The Second Generation in the U.S. and U.K.: Identity Work among Adults of Nigerian Descent

This dissertation examines the impact of race on the life experiences and social outcomes among second generation adults of Nigerian descent in the U.S. and the U.K. Using data from 150 semi-structured in-depth interviews, (75 in each country) the following questions are addressed: 1) How does the educational and occupational attainment of the second generation compare to their parents? (2) What are their ethnic identities? (3) What are their relations like with their proximal hosts, African-Americans in the U.S. and Black-Caribbeans in the U.K.?;In both countries, the adult second generation of Nigerian descent in this sample are solidly middle and upper class, with no evidence of downward mobility vis a vis their parents. In both countries, subjects reported tensions with their proximal hosts African-Americans in the U.S. and Black-Caribbeans in the U.K., mostly when they were children, adolescents, and teenagers. This laid the foundation of intra-black ethnic diversity and the articulation of ethnic difference now that they are adults. Interviews reveal an ethnic core among my subjects that is impervious to ethnic labels and is cross-national and which has "consequential commonality." Over time and in adulthood middle class status blurs the ethnic boundaries between my subjects and their proximal hosts.;Second generation Nigerians in the U.S. were much more likely to adopt an American identity than their counterparts were to adopt a British identity. These differences are explained with reference to each country's history which includes colonialism, slavery, black civil rights, its racial and ethnic arrangements, the racial and ethnic diversity of its population, its social construction of the proximal host, its approach to dealing with its ethnic and racially diverse population, and its antidiscrimination laws.