Wanna know why immigrants can't easily integrate?

[Pasi Nurminen]

If you're one of those people who has always wondered why immigrants can't just learn English (or whatever your local language might be) and integrate themselves culturally with the majority in your country, you probably don't understand the experience of being in a foreign land with completely alien customs.

Well, I've got an experiment for you folks to try.

Step one: purchase a plane ticket and a residency visa/work permit to an Asian country of your choice. Preferably a poorer one, but China or even South Korea would do fine.

Step two: set up a neat little life, a house, a job of some sorts, etc. Collect everything you'll need to live for a year.

Step three: live in said conditions for one year.

Step four: examine your life after one year. Take a look at who your friends are, where you go, what you eat, what language you predominantly speak, and how difficult it's been for you to pick up what little you have of the local language.

You'll be surprised to learn that you still mostly hang out with fellow [white, English speaking] foreigners. While you'll probably have a few friends and co-workers who are locals, most of your mates will be fellow falang.

And the language! You have only mastered a few rudimentary phrases in the local language (most likely), and you'll be amazed that the locals will try to speak your language to you! Scratch your head at that one. In your country, you demanded people speak your language, and now that you live in another country where a completely different language is official and predominantly spoken, you come across tons of people who would rather speak to you in your language, the foreign language, than people who will demand you speak the local one!

Culturally, have you changed at all? Not one bit! While you've probably learned to put up with local cultural nuances, ie you are more aware of the value of face, you still adhere to Western customs and the locals for the most part don't seem to care. When you're out with your mates you still conduct yourself in the same manner. You still have the same worldview as before, and you still treat people in the same manner. Yet, no one seems to care!

In short, people don't seem to care that you haven't integrated and adapted to their culture despite the fact that you're living in their country! Strange isn't it?

Step five: repeat these examinations of yourself at the two, five, and ten year marks, if you make it that far of course.

What do you think? Should a white, English speaking foreigner have to adapt in such circumstances?

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

I have had lots of experiences with immigrants both on my mission and in my current job. Most of them Hispanic but some from other countries. Although to be honest it seems that Hispanics have the hardest time assimilating, it is always a tough balance between keeping your old customs and adapting to the new. But what makes US culture so great is that immigrants didn't just drop their old ways and pick up the prevailing cuilture but that they added to it.

 

[Xanikk999]

No whats hard for immigrants is being allowed to come here in the first place. As far as i know we do not currently accept immigrants from latin america or cuba.

 

[skadistic]

I wonder if legal immigrants have a harder time then say illegals?

 

[Pasi Nurminen]

No whats hard for immigrants is being allowed to come here in the first place. As far as i know we do not currently accept immigrants from latin america or cuba.

Uh, you might wanna look that one up. Latin America is a pretty big place, America has not banned immigrants from it.

 

[Xanikk999]

Uh, you might wanna look that one up. Latin America is a pretty big place, America has not banned immigrants from it.

Ok let me rephrase that. Some countries in latin america.

 

[Masquerouge]

Well I've been living in a foreign land with not-so-alien customs for two years now

And a good part of my friends are French... But the majority are locals.
Culturally I think I adapted a bit. I saw that when we went back to France last year, we were not used to a lot of things anymore.

So I can only imagine what it's like if we moved to say China... though I doubt that people in Southeast Asia would try to speak to me in French.

 

[Pasi Nurminen]

So I can only imagine what it's like if we moved to say China... though I doubt that people in Southeast Asia would try to speak to me in French.

You'd be surprised on that one. In Indochina there are still French schools in major cities and French is still considered a language of rich and educated people, though to a significantly lesser extent than English.

What is a surprise is the total lack of any Japanese or Korean language fluency among locals employed in the tourist industry, given that those countries supply the greatest numbers of tourists to SE Asia.

 

[Fëanor]

The Problem is not that most do not "Integrate" after one year, the problem is with those whom do not integrate after 5, 10 and 20 years. The Problem becomes their 5+ children whom are born with the nationality of the Nations they are born in but are raised by people whom have never integrated or embraced the values of the Nations they now live in.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

Yet based on my extensive experience, the children try to assimilate even if the parents don't. Remember, one's peers have as large an influence on one's culture as one's parents. The kids want to learn English to be like their friends.

 

[Pasi Nurminen]

The Problem is not that most do not "Integrate" after one year, the problem is with those whom do not integrate after 5, 10 and 20 years. The Problem becomes their 5+ children whom are born with the nationality of the Nations they are born in but are raised by people whom have never integrated or embraced the values of the Nations they now live in.

And my point is that people with such attitudes should try living in a completely alien culture and see how well they integrate, or their children integrate. Try living in such a country for five, ten, or twenty years, or at least talk to someone who has. You can find them on the internet. They do not integrate after having lived so long outside their culture, neither would you. The point of this thread is that it would be nice for cultural xenophobes to be less hypocritical.

 

[Masquerouge]

You'd be surprised on that one. In Indochina there are still French schools in major cities and French is still considered a language of rich and educated people, though to a significantly lesser extent than English.

Oh yeah you're right. Forgot about those former colonies

My weirdest experience on that matter was probably when I took the Transsiberian to go from Moscow to Beijing. In that completely random Russian train station, we got off for a couple of minutes of exercise, and a Russian teenager came to us and started discussing, in French, why Louis XI was his favorite king.
Turned out he checked every time the Transsiberian came if there were any French people he could discuss with

But my point was to say that you should expect more people to speak English than French, as a rule. So an English immigrant should have more people speaking English to him than a French one... you get it.

 

[MobBoss]

And my point is that people with such attitudes should try living in a completely alien culture and see how well they integrate, or their children integrate. Try living in such a country for five, ten, or twenty years, or at least talk to someone who has. You can find them on the internet. They do not integrate after having lived so long outside their culture, neither would you. The point of this thread is that it would be nice for cultural xenophobes to be less hypocritical.

Pasi...this thread makes no sense. There are virtually millions of immigrants that do indeed integrate quite well into American culture. So I dont get your point at all.

 

[Pasi Nurminen]

Pasi...this thread makes no sense. There are virtually millions of immigrants that do indeed integrate quite well into American culture. So I dont get your point at all.

I'm going to run this one by you very slowly.

There are people who demand that immigrants to their countries culturally and linguistically integrate.

These people should move to an Asian country.

They would see that they do not integrate with the host culture, and if they do, it's only very minimal.

Ergo, these people are hypocrites.

Do you understand?

 

[scipian]

As a poster above said, one year is not the time needed to integrate.

Also, my brother has studied/taught in Germany (2 years), Russia (2 years), China (1 year), S Korea (1) and plans to go back to China or Japan. He became fluent In German and Russian (and is now making a good deal of money doing expert freelancing translating business propositions). Also, he learned a fair deal about Chinese and Korean (and that is with a completely different alphabet and everything. Much more different than say Spanish and English). Furthermore, he befriended the locals, visited villages in rural Russia, visited poor Eastern European villages and talked about their problems, traveled with Korean friends to see the historical sites, and discussed politics with his fellow Chinese teachers.

Assimilation is not that hard. He spent 1 or two years and was already very assimilated. Imagine if you became a citizen of that country and planned to spend your next 60 years there. There's a big difference between touring and moving permanentally. In addition, we Westerners have the better nations. One may argue that Mexico is better than America but that would be stupid. We would be moving to another country as fairly rich, intelligent people speaking the language of politics and business. Mexican immigrants to America enter in as poor workers and are speaking a language not well known. So, they would have a much greater need to assimilate than we would.

 

[skadistic]

I'm going to run this one by you very slowly.

There are people who demand that immigrants to their countries culturally and linguistically integrate.

These people should move to an Asian country.

They would see that they do not integrate with the host culture, and if they do, it's only very minimal.

Ergo, these people are hypocrites.

Do you understand?

They aren't hipocrites because they didn't move to your asian nation. Do you undrestand?

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

There is a huge difference between speaking the language, and being friends with the locals, and assimilating. I was in a sense living in Latin America for two years on my mission; I will always feel at home among Hispanics, but I am by no means a Hispanic myself.

 

[MobBoss]

I'm going to run this one by you very slowly.

There are people who demand that immigrants to their countries culturally and linguistically integrate.

These people should move to an Asian country.

They would see that they do not integrate with the host culture, and if they do, it's only very minimal.

Ergo, these people are hypocrites.

Do you understand?

Yes...I understand and I dont agree. Ever been to Japan? I have. You do things their way or not at all. Thats it.

And last I checked, Japan was indeed an Asian country.

And yes, I think that if someone moves to America then they should culturally and linguistically integrate. They want to move to America to be American...not be a (whatever) in America.

 

[Technocactus]

I don't have a problem with not intergrating much after 1 year. If they have't intergrated after 10 years, tha's a different matter.
And all these people who should move to Asia - if it's intergrate or don't immigrate, then surely by not immigrating, they are following what they said?

 

[Pasi Nurminen]

As a poster above said, one year is not the time needed to integrate.

Also, my brother has studied/taught in Germany (2 years), Russia (2 years), China (1 year), S Korea (1) and plans to go back to China or Japan. He became fluent In German and Russian (and is now making a good deal of money doing expert freelancing translating business propositions). Also, he learned a fair deal about Chinese and Korean (and that is with a completely different alphabet and everything. Much more different than say Spanish and English). Furthermore, he befriended the locals, visited villages in rural Russia, traveled with Korean friends to see the historical sites, and discussed politics with his fellow Chinese teachers.

Assimilation is not that hard. He spent 1 or two years and was already very assimilated. Imagine if you became a citizen of that country and planned to spend your next 60 years there. there's a big difference between touring and moving permanentally.

Picking up the local language is but one aspect of integration. Exactly how much is "a fair bit" anyways? Can he hold a complex discussion about the nature of future funding for quantum physics research, or can he just order a sandwich? Who were his friends? Where did he hang out? Who did he go out with? What aspects of his personality did he change to match the locals? Did he give up on the traditional Western individualistic mentality in favour of a group mentality common to Asian societies? According to what you've told me, your brother did not assimilate. Anyone can "travel to villages" or "engage in political discussion." I know some people here who talk to me about politics, and want to know what politics are like in Canada. That doesn't make me assimilated.

The vast majority of expatriates living in Asian countries do not integrate.