A Better Way of Looking at Immigrant Assimilation [PSMag.com]

Last Sunday’s massacre at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, by a gunman who pledged incoherent loyalty to extremist groups in the Middle East, has re-energized our discussion of the cultural status of Muslims in the United States. Donald Trump struck again last Tuesday with broad generalizations against Muslim Americans, telling Fox News that among second- and third-generation Muslim immigrants, “for some reason there’s no real assimilation.” (On Sunday, Trump went further, calling for racial profilingof Muslim Americans.)

“Assimilation” is a thorny term to define, and looking only at how strongly Muslim Americans identify with their national heritage ignores the other side of the coin: the extent to which Muslims, as cultural minorities, may be excluded in American life. Vox has highlighted data indicating that Muslims in the U.S. identify strongly as Americans, rather than primarily or exclusively as Muslims, to establish that U.S. Muslims are, in fact, well-assimilated. Relying on that comparison for a complete picture of assimilation is problematic; given rising Islamophobia that equates “Muslim” with “un-American,” the question of American identity sometimes demands impossible choices between heritage and nationality. In such an environment, navigating between Muslim roots and daily American life can befraught.

[For more of this story, written by Elena Gooray, go to https://psmag.com/a-better-way...775db28bb#.87oa9la0r]