Belonging: Maintenance, Change and Status within the Haitian Community in Evanston, Illinois

The question of Haitian migrants is how the community adjusts to American society that is materially rich and wealthy and yet socially segmented and stratified. Like all migrants, especially migrants from less industrialized and more agrarian societies, they have to learn how to live in an industrialized and technological society. In order to survive in a society characterized by division of labor and organized rationally, they have to learn a new language, new skills and new styles of organization of work and time. Unlike most immigrants, they have to adjust to social stratification on the basis of their skin color and facial features. The author proposes that Haitian migrants are likely to experience conflict of identity and sta¬tus as a result of migration and contact with the American racial strati¬fication system. The general hypothesis of this research is that there is a conflict of identity and status among Haitian migrants when they meet and contact members of the American society.