reading comments

Order Description
READING PAPERS
To fulfill the requirement for this course, you are asked to write two essays (5-7 pages). The goal of these papers is to
get you to think critically and personally about the literature on migration and transnationalism, and thus about the
concepts of culture, movement, borders, community, and identity.
You will be asked to explore one full length ethnography.
You MAY consider “reading ahead” and using sources for the paper not yet covered in class.
ONE paper should explore a full length ethnography.
Guidelines for content:
There are several different ways for you to develop a theme or topic. You could identify a theme (or concept, or idea,
or way of looking at different aspects of transnationalism) that you feel links a minimum of four of the reading
assignments in at least two different course dates, or alternatively is present in one of the full length ethnographies.
OR you might find a theme contained in several of the readings that you DISAGREE with. Your paper could be a
discussion of this theme and argument as it is expressed in these articles, and what points you disagree with.
You may wish to critique the METHODOLOGIES of the various articles. Discuss what methods the authors have
used to gather their material, and evaluate which of them you think is more compelling, or more convincing.
You MAY wish to discuss a personal event or anecdote that you feel relates to these readings. But be cautious with
this approach. I will look for ample evidence that you have read and understood the articles, as well as drawing
parallels with your own personal experience.

Reading list:
Levitt, Peggy
2001 The Transnational Villagers. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Guest, Kenneth.
2003. God in Chinatown. New York: NYU Press.

Raj, Dhooleka S.
2003. Where are you from? Middle class Migrants in the Modern World. Berkeley: University of
California Press.
Cohen, Jeffrey, and Ibrahim Sirkeci
2011 Cultures of Migration: The Global Nature of Contemporary Mobility. Austin:
University of Texas Press.