The Violent Foundations of American expectations about Assimilation: National Projects versus Democratic Ones.

This paper critiques assimilation norms in mainstream immigration literature, including literature that views itself as progressive, on 3 levels: the economic lens with which nearly every aspect of immigration to the U.S. is viewed; the primacy of the nation-state in all accounts that is obfuscated, thereby obscuring undemocratic aspects of assimilation norms; and finally the legal context of reception that shapes immigrants' experiences and which must be taken into account when assessing the "success" of the assimilation process. More broadly, the idea that assimilation norms are peaceful, mutual, consensual (and so on) is questioned and very briefly, the paper argues for post-national citizenship. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]