Identity in an era of globalization and transnational migration: The discursive construction of identity of Israeli immigrant women

This dissertation explores the nature of identity constructions that occur when women undergo geographic and cultural dislocation due to immigration. It examines identity constructions from a theoretical perspective that conceptualizes identity as a discursive phenomenon. Identities, according to the discursive approach, are multiple, situational, unstable and conflictual, always in process and never complete. Individuals function in the context of multiple discourses that are available to them in a society, and identity construction occurs in relation to these discourses. This dissertation explores how Israeli women, as a particular group of immigrants to the United States, construct their identities in relation to and as a function of their engagement in the multiple discourses in their new social context. The transnational conceptual framework on migration is applied to Israeli immigrant women's identity constructions. The transnational framework considers Israeli immigrant women as part of an international migrant community whose networks, activities and patterns of life encompass both their host and home societies. The research questions posed in this study deal with identity constructions as they are revealed in the Israeli immigrant women's reports of their everyday experiences. The long interview method is used to answer the research questions.;This dissertation finds that, in the process of constructing and reconstructing their identities, Israeli immigrant women are playing new roles and opening up new "territories." They resist dominant ideologies by insisting on being acknowledged as an independent group of immigrants in the United States and by establishing and transforming social organizations. By their actions, the Israeli immigrant women link their Israeli-oriented activities to those of the larger American and Jewish populations and assert a particular group identity, which is a prime method of competing for power in a society.;This dissertation shows that these new identity constructions are facilitated by new communication networks. The women in this study use modern means of transportation and networks of communication to maintain their relationships with family and friends in Israel, 'stretching' social relations from a local context to a global one. In so doing, they replace the traditional notion of immigration as a "drastic" move with a more continuous one.