Armenian-Americans: From Being to Feeling American

Armenian-Americans have been generally overlooked by census enumerators, survey analysts, and social scientists because they are classified as white, their small numbers, and relative dispersion throughout the U.S. They remain a little-studied group that has been called a "hidden minority." Armenian-Americans fills this significant gap. Based on the results of an extensive mail questionnaire survey, in-depth interviews, and participant observation of communal gatherings, this book analyzes the individual and collective struggles of Armenian-Americans to perpetuate their Armenian legacy while actively seeking new pathways to the American Dream. This volume shows how men and women of Armenian descent become distanced from their ethnic origins with the passing of generations. Yet assimilation and maintenance of ethnic identity go hand in hand. The ascribed, unconscious, compulsive Armenianness of the immigrant generation is transformed into a voluntary, rational, situational Armenianness. The generational change is from being Armenian to feeling Armenian. The Armenian-American community has grown and prospered since the turn of the twentieth century. Greater tolerance of ethnic differences in the host society, the remarkable social mobility of many Armenian-Americans, and the influx of large numbers of new immigrants from the Middle East and Soviet bloc in recent decades have contributed to this development. The future of this community, however, remains precarious as it strives to adjust to the ever changing social, economic, and political conditions affecting Armenians in the U.S.; the Diaspora; and the new Republic of Armenia. Armenian-Americans will be of interest to sociologists, anthropologists, and social historians, and of course to people of Armenian ancestry.

Anny Bakalian is the associate director of the Middle East and Middle Eastern American Center at the Graduate Center, City University of New York. She is the co-author of Backlash 9/11: Middle Eastern and Muslim Americans Respond.