Crossing National Boundaries: Social Identity Formation Among Recent Immigrant Women in Australia From Former Yugoslavia

Abstract

For both individuals and communities, crossing national boundaries involves managing personal and social identities in new social settings. This process is facilitated by social, cultural, and economic features of both the country of origin and the country of destination as well as the personal skills of the individuals who migrate. In-depth interviews with women in Australia from former Yugoslavia reveal how they draw ethnic boundaries and maintain a native ethnic identity in their private lives, partly in response to the difficulties they face in crossing other boundaries in Australian society, such as the labor market, educational institutions, and relationships with the Australia-born population. Women's previous and current socioeconomic status, and their ethnic and educational background, interplay in developing new identities in the new social setting that cannot be reduced to native ethnicity. In this article we deal with women's practices in their private lives that symbolize immigrants' identity formation within a given social context.