Nations Unbound

This work examines an increasing trend in migration - transnationalism. Immigrants today are no longer rooted in one location. By building transnational social networks, economic alliances and political ideologies, they are able to cross the geographic and cultural boundaries of both their countries of origin and of settlement. Through ethnographic studies of immigrant populations from St Vincent, Grenada, Haiti and the Philippines to the United States, the authors aim to demonstrate that transnationalism is something other than expanded nationalism. They argue that by placing immigrants in a limbo between the settler and visitor, transnationalism challenges the concepts of citizenship and nationhood.

"This is an exciting book because it deals with a major issue of our times that is yet only poorly understood. Our authors show how transmigrants link their home countries with the countries of their sojourns, how this changes the state of affairs in both, and how we are all caught up in these changes. By looking closely at the lives of particular populations, the authors are able to illuminate important shifts and changes in the world. At the same time, they speak to issues of race, ethnicity, gender and class, and significantly alter the ways we understand them."

Linda Basch is director. National Council for Research on Women. Nina Glick Schiller is associate professor of anthropology, University of New Hampshire and academic editor of the Journal Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power. Cristina Szanton Blanc is senior research associate at the Southern Asian Institute, International Affairs Columbia University and author of the Gordon and Breach title Urban Children in Distress: Global Predicaments and Innovative Strategies (1994).