The Analysis Of West Indian Immigrants' Process Of Assimilation In Post-war America And Comparison With West Indians In Britain

This paper mainly analyses the West Indian immigrants' process of assimilation in America since World War II. It also compares with West Indian's assimilation in Britain at the same time, and then points out their differences and similar characteristics in terms of assimilation in two countries.The foreword introduces the situation of current research about the West Indian immigrants, summarizes briefly the relevant research of foreign academic communities; introduces the research approach and goal of this paper, defines and explains some main concepts.The paper is made up of four parts:Part one reviews the experience of West Indians who immigrated to America, the characteristic of immigrants and the mode of immigration, and explains the reasons of immigration from such angles as economy, politics, culture, history and reality, etc.Part two analyses the situation of West Indian immigrants' assimilation in America. Immigrants set up their ethnic communities, entered the labor market actively, changed their attitudes and became naturalized Americans, participated in politics actively. Meanwhile, their family income rises steadily. All these facts indicate that West Indian immigrants are being assimilated constantly.Part three describes the serious racial discrimination that West Indian immigrants encountered in America. It reflected not only in daily life, work, but in their living and educating segregation. Under the atmosphere of discrimination, the immigrants show a diversified trend of assimilation: the first generation of immigrants mainly insists on an immigrant identity of their home culture, and the second generation mainly insists on an ethnic identity or Afro-American identity.Part four discusses West Indian's experience of immigrating to Britain and their current situations of assimilation. Though they are in a marginalized position in the labor market of Britain, the trend of integration in politics and race is being strengthened constantly. There are several factors that determine West Indian immigrants' different process of assimilation in these two countries: the different characteristic of immigrants, the different race structure and race relation, and the different policies dealing with ethnic problem between America and Britain.The conclusion summarizes briefly the full paper, and draws some views on the assimilation of West Indian: first, West Indian immigrants will insist on a ethnic identity for along time in both countries; second, it displays a "triple identities" in West Indian immigrants' assimilation in America at present; third, becoming Afro-American is the prospect and direction of West Indian' assimilation in America.