9406485 Lamphere This project involves the dissertation research of a student of cultural anthropology from the University of New Mexico. The student will conduct an ethnographic study of Salvadoran immigrants to the US, living in Los Angeles. The question is to understand how migrants use new concepts of ethnicity -- as Latinos in an Anglo-Saxon country, and as Salvadorans -- when their political identity is local in their home country -- to construct their political identities and mobilize support, often transnational, to sustain productive and meaningful lives. The techniques used consist of ethnographic participant observation, and formal interviews of immigrants to understand these transplanted individuals relations to and understandings of the national state. This research is important because transnationalism is a dominant fact of our world. Increased understanding of how people change their identities, and construct new political identities to establish lives in new places and maintain connections with their home places can help us design programs to ameliorate problems and facilitate positive adjustment. The basic question is important -- understanding how Salvadorans living in the US adopt Salvadoran nationalism (missing to a large extent at home) and Latino ethnicity as coping mechanisms to help develop successful lives in the US will be valuable.
