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A range of studies have found that immigrants generally start out using different travel modes but over time they 'assimilate' toward adopting similar travel modes to the general population. These studies tend to focus on 'when' and 'if' travel assimilation occurs, with some studies using socioeconomic factors to explain 'why' this occurs. But few studies have explored the role of culture, attitudes and other 'soft' factors in shaping the process of travel assimilation among immigrants. In Australia, South Asians have been the largest and fastest growing immigrant group, and as skilled migrants they face few 'hard' barriers to car use. The aim of this paper is to explore the interaction between cultural influences, attitudes and initial travel experiences upon arrival in Australia on long-term travel assimilation amongst South Asian immigrants. Qualitative interviews with 20 South Asian immigrants were used to identify a range of cultural and psychosocial factors, such as perceptions towards travel modes and gender-based cultural norms. Attitudes and behaviours evolve during their early years in Australia, beginning with a 'honeymoon period' – a phase where all travel modes are seen as positive – before car use begins to dominate. The findings have implications for how we understand the interactions between attitudes, cultural practice and travel behaviour and how they evolve over time. They also imply that policymakers have only a narrow window of time to encourage sustainable transport among South Asian immigrants before the travel 'honeymoon period' wears off. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper outlines the ways in which the conception of social integration and its practical realization have developed over time in Australia, and the various pathways that models of integration have followed. It makes a distinction between the approaches to inclusion of the indigenous population, the Australian Aborigines in broader Australian social life and social institutions, and those dealing with populations of incoming migrants, refugees and asylum-seekers. Although there are similarities in the models of integration mobilized in both arenas, the differences and interactions are also significant and characteristic of what is specific about settler-colonial societies. The central models in both fields are assimilation, integration and multiculturalism, and the paper will sketch briefly how each model has operated both in theory and in practice, how they have succeeded and interacted with each other, how they have intersected with other types of concerns, such as citizenship, civilization and security, as well as what might be distinctive about the Australian approach to social integration in comparison with other countries. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Some 5 million people live in the Palestinian diaspora today, with the possibility of their 'return' to their homeland ever bleaker due to the failure of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. As a result of the nature of their dispossession from their homeland and their politicised exile, understanding the complexities of their lived experiences requires us to go beyond conventional notions of "first" and "second" migrant generations. This paper argues that the experiences of diaspora Palestinians are in many ways framed not so much by what "generation" they belong to in terms of migration, but by how many generations they have been in exile. It examines shifts in negotiations of concepts of identity, belonging and home for successive generations of diaspora Palestinians. It then explores these ideas through the case study of the community of Palestinians from Kuwait who relocated to Australia as a result of the 1990-91 Gulf conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to Singapore-based academics Randolph Kluver and Wayne Fu, there is a need to seek out cultural proxy signifiers 'which indicate the extent to which beliefs and values are moving across national boundaries' (Kluver & Fu, 2004, n.p.). This paper examines how Singaporeans who have settled in the Western Australian city of Perth which houses the largest single concentration of Singaporeans outside Singapore, to the extent that it has been dubbed 'Singaperth' by The Straits Times (Long, 2003a, 2003b)--reconnect with Singapore culturally in and through their creative pursuits. The motivations and thoughts of three Perth-based Singaporeans who belong to the 'creative class' (Florida, 2002), and who continue to relate to Singapore in their work and cultural activities, are presented and analysed. Using these three respondents as 'proxies', this paper considers the extent to which Perth might be seen as a creative suburb of Singapore, where cultural globalisation entails the embrace of the new creative and cultural 'network', one which enables these 'Singaperthions' to enjoy their 'new' suburban home, yet gives them autonomy to selectively, albeit consciously, mediate their diasporic 'homeland' and cultural 'centre' identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An essay is presented on the identities of Koreans living in Beijing, China and Sydney, Australia. The relationship between Korean communities and host countries is explored through an examination of free Korean-language newspapers published in each location. The assimilation and hybridization of ethnic identities is discussed in relation to the social and political climates of China and Australia.

The authors address whether "negative" assimilation among immigrants living in the United States occurs if skills are highly transferable internationally. They outline the conditions for negative assimilation in the context of the traditionalimmigration assimilation model, in which negative assimilation arises not from a deterioration of skills but from a decline in the wages afforded by skills coincident with the duration of residence. The authors use U.S. Census data from 1980, 1990, and 2000 to test the hypothesis on immigrants to the United States from English-speaking developed countries. They present comparisons with native-born workers to determine whether the findings are sensitive to immigrant cohort quality effects and find that even after controlling for these effects, negative assimilation still occurs for immigrants in the sample. They also find that negative assimilation occurs for immigrants from English-speaking developed countries living in Australia and for immigrants from Nordic countries living in Sweden [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The postwar immigration programme in Australia was a bold and visionary nation-building exercise, one that promised rapid assimilation of ‘aliens’. Some historians note deficiencies in the metanarrative of postwar immigration, but then fail to explain the contradictions which have become apparent. This article attempts to resolve those contradictions, by arguing that a distinction needs to be made between the rhetoric employed in selling the benefits of immigration to the Australian public and the implementation of policy. Assimilation policy was poorly conceived, ill-defined and without financial or human resources for meaningful implementation. Government concern was with public opinion—and with overseas recruitment of workers and labour control in Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This essay argues that the tension between ‘ethnic’ and ‘national’ identity is not contingent, but structurally embedded in the workings of the contemporary nation state. Through an analysis of ‘the Chinese’ in ‘Australia’ it aims to demonstrate that seemingly unambiguous concepts such as assimilation (the ethnic is absorbed by the national), multiculturalism (the ethnic coexists with the national) and diaspora (the ethnic transcends the national) cannot capture the diverse difficulties, ambivalences and failures of identification, belonging and political agency experienced by Chinese Australians. A more satisfactory analysis requires a questioning of the groupness of ‘the Chinese’ (as well as ‘the Australians’) and overcoming conceptual groupism (Brubaker): the tendency to take discrete, sharply differentiated, internally homogeneous and externally bounded groups as basic constituents of social life. Instead a more processual and flexible understanding is proposed, where the relationship between ‘ethnic’ and ‘national’ identity is one of constant evolution and mutual entanglement. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This study uses data from the 2011 Australian census to test a spatial assimilation model of intergenerational concentration and dispersion involving 40 ethnic groups in Sydney and Melbourne. Multivariate statistical techniques are used to examine how acculturation and socio-economic characteristics predict ethnic residential concentration, measured by the index of dissimilarity. Findings support the thesis that ethnic clustering and dispersion reflect immigrant cultural and socio-economic adjustment to Australian life. Ethnic residential concentration is explained by Australian nativity, immigrant duration of residence, English proficiency, educational qualifications and unemployment. Findings are supported by a threshold analysis, which identifies a declining tendency, from the first to later generations, to live in areas of high coethnic concentration. An examination of outlier groups finds that unexplained factors appear to be slowing the spatial assimilation process for a few groups, consistent with a pluralism scenario. A major contribution of this study is its analysis of multiple ethnic groups across three generations and three time-of-arrival immigrant cohorts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that the assimilation policy adopted by the Australian government during the 1950s was based on a denial of a migrant's past. The assumption that the migrant would readily merge into Australian cultural life ignored the ways in which past stories and memories shape the self. Through an analysis of the Good Neighbour Councils I explore the nature of assimilation that was based on a neglect of collective war memories of immigrant groups. This perspective is distinguished from that adopted by several theorists of the day such as W.D. Borrie and Jean Martin whose studies were less crude and one-dimensional. The experiences of Greek migrants are examined to consider how Greek war stories could not often find expression or recognition in the assimilationist climate of the post-war period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There have been few Australian studies of language maintenance amongst immigrant languages from the Indian subcontinent. The present study focuses on Tamil speakers in Melbourne from Sri Lanka or India, who are Hindus or Christians. Tamil is a pluricentric language that has been under the domination of English in these countries, at least amongst the more educated classes. The study explores the complex interplay of factors including country of origin, religious affiliation, level of education, medium of instruction, previous experience with English, attitudinal and sociohistorical factors, all of which interact to influence language use patterns. The data consist of interviews with 16 two- and three-generation Sri Lankan and Indian families, supplemented by focus groups comprising representatives of Tamil-speaking organisations and religious leaders. The study describes considerable variation in patterns of language use and attitudes to the maintenance of Tamil amongst these families. It highlights the diversity and complexity of individual responses to various combinations of factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using 1980/81 and 1990/91 census data from Australia. Canada, and the United States, we estimate the effects of time in the destination country on male immigrants' wages, employment, and earnings. We find that total earnings assimilation is greatest in the United States and least in Australia. Employment assimilation explains all of the earnings progress experienced by Australian immigrants, whereas wage assimilation plays the dominant role in the United Stales, and Canada falls in between. We argue that relatively inflexible wages and generous unemployment insurance in countries like Australia may cause assimilation to occur along the quantity rather than the price dimension. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An important feature of the Australian government's post-war immigration program has been the preference shown for immigrants from the British Isles. In a fundamental sense, the success of the Australian government's assisted and non-assisted British immigration program could be measured by the proportion of immigrants who settled permanently in Australia. The fact that no reliable estimate of this proportion has yet been made is probably due to several reasons. It is the aim of this article to discuss the factors contributing to the absence of reliable estimates. The socio-economic characteristics of returned migrant workers have been examines by a sample survey of re-registrations for the National Insurance during 1959.