至可以借此强化自己的分离感”，斯坦福大学美国历史学教授戴维·M.肯尼迪这样说道。

[10]可以确定的是，今天的同化模式，与几代以来一直延续的模式基本相同。移民的子女，尤其是生在美国或者幼时就来到美国的那些孩子，一般短时间内就可以掌握英语，养成美式习惯。很多情况下，他们成了自己父母的翻译。

[11]但是如今移民适应美国社会的方式发生了重要的改变，这些改变对移民的影响有利有弊。新移民和本土美国人在收入、教育和贫困水平方面的差距在扩大，许多新移民摆脱不了毫无前途的工作，这些工作几乎没有升迁的机会。

[12]之前的几批移民还欠缺技能，受教育水平也较低。这些移民的收入和教育水平低下，尽管他们的孩子可能说着流利的英语长大，比父母受到更多的教育，并以其他方式融入了美国社会，但兰德公司移民政策研究中心主任乔治斯·韦内兹称，研究表明，“移民子女远远落后于其他学生，尤其是在大学入学率方面。例如，当前美国本土出生的拉美族裔青年高中毕业后进入大学学习的机率比非拉美族裔白人学生低30%，大学毕业率也只有他们的三分之一。”

[13]移民子女的适应速度总是比父母快，结果常常造成家庭内部的紧张和分歧。在移民美国以逃避贫困的成人看来，他们在美国的生活比在老家好，但是他们的孩子经常对比自己与其他美国人的生活，觉得自身有所匮乏。

[14]研究者称，有些孩子受到日益滋长的帮派文化吸引，企图从其中找到认同、发泄被异化的情绪。内布拉斯加大学社会学家洛德斯·戈维亚称，很多情况下，问题不在于他们没有充分融入美国文化，而是在于融入过深。

[15]戈维亚说，对美国校园里的移民子女来说，“对祖国、祖国文化和母语的依恋其实是件好事。”外国移民经常会面临家庭社会地位的下降，“这些依恋可以使他们保持自我认同和自尊”。戈维亚出生于委内瑞拉，她说，“同化程度”最低的学生通常比其他移民学生在校表现要好，有时还会优于美国本土学生。

[16]“大熔炉”的概念已经盛行了几代人的时间，使美国经历两次世界大战始终团结统一，不应该被摈弃。美国政治文化保证人民自由，同样也尊重多样性。当今时代，背景如此不同的人们汇聚在一起，如何阐述这种文化不可避免地成为一个挑战。

[17]由于移民趋势上升，美国及其他发达国家的民族多样性日益加强。哈佛大学政治科学家罗伯特·帕特南谈及其长期影响：“成功的移民社会创造出新的相互影响的团结形式以及更具包容性的认同感，最终我们将看到，面对挑战，最好的方法不是让‘他们’像‘我们’，而是创造全新的、内涵更丰富的‘我们’。” □

（译者单位：北京航空航天大学外国语学院）

Immigrants Shunning1Idea of Assimilation

ByWilliam Branigin

1 shun避开；排斥。