Racial and religious contexts: Situational identities among Lebanese and Somali Muslim immigrants

Racial and religious contexts:

Situational identities among Lebanese

and Somali Muslim immigrants

Kristine J. Ajrouch and Abdi M. Kusow

Abstract

This study addresses the racial and religious contexts of identityformation among Lebanese immigrants to the United States of Americaand Somali immigrants to Canada. Each enters with a different racialstatus: Lebanese as white; Somalis as black/visible minority. Ethno-graphic interviews explore the strategies of adaptation and identitydevelopment within these groups. Specifically, we compare and contrastthe Lebanese and Somali experience through an analysis of ethnicrelations in the country of origin, the conditions of immigration, andthrough accounts of their encounters and identity negotiation with thehost society. We demonstrate the strategies each group implements tonegotiate both race and religion in identity development. Our findingsreveal that each group attempts to make their religious identity evident,however, Somali immigrants must negotiate the effects of ‘othering’processes with both race and religion, while Lebanese immigrants build areligious identity from privileges afforded to them by virtue of their whiteracial status.

Keywords: Immigration; identity; Lebanese; Somali; Muslim; race.

Introduction

Immigration to both the United States and Canada has shifted overthe years, particularly since the mid-1960s so that the greater majorityoriginates from Latin America, Asia, and Africa (Bureau of UnitedStates Census 1997; Peak and Ray 2001; Baines 2002). Moreover, ashift in religious diversity among immigrants, most notably an increasein Muslims, has occurred so that ‘otherness’ emerges on both racialand religious grounds. The purpose of this article is to explore howMuslim immigrants, originating from two different cultural and

Ethnic and Racial Studies Vol. 30 No. 1 January 2007 pp. 72�94

# 2007 Taylor & FrancisISSN 0141-9870 print/1466-4356 onlineDOI: 10.1080/01419870601006553

‘racial’ backgrounds, negotiate identity in both the United States andCanada. An examination of the intersection between racial andreligious identities among Muslims migrating from Lebanon andSomalia provides a novel opportunity to examine how the linesbetween race and ethnicity blur as immigrants negotiate their identitiesin their respective host countries.

An increasing number of scholars over the past two decades haveacknowledged the role of technology and ease of travel as consequen-tial to the immigrant experience. They have described the immigrantexperience as one that involves maintaining cultural, economic andsocial ties to the homeland society. This approach, known astransnationalism (Basch, Glick-Schiller and Szanton Blanc 1994;Malkki 1995; Matsuoka and Sorenson 2001), introduces homelandties as a key component to the immigrant adaptation process in thehost country. We build on this paradigm by providing an empiricalinstance that illustrates how the interactions between religion and raceon the one hand, and homeland and host context on the other,represent critical variables in delineating the processes through whichMuslim immigrants live through the adaptation process. While somerecent research has examined the connection between identities andtransnational migration (Al-Haj 2002; Mittelberg and Borschevsky2004), a comparative assessment of how identity emerges amongMuslim immigrants, and perhaps more critically how it shifts inrelation to the homeland, represents an area in need of examination.

Race and immigration

One way to understand the situational and negotiated nature of racialidentities is to examine how a normative racial stratification systempatterns the process of immigrant assimilation (Sorenson 1991; Bashiand Mcdonald 1997). Historically, the assimilation of immigrantgroups has been articulated in terms of their degree of closeness toand distance from certain cultural, physical, and moral ideals. Thoseperceived as nearer to white cultural ideals were assumed to assimilateto whiteness, while those who are culturally and physically distinctfrom whiteness were assumed to assimilate to blackness, or some othernon-white category. This process of othering, according to Ong (1996,p. 751) ‘emerges in a range of mechanisms that variously subject non-white immigrants to whitening and blackening processes that indicatethe degree of their closeness to or distance from the ideal whitestandards.’ In order to show how the process of blackening andwhitening works, Ong provides ethnographic data that demonstratethe ways in which class informs the process of racialization byillustrating how poor welfare dependent Vietnamese immigrants areblackened while affluent Hong Kong Chinese are whitened.

Lebanese & Somali Muslim immigrants 73

One example where the process of whitening and blackening is notcompletely understood is revealed by the experience of South Asianimmigrants to the U.S. (Kibria 1996), where they do not know whichcategory they fit into and as such become ‘ambiguous whites’ (p. 79).Another example involves Ethiopian immigrants to Canada. Sorenson(1991) illustrates how, upon immigration, Ethiopians face tenserelations with those of Jamaican ancestry because they do not readilyaccept a black identity, preferring to identify with their national origin.Furthermore, Ethiopians encounter an official governmental policy inCanada that does not address social and economic needs of specificcultural or ethnic subcultures, instead opting to ‘keep all Africanstogether’. While Canada approaches its diverse population with amulticultural outlook, still prevalent are notions about a blackidentity, assumed to include any group with dark skin, regardlesswhether national origins are from Jamaica or from Ethiopia (Sorenson1991). These instances indicate that race must be simultaneouslyunderstood as a social construction (e.g. Nagel 1994), and as animportant organizing principle of social relations in North America,maintained through the competitive interactions between state agen-cies and minority groups agitating for social change (Omi and Winant1986, 1994). In other words, race is both a structuring and culturalforce in society, shaping interactions as well as being shaped byindividual/group agency. Race categories are unstable and fluctuating.While ideas of race structure individual experiences and interactions,definitions of race are also subject to renegotiations, drawingsimultaneously from present day and historical predicaments.

A key issue to consider in any discussion of race and acculturation isthe definition of whiteness. In the U.S., it is an identity that includesboth physical characteristics and ideological premises to designatesuperiority in relation to the ‘other’ (Cornell and Hartmann 1998;Lewis 2002). In Canada, whiteness represents ‘an implicit (andfrequently explicit) norm around which belonging is constructed’(Peake and Ray 2001, p. 180). While Canada has officially adopted amulticultural policy, Peake and Ray suggest that it is neverthelessframed by ‘. . . white culture . . . which dominates in terms of social,economic and political power,’ (p. 182) and therefore insufficientlyaddresses matters of systematic racism.

Similarly, blackness is also at the very basic level derived fromphysical characteristics and is delegated to any person of known blackAfrican descent with the implication that a ‘single drop of black blood’makes a person black (Davis 1991, p. 41). While immigrants to Canadamay deny affiliation with a black identity, Canadians, both black andwhite, resent those recent African immigrants who do not identify assuch (Sorenson 1991). In reality, the meaning of blackness is a variablephenomenon that has been determined by the different socio-cultural

74 Kristine Ajrouch & Abdi Kusow

and historical moments that defined and continue to define the natureof racial categories (Gordon and Anderson, 1999).

Below we provide a conceptual model to illustrate the various waysin which race and religion intersect to produce minority and majoritystatus in both the homeland and host country.

Conceptual framework

Some forty years ago, Gregory Stone (1962) proposed that identity isnot a property of individuals but of social relationships. Critical to thisnotion is the extent of identity validation, which Stone regarded as thebasis upon which consensual roles are enacted. In his scheme,identities are established when identity announcements (informationgiven by persons about who they are) correspond to identityplacements (categories that others place the person in). The degreeof correspondence between these two can range from total lack of fitbetween announcements and placements, resulting in identity invali-dation and role enactment confusion to total fit between announce-ments and placements, resulting in complete consensus. In this scheme,therefore, identities are variable, ranging from stable and enduring tounstable and transient, and because they are information-dependentare always constructed and potentially negotiable.

We draw from Stone’s general formulations of identity transactionsto join current debates about immigration, race, and religion in ourresearch on Lebanese Muslim immigrants to the U.S. and SomaliMuslim immigrants to Canada. For both immigrant groups Islamconstitutes an integral force in their originating country, organizingsocial life. While not always consciously referenced, it exists as animplicit element of everyday life and shapes the nature of dailyinteractions. However, Islam does not exist as an automatic presence inthe U. S. or Canada, both of which are known as ‘Christian’ countries.Those who are Muslim in North America must engage in identitywork to ensure legitimate recognition. On the other hand, racerepresents a pervasive organizing mechanism in both countries. Assuch, while classifying individuals strictly on the basis of physicalappearance can become complicated, in most cases whether onebelongs to the majority group or that of the minority, s/he has noneed to assert her/himself, rather it becomes readily apparent. In fact,both the U. S. and Canada collect official data on race through theirnational census (Darden and Kamel 2000), a legal and governmentsanctioned identity category that does not exist in either Lebanon orSomalia.

Ultimately, we address a question of identity salience (Stryker 1968).Our research question is informed by the contention that identityformation is simultaneously engendered by the social and racial


conditions in which immigrants come from as well as those theyencounter in their host environments. In other words, we argue thatidentities not only emerge from the social and racial boundaries thatdefine a majority/minority status in the host country, but they alsoreflect those in the homeland environment. Table 1 presents a matrixof situational identities, the conceptual framework that displayscriteria by which identities and the resulting social status emerges inboth the homeland and host country. In particular we compare andcontrast the situation of Lebanese immigrants to the U.S. and Somaliimmigrants to Canada.

Both Lebanese and Somali immigrants occupied an identity basedon religious characteristics in their homelands. Religious affiliationsignifies a minority social status for the Muslim Shi’a in Lebanon,while for the Somalis religious indicators of identity position them asmembers of the majority culture. However, upon immigration thenature of identity markers shifts in that race becomes a keydimension by which identity placements occur. Social status defini-tions become inverted so that while the Shi’a held a minority statusin their country of origin, they claim dominant group status by virtueof their placement in the ‘white’ racial category once they immigrateto the United States. A similar process occurs with regard to Somaliimmigrants to Canada. They occupied the status of dominant societymembers by virtue of their religious characteristics in Somalia;however, immigration to Canada places their cultural characteristicsin the realm of the ‘visible minority’ category, which implicitlyincludes race as a key element in that designation. While character-istics based on culture/religion contribute to identity placements inCanada, racial categories introduce another level to the matrix ofidentity and become a principal means by which Somali immigrantsenter a minority status in contrast to their dominant group positionin Somalia.

Table 1. Situational Identities

Lebanese Immigrants Somali Immigrants

United States Canada

Identities Homeland Host Homeland Host

Religion Yes No Yes YesRacial No Yes No Yes

Social Status Minority Majority Majority Minority


Data and methods

Description of the studies

The dimensions of situational identities reported here were derivedfrom two-independently conducted qualitative studies (see Ajrouch1997, 1999, 2000 and Kusow 1998, 2003, 2004, for a detaileddiscussion of methods and substantive findings). Study 1 wasconducted in the Detroit-Dearborn metropolitan areas in the stateof Michigan, home to the largest concentration of Arab Americans inthe U.S. (Zogby 1990). The data presented were collected between 1995and 1996. The purpose of the study was to explore the dynamics ofethnic identity formation among children of ‘Arab’ immigrants.

Study 2 was conducted in Toronto, Canada, estimated to house thelargest population of Somali immigrants in Canada and all of NorthAmerica (for a published estimate in Toronto, CA, see Opoku-Dappah1995). Data were collected from 1996 to 1997. The purpose of thestudy was to examine the role of migration and identity processesamong Somali immigrants to Canada.

Sample descriptions

Data for Study 1 were collected from 30 Lebanese immigrant parents.Most of the Lebanese participants in this study had spent a good dealof time in Beirut; however, their initial places of origin were the villagesand towns of south Lebanon. Immigration for about half (14)occurred in the 1970s, while the remainder (16) arrived in the earlyto mid 80s. While the main reason (61 per cent of responses) given forimmigration is related to the incidence of war, the second mostcommon explanation revolved around motives such as family reuni-fication, opportunity and marriage. Data for Study 2 were collectedfrom thirty Somali immigrants. Of the thirty Somali participants, 87per cent were born in an urban area. About one third (10) of theSomali immigrants came to Canada before 1990 while the remainingtwo thirds (20) came after 1990. Nearly 80 per cent of the Somaliimmigrants in this study left as a result of the civil war, with the restimmigrating for educational and health purposes. For both samples,participants were equally divided between men and women.

Data collection and analysis

Data gathered for both studies included audio-taped interviews, andobservation in community events. The data in Study 1 were originallyderived from fieldwork carried out in the Dearborn public schoolsystem. Parents of children who attended this school were contacted


and asked to participate in either a focus group discussion or a lifehistory interview that would address the issue of raising children inAmerica. Two focus groups were conducted (six participants each) at asocial service agency serving the community and eighteen structured,open-ended interviews were completed in the participants’ home. Thefocus group questions and open-ended interviews from which dataabout Lebanese immigrants were collected involved questions thatprobed for an understanding of the immigrant’s perceptions of life inthe country of origin juxtaposed to life in the United States, conditionsthat prompted immigration, attitudes about living in the United States,experiences of discrimination, and understanding of community life.Participants were asked to directly compare and contrast the Arabfrom the American in an attempt to gauge the parameters aroundwhich identity is organized, and to glimpse the strategies immigrantparents use to teach their children about who they are and from wherethey come. The strength of the open-ended format is evident in thatinformation not directly sought often arises through conversationsbetween the interviewer and the participant(s), revealing criticalinsights about the immigrant experience not otherwise tapped.

The data in Study 2 were originally derived from fieldwork carriedout in Toronto, Canada. Respondents were interviewed at their homeor in an agreed upon location. The primary interview schedule used tointerview Somali immigrants comprised thirty-nine open-ended ques-tions and a face sheet containing several socio-demographic variables.The open-ended questions were divided into two thematic areas. Thefirst group of questions pertained to the cultural background of therespondents, particularly, their perceptions of colour-based identitycategories before leaving their homeland. The second group consistedof questions dealing with their encounter of colour-based racialcategories in North America.

In both studies, the authors conducted each interview, andtranscribed all interviews verbatim. The initial coding consisted of adetailed reading of each interview (open coding) followed by axial andselective coding (Strauss and Corbin 1990). Once the initial categoriesand dimension were identified, connections between categories andsub-categories became apparent. The coding schemes developed foreach study were then compared and contrasted to one another togenerate a profile of conceptual themes and relationships that emergedfrom each data source (see Table 1). The master categories developedfrom this comparative data included: 1) Homeland, and 2) HostSociety contexts. Each of these master categories resulted in twosubcategories: majority and minority statuses. By majority andminority status we refer to the socio-political position of studyparticipants before and after migration. The coding process furthergave rise to the prominence of religion and race as two central


organizing themes in which majority/minority statuses are established.This process was initially achieved through open coding which allowedus to fracture data for the identification of categories, their properties,and dimensions within and across studies (Strauss and Corbin 1990).

Although the studies were conducted by two researchers in twodifferent communities, findings from both studies were remarkablyconsistent in terms of the adjustment process. The Lebanese in theU.S. and Somalis in Canada each reveal how their migrationexperiences were affected by the interaction between both the culturaland racial contexts of the host country and the homeland. Notable wasthe overlapping of significant themes regarding strategies each use tonegotiate identity as Muslim immigrants. This comparative analysisprovides a unique opportunity to highlight the situational aspects ofidentity formation.

Social organzation of homeland and host societies

Homeland

Lebanon . Lebanon, once part of Greater Syria, was established as acountry after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. In 1920, the Frenchdeclared Lebanon to be a sovereign state, and in 1926, it received aconstitution that transformed Lebanon into a Republic. The LebaneseRepublic was released from the French mandate in 1943. In 1946,Lebanon became totally independent from France. The countryprospered for twenty-five years until civil war broke out in 1972between religious factions. Lasting for almost twenty years, the civilwar formally ended in 1990 when all parties agreed to power sharingbetween Christian and Muslim sects.

Religious affiliation is an important organizing mechanism inLebanon, and a major component of one’s political and social identity.There are seven main religious groups: Maronites, Sunni Muslim,Shi’a Muslim (the single largest sect), Greek Orthodox, GreekCatholic, Druze, and Armenian Orthodox (Bates and Rassam 1983).By constitutional arrangement, quotas are set for the number ofmembers serving in the political establishment, and positions ofleadership are based upon religious affiliation. For example, regardingpositions of power: the President of Lebanon must be a Maronite, thePresident of the Parliament is Shi’a Muslim, the Prime Minister of thecountry is a Sunni Muslim, and so forth. Also, whereas civil,commercial, and criminal law is the same for all citizens, (i.e. theadministration of such laws are carried out by state courts), familymatters concerning marriage, divorce, and inheritance are left up toreligious courts officially recognized as part of the Lebanese judiciary.Therefore, religion and sect have to be designated on all legal


identifications, regardless of personal wishes (Salibi 1988). Theseprocesses also produce a stratification system based on religiousaffiliation, with Christians historically occupying the highest levels,followed by Sunni Muslims, and last the Shi’a Muslims.

The Shi’a of southern Lebanon have occupied the lowest end of thesocial strata and possessed the least amount of power and privilege(Ajami 1986). Oppressed and denied access to resources, the Shi’awere, and still in some circles remain in Lebanon, the epitome of whatin the U.S is often referred to as a ‘culture of poverty’ (Ajami 1986).Their low position in Lebanese society, coupled with the civil war inthe late 1970s and all through the 1980s, simultaneously furthermarginalized the Shi’a and spurred immigration activities. Immigrantsin this study are Shi’a Muslims from the south of Lebanon. Uponimmigration to the U.S., the Shi’a enter a society stratified by race, andbecome part of the privileged class by virtue of their racial affiliation,i.e. legally classified as white.

Somalia. The Somali Republic became independent in 1960 as a resultof the unification between southern and northern Somalilandspreviously administered by the Italian and British colonial powersrespectively. After two successful parliamentary-based civilian admin-istrations from 1960 to 1964, and 1964 to 1968, a military regimetoppled the third administration and remained in power until 1990when the whole country descended into a generalized civil war.Somalia remains without a consensually recognized national govern-ment to this day.

Unlike Lebanon where the demarcation between Sunni and Shi’aIslam is an important category of social stratification, virtually allSomalis are professed Sunni, and therefore religious affiliation is not acategory of internal social differentiation. Islam, nevertheless, providesa central cultural frame of reference; it is the predominating valuesystem that informs daily life. In terms of social organization, Somalisociety is divided into five major social groups conveniently known asclans. These are a vast confederation of kinship-based groupings thatultimately claim descent from a mythical ancestor whose status isbased on perceived nearness to the lineage of the prophet Mohammed.Descent among individuals within each clan is traced through the maleline. Thus, the nature of social organization, as well as the degree ofsegmentation/differentiation is derived from what anthropologistsrefer to as segmentary lineage systems. Such societies are made upof several structurally similar groups capable of combining anddividing at various levels depending on the prevailing social, political,and economic circumstances. In other words, social order, whether itrelates to political organization, social stratification, or economicdistribution, is mediated by perceived clan differences.


Clan differences, however, are not based on actual racial or ethnicdifferences, or on observable economic class. This does not, however,mean that social stratification does not altogether exist in Somalia.There are a number of groups who occupy culturally subordinatedstatuses in Somalia (Kusow forthcoming). However, on both culturaland religious counts, the participants in this study occupy majoritystatus as members of mainstream Somali society.

Host Societies

United States. Immigration to the United States includes theexperience of being placed into a racial hierarchy; race is a masterstatus, and one of the primary means by which identity is established(Bonilla-Silva 1999). Racial identification rests on physical appear-ances, including skin colour, hair texture, and facial features.Immigrants from Lebanon, regardless of religious affiliation, arelabelled as Caucasian/White, a placement secured by a series of legalcases after the Syrian/Lebanese racial identity was questionedthroughout the rise of nativist fears in the U.S. during the early1900s (Gaultier 2001). Denied citizenship due to their ‘Asiatic’ origins,the Syrian/Lebanese actively claimed ‘whiteness’ through references totheir Christian faith and Semitic (hence Caucasian) origins (immi-grants from Lebanon at the end of the nineteenth century, wereprimarily Christians (Naff 1994)).

The denial of U.S. citizenship at the turn of the century forcedLebanese immigrants to embrace the racial hierarchy as they activelylobbied to be ‘white’ as opposed to the ‘other’ (black or Mongol).Aside from the legal classification, because the appearance ofLebanese immigrants resemble other Mediterranean people, includingthose originally from Italy, Greece, or Spain, the average Lebaneseimmigrant becomes indistinguishable from those of southern Europe.The primary physical marker that distinguishes Muslim Lebanesefrom other dominant group members is style of dress. That is,‘otherness’ is announced when Muslim Lebanese women opt to weara head scarf, or some variation, designating a religious identity.

Canada. As far as racial classification is concerned, Canada issomewhat different from the United States, but in a general sensealso quite similar. In this regard, Canada historically differs from theUnited States in that as a nation it did not experience slavery to thesame degree. The majority of the black population in Toronto resultedfrom Caribbean immigration over the last few decades, and morerecently due to migration from Africa. Also, Canada’s culturalideology regarding race relations is officially guided by multicultural-ism, a public affirmation of diverse cultures in society, as opposed to


assimilation, which stresses conformity to the dominant cultural norm.In general, though, because of its proximity to the United States,original settlement patterns (European origin) and history of immi-gration, Canada’s cultural and social ideals, including race relations,reflect a similar inclination to that of the United States. For example,similar to the normative white/non-white dichotomy in the UnitedStates, Canada employs white versus visible minorities. The twocategories, despite differences in terminology, clearly perform thesame processes of exclusion and inclusion. Moreover, in Canada, thenotion of blackness is articulated through Jamicanness. According toLevin (1988) ‘. . . despite the existence of ‘‘white Jamaicans’’ and blackswho are not Jamaicans, in Canada, Jamaicanness has become aeuphemism for black’ (quoted in Jackson 1998, p. 28). Legally thosewho migrate from Somalia are classified as a visible minority in theCanadian Census, a phrase that in other words, denotes a ‘non-white’status. In that sense, racial classifications in Canada may differ fromthose in the U.S. in the political sense, but not substantively in theways that race/visible minority status affects social relations and accessto resources in both Canada and the U.S.

Identity placements and announcements

Muslim Lebanese immigrants in the United States

Immigration policy in the U. S. historically employed whiteness as aprecondition for citizenship (Gaultieri 2001; Hale 2002), and so thesaliency of race to adaptation among immigrants is a deep-rootedphenomenon that implicitly organizes the migrant experience. A keyissue to consider in the analysis of immigrant adaptation is thedefinition of whiteness. Whiteness represents a sociological categorythat demarcates unspoken privilege and power. Its existence derivesfrom the construction of ‘otherness’; in other words, the designation ofthose groups held in lower esteem, possessing less power and privilegein society. To be white means not having to refer to one’s race; it is aprivileged status that does not require contemplation or reflection(McIntosh 1989).

The influx of Muslim immigrants from the Middle East in someways challenges the ideological underpinnings of whiteness. Legallyplaced in the ‘white’ category, their national origins and religiousaffiliation differ from the initial defining characteristics (Samhan1999). However, Lebanese Shi’a Muslims in this study embracewhiteness as a preferred social identity. Even though other ‘white’Muslim immigrants may embrace whiteness upon immigration to theU.S., this tentatively suggests that the Shi’a from Lebanon, becausethey experienced life as a minority in their homeland, readily embrace


the privilege that comes with whiteness by ignoring the aspects of theiridentity that directly conflict with the Christian ideals of whiteness.The benefits of adopting a white identity extend beyond simplesuccessful adaptation; it also confers the advantage of rejectinghomeland arrangements. The combined effect provides the basesupon which elevated self-worth and positive identities emerge. Wewill discuss this phenomenon further in relation to the data presentedbelow, but suffice it to say that the tendency among Lebanese Shi’aMuslim to embrace a white identity in part stems from the minoritystatus experience in their homeland. The consequence and benefit ofdominant group placement emerges through the narratives theyproduce about their immigrant experiences.

Participants elaborate on how religious identity in the homelandshaped their concepts of self. From the discussion below, one sensesthe depth of this fact, lodged in their upbringing.

LENA: In Lebanon, the Christians have all the freedoms they want.They’re proud to be Christian because, they’re the stronger, ah, wellthey have the power.NINA: Yeah. And then, I don’t know, our parents, taught us to beashamed of ourselves, not to be proud. You know, to look down onyourself, and look up at the Christians. But this country teaches younot to do that. You know, be proud, and ah, your culture is�SARAH: In this country, the freedom in this country gave us more,like a chance to be what we are, gave us the chance to becomesomebody, and you know we owe it to this country, I think.LENA: Mhmm. Yeah, we owe it to this country.

Once in the U.S., Shi’a Muslims find themselves part of thedominant racial category. This social status aids in the developmentof a positive sense of self, and pride in their religion, which signifiesmovement from a minority status to majority status. Of particularinterest is that they reference all the privileges associated withwhiteness (e.g. freedom), yet do not explicitly refer to the racialidentity itself. In other words, they do not talk about being ‘white.’This omission lends support to the idea that whiteness is an unspokenprivilege, an identity that does not always require direct, verbalreference (McIntosh 1988). In fact, Lebanese Shi’a Muslim immi-grants directly compare their social status in the homeland (Lebanon)to that of the host country (U.S.):

NINA: I’m talking, is you can be free to be whatever you want in thiscountry. Back home, there is a lot, you can’t say you’re, especiallybefore the civil war, ok, you were ashamed to say Yeah, I’m Muslim,Shi’a.


SARAH: Yeah, that’s right.NINA: But in this country, you can be whatever you want tobe . . . (commotion) and no one would say, that you’re different.LENA: But now, if, even if you go back home, you’re proud to beShi’a.NINA: Well, I’m talking about–And I’m proud to be Shi’a in thiscountry, too.LENA: But you will be there too. Because this country teaches youto be yourself, (SARAH: Yeah) and to be proud of it.NINA: And you can speak your mind. You can sit in here and saywhatever you want.SAWSAN: You can do whatever you want in this country.NINA: So back there, we didn’t have this freedom. And up until nowpeople don’t have the freedom.SARAH: In this country you’re given a chance, (SARAH: Yeah!)SARAH: To be yourself.

Leaving the minority status of their homeland, and entering thedominant rank of their new home, Lebanese immigrants now asserttheir status based on individual qualities as opposed to status based onmembership in a religious category. This fact appears when Sarahclaims, ‘They [Americans] make you feel you are a human being. Soover there [Lebanon], you know there is a difference. They treat you,you know just because you’re Muslim, you’re worthless.’ Pride,equality, and being evaluated as an individual serves to elevate feelingsof self-worth, effectively diminishing feelings of inferiority developedin Lebanon vis a vis their social status emerging from religiousaffiliation.

The identity that emerges upon immigration is lodged in theprivileges associated with being ‘white’. It appears that these Lebaneseimmigrants enjoy white privilege, in the sense of perceiving fairness,equality, and justice upon immigration, but do not directly referencetheir racial identity. They elaborate on their status in the U.S. withoutinvoking the racial hierarchy into which they entered. The experienceof Lebanese immigrants in this study is consistent with the practice ofrace in the U. S. where claim to whiteness itself does not need publicacknowledgement. It is announced through such proxy categories asindividualism, as well as perceptions of freedom and equality.Although none of the immigrants in this study explicitly referencetheir ‘whiteness,’ the sense of entitlement they have developed mirrorswhite privilege. Being white means not having to acknowledge theexistence of racial categories, and represents a strategy adopted bymembers of the privileged race (i.e. white) in order to ensure legitimatebelonging and downplay any semblance of inequality (McIntosh 1989;Ignatiev 1995).


Placement into the dominant social status upon immigrationbecomes threatened when Lebanese immigrants visibly announce areligious identity. The introduction of Islam as part of identity forLebanese immigrants represents an instance where majority groupmembership is challenged, and to some extent causes doubt aboutwhether one is accepted into the majority group. In the U.S., Islamproduces a situation where immigrants from Arab speaking countriesbecomes racialized, or perceived as ‘the other’ (Naber 2000). Oneparticipant describes a confrontation she had with a neighbour aftershe decided to cover her head and wear ‘hijab.’ The neighbour calls outto this participant, whom we will call Joumana, upon seeing her wearthe head scarf for the first time, ‘You can’t wear this rag on your headhere! This is America.’ Joumana recounts: ‘I don’t used to answer her.Not once. But my husband, he answer her once. He said, this isAmerica, we have the freedom to do whatever we want. And one timehe called the police on her.’ The perception that their rights wereviolated, leading to a phone call to the police, illustrates theindignation this respondent and her husband felt from such remarksand harassment. Joumana states that she had a cordial relationshipwith this neighbour before she decided to wear the scarf. They wouldgreet one another when they met on the street, however, when shewitnessed a change in Joumana’s appearance, ‘she went crazy. I don’tknow why, who bother her? I don’t know why.’

The above situation underscores the offence that Joumana and herhusband took because of the unexpected reaction from her neighbour.However, this incident also illustrates the significance of appearance toidentity, and more poignantly, how announcement of a religiousidentity (through dress) challenges placement into the dominant socialstatus. In this case, the Lebanese Muslim immigrant woman witnessesthe intolerance of an American neighbour towards her decision towear the hijab (head scarf). The immigrant woman’s husband respondsthat in America, ‘we have the freedom to do whatever we want.’ Itseems that before this woman chose to wear the scarf on her head, sheappeared acceptable to her neighbour. She was not readily identifiableas ‘the other’, and in particular, not as ‘the religious other’. Once shewore the scarf, however, such identification could occur. The negativereactions expressed by a neighbour who was at least cordial before thedecision to dress in an Islamic fashion, offers evidence for howappearance (dress, clothing) not only affects how others see you,altering an identity from acceptable to unacceptable, but furthermoreillustrates how religion interferes with full acceptance, at least at theinteractional level of social life.

While Joumana does not succumb to the pressure to conform to herneighbour’s idea of appropriate dress, the existence of this conflictreveals the tension that exists between an identity based on ‘whiteness’


as opposed to one based on Islam. The religious identity she visiblydemonstrates through dress in fact threatens her position as part ofmainstream America. However, even when Joumana faces prejudicedattitudes from her non-Muslim American neighbour, the pride,confidence, and self-esteem developed by virtue of ‘legal admission’(i.e. classified as white) into dominant society serves as a source ofreference for coping with such negative attitudes. The sense of freedomshe draws from in order to justify her choice to deviate from themainstream norm reflects a privilege accorded those with dominantstatus. Lebanese Muslim immigrants enjoy identity options (Waters1990), but only to the extent that they do not announce a religiousidentity through dress, which ultimately places them outside themajority status.

Muslim Somali immigrants in Canada

In contrast to the Lebanese Shi’a immigrant sample, the Somaliimmigrants in this study have never experienced minority status, eitherreligion or colour-based, in their homeland. The only system of socialdifferentiation that they have actually experienced is based on clan-based categories. However, as we have pointed out earlier, clandifferentiation, albeit a meaningful system of classification in Somalia,is not derived from racial or colour-based categories. In other words,for the Somali immigrants in Canada, ‘identity is anything but racial’(Kusow 2006:548). This proposition raises a fundamental dilemma forthe idea of race in that it challenges the white-nonwhite binaryopposition that is the constituent unit of the racial world-view inNorth America. Virtually all the respondents identified themselves interms of nationality rather than colour-based identity categories. Onewoman who responded to the question ‘‘what did you consideryourself while in Somalia,’’ gave the following comment: ‘I consideredmyself a Somali. Well, a Somali, like there is Chinese, Indian, or eventhe whites have different types, they don’t all look alike, maybe wethink that they look alike, but they don’t. So, I consider myself aSomali, I did not consider myself as black, white, Chinese, or Indian, Iconsidered myself as Somali and only Somali, that was my race.’According to this participant, the identity invoked presents anundifferentiated, non stratified society in that she simply claims heridentity as Somali. There are no references to religion, race, or clan.This is not to suggest that stratification does not exist in Somalia (seeKusow, forthcoming), rather this response signifies that the participantviews the world through the lens of the majority group in Somalia.Claiming a nationality based identity as opposed to membership in aclan corresponds to the tendency among whites in the U.S., who donot acknowledge whiteness outwardly. As evidenced in the narrative


above, dominant group members in Somalia have no need toacknowledge the characteristics that define them as members of thedominant group with majority social status.

Despite cultural-based differences in Somalia, Somalis do notemploy racialized identity categories to distinguish majority/minoritysocial status in their everyday life interactions. Despite the fact thatSomalis in Canada did not employ colour-based racialization todifferentiate one another in the homeland, they are, at the same time,aware of the social and political significance of colour-based categoriesin Canada. Somalis in Canada are well aware of their minority status,and how that affects entitlement and limits full participation in thehost country. In response to a question about whether or not a Somalican ever consider himself/herself a Canadian citizen, one participantresponded:

I don’t think so, no. I don’t consider myself and I will never considermyself because if you don’t get your rights as a citizen, if on the sideyou are an immigrant and there is no point of claiming citizenship asan indigenous person. My kids who are born here I don’t tell themthat. I tell them this your country, this is your birth place, but deepin my heart I know, it is not their country, deep in my heart, I knowthis is a place they will never have the right to be a full citizen unlessthere are miracles which I don’t think will happen. I don’t thinkthere will be a black Prime Minster in the next two hundred years inCanada.

This comment indicates that racial categories do inform the identityexperiences of Somalis in Canada. This is evident in that he refers tothe likelihood of Canada ever electing a ‘black’ Prime Minister.Whether or not immigrants perceive themselves as full citizens of theirhost country depends on the degree to which they have, or perceivethey share similar identity categories with mainstream culture. In thiscase, Somalis learn that because they do not share the same racialidentity as the dominant group in Canada, they face exclusion fromfull citizenship. In effect, they have moved from majority status in thehomeland to occupying a minority status in Canada. A visibleminority status in Canada supersedes any differentiation that mayhave existed within the country of origin, and also superimposes onnational origin differences (Sorenson 1991). In some situations,however, the process is more complex because the issue may not bewhether or not groups share similar identity categories, but whichidentity categories they share. For example, as illustrated above in thecase of Lebanese immigrants today, sharing racial categories with thehost society may be negated by differences in religion.


What emerges from the interviews with Somali immigrants inCanada as well is that Somalis do not see their minority status strictlyon the basis of their skin colour. Skin colour for Somalis becomes onlyone of the multitudes of identity categories through which they canassert their self identity. Thus, the majority of the respondents assertan identity through non-racialized, particularly, Islamic-based identitycategories. While Islam operates as an othering process for MuslimLebanese immigrants in the U.S., it serves as a strategy Somaliimmigrants implement to distance themselves from a black identity inCanada. By far, the most important and revealing strategy of stayingoutside the racialized structure of Canadian society is to deny theexistence of discrimination based on race, insisting instead on cultural-based discrimination.

Yeah a lot of times, a lot of times. First of all it was when I appliedfor a job. When they call you for an interview, the first thing they dois find out who you are because when they look at your resume andyour work experience they always imagine maybe they are gettingsomebody who is white and when you show up and they see that youare an African woman and apart from being black being a Muslimthat counts too, and sometimes you wear your Hijab and from therethey tell you point blank we have a dress code. They ask is this theway you are going to dress. If the answer is yes, then you won’t getthe job. See when I first came, I used to think it was O.K. I thoughtbecause maybe that is their policy until I found out it was not O.K.If you have the experience and you can do the job, then they shouldnot restrict you from what you believe and that is the time I visited Ithink the human rights office and read their code and every thing.So there was a time after that when I applied for a job and they tookme, after taking me they decided I should put my Hijab down, Iagreed to put the large over but I kept a small Hijab and then theysaid no you can’t work with that thing, it is too bothersome for you,and this and that. But I said it does not bother me or anything. So Iwent to this human rights group who intervened. It took a while forthem to understand the situation, but after everything was O.K. Istill thought I had to leave the job because I was too uncomfortable Ithought I won’t it was still uncomfortable for me to work for them.

The above narrative represents the shifting and increasingly complexways in which immigrants negotiate identities. Historically, identitieswere negotiated on the basis of either racial or cultural categories. Forthose groups who were perceived as racially similar, but culturallydifferent, identity placement as well as announcements were made onthe basis of cultural differences. For those perceived racially different,but culturally similar, the process of othering was achieved through


skin colour. What is striking about the above narrative, however, isthat it provides an empirical instance in which the distinction betweencolour and cultural distinctions cannot be analytically or theoreticallymaintained because Somalis come to Canada with multiple identities,all of which represent a certain degree of otherness. However, theychoose to announce cultural-that is-religious-based identity in favourof skin colour to announce their identity. Such announcement ismainly expressed through female behaviour, i.e., wearing the hijab.However, the resistance is more than just ‘cultural,’ it is also racial.According to Stone, self and identity are established and main-tained by the communication of appearances as much as they arethrough discourse. The overwhelming majority of Somali women inCanada wear the Islamic hijab. Some of them wear a moreconservative version - one that covers the whole body including theface in such a way that one cannot distinguish the identity of theperson. This religious attire is in fact very interesting in that women inSomalia do not simply wear the hijab culturally. In other words,Somali women as well as men in Canada become more devoutMuslims than they were in Somalia (Bernes-McQwen 1999; Baines2002).

This tendency to practise a more strict interpretation of Islam uponimmigration has been found to exist among other Muslim immigrantsas well (e.g. see Haddad 1994), and often occurs as a strategy to createa familiar cultural space in response to an otherwise strange and alienvalue system. Moreover, it is the announcements made by women intheir presentation of self through dress that signifies this identity forimmigrants. They ensure that the hijab is outwardly noticeable suchthat it becomes an important visual identity marker to at least thesame degree as skin colour. Somali identity emerges through two pathsof othering, the first found in skin colour, and the other in religion.The religious identity is emphasized more in identity announcementsthan is skin colour. This process allows Somali immigrants to becomepart of a pan-ethnic Islamic identity as opposed to the visible minoritycategory of African/black/Jamaican.

Summary and conclusions

We look specifically at the adaptation experiences of two Muslimimmigrant groups entering a host society, focusing on the processes ofracial and ethnic identity formation. The first dimension of thisanalysis addresses race and how established racial categories impingeupon an immigrant identity. The second dimension addresses the issueof religion, and illustrates how each immigrant group grapples withtheir religious affiliation within the existing racial/ethnic stratificationsystem of North America. The negotiation of identity involves a desire


to forge a sense of self that is positive. How each group manages thereaction to their religion stems from identity announcements theycarried with them upon immigration, along with those identityplacements they faced from entry to their new homeland. Suchinsights offer a unique opportunity to begin to discern the processof identity formation among immigrant groups, a critical buildingblock upon which life trajectories and opportunities rest.

Race and religion are two of the most critical variables in theexperience of adaptation among immigrants, particularly in terms ofdiscerning minority/majority status. Immigrants enter the host countrywith specific identity announcements, and whether they remain thesame or change upon immigration hinges on both structural andcultural conditions. These migrant identities, as it were (see Maines1978), do not enter the cultural configurations of the U.S. and Canadain identical ways. Moreover, insofar as those configurations entailidentity placements, they present different kinds of identity transactionmodalities for each immigrant group.

The establishment of an identity occurs when structural definitionsconcur with those of the individual or group (Stone 1962). As Stonestates, ‘identifications with one another, in whatever mode, cannot bemade without identification of one another’ (italics in original, p. 396).Indeed, establishing a racial identity is an interactional process, themeaning of which is produced through discourse and appearance,particularly when there is some ambiguity in that appearance (Hughes1958; Kibria 1996). At the same time, establishing identity is the basisupon which interaction occurs, and leads to a trajectory of life courseexperiences. Somali Muslim immigrants work to reject classificationon the basis of skin colour, while Lebanese Muslim immigrants tacitlyaccept the classification of white. Interestingly, Somalis use an Islamicappearance to enhance a Somali ‘ethnic’ identity, while distancingthemselves from a black identity. An Islamic appearance amongLebanese, however, produces negative reactions in that they arediminished from the status of white to that of ‘other.’

Racialization refers to the process by which categories of humansare sorted into a hierarchical system based on skin colour, physicalfeatures, and cultural values. The racialization process exists in theU.S. and Canada as a means by which to offer (or deny) privilege andopportunity based on physical appearances. Both Lebanese andSomali immigrants attempt to engage with the racialization processin ways to maximize valued identities that have implications for social,political, and economic rewards. However, racialization as a system ofpower governs the range of identities available to immigrants depend-ing on the socio-political climate.

Yet to be determined is how initial immigrant identities, whetherbased on race or religion, change over time and with future


generations (Kibria 1996). Socio-economic factors will be key. It mayfollow that Somali immigrants will emulate the experiences ofCaribbean and other African immigrants who initially opt for anethnic identity based on national origins, but then descend into theracial hierarchy system of North America with the advent of futuregenerations due to the structural organization of the socio-economicsystem which ‘sees a monolithic ‘‘culture’’ and ‘‘race’’ within theAfrican American population’ (Bashi and McDaniel 1997, p. 675). TheLebanese immigrants in this study are legally defined as white. Whiteidentity invites these immigrants and their descendants into theprivileged world of the racial hierarchy in the U.S. However, there isevidence that the children of these immigrants do not accept a whiteidentity. As Ajrouch (2004) illustrates, among the second generation,the most salient characteristic that differentiates whites from ArabAmericans pertains to symbols of femininity. The boundaries thatsignify ethnic identity for the adolescents draw heavily on articulationsabout appropriate feminine behaviour. To the second generationresiding in the same community setting as the immigrants in thisstudy, the term ‘white’ refers not to themselves, but to those who aremembers of the dominant American society (Samhan 1999; Ajrouch2000, 2004).

Based on the narratives of study participants, religion dictated muchof their identity in the countries of origin. Entering the NorthAmerican context supposes a novel stratification system, whereappearance supersedes all other identification markers. Race consti-tutes a primary means to identify minority/majority status, andidentification of one as a member of a particular racial group impliesa long list of preconceived ideas about attitudes and actions, as well astrajectories for future generations (Kibria 1996; Bashi and McDaniel1997). Islam, also a primary means of constructing otherness in theU.S. and Canada, carries with it preconceived notions, much as doesracial categorization. Islam is portrayed negatively in the U.S. andCanada, particularly through media outlets (see Iqbal 2003). Suchportrayals present another level of otherness beyond skin colour.Distinctiveness based on an affiliation with Islam may supersede thepower of skin colour to designate otherness if the socio-politicalclimate continues in the direction of post 9-11 events, providing anadded layer of complexity to understanding adaptation processes forMuslim immigrants.

In sum, our data provide evidence of a transnational phenomenon,suggesting that it is not only race and religion that inform the natureand kinds of identity embraced by immigrants, but also whether or notthe immigrant occupied a minority or majority status in theirhomeland and moreover how such statuses interact with thoseavailable in the host countries. It may be that the interaction between


status indicators in both contexts provides a critical pathway throughwhich adaptation occurs and both identity placements and announce-ments among immigrants are negotiated.

Acknowledgements

This research was supported in part by NIA grant R03 AG19388-01.The authors would like to thank Laurie Abi Habib for helpfulcomments on an earlier version of this article as well as twoanonymous reviewers.

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Racial and religious contexts: Situational identities among Lebanese and Somali Muslim immigrants

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