Fit to Miss, but Matched to Hatch: Success Factors among the Second Generation's Disadvantaged in South Florida

Lisa Konczal and William Haller
Additional contact information
Lisa Konczal: Barry University
William Haller: Clemson University

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 2008, vol. 620, issue 1, 161-176

Abstract: This article examines the elements of successful outcomes among disadvantaged members of the South Florida immigrant communities and assesses the utility of rational choice theory and the Wisconsin model. The findings are derived from ethnographic interviews and analysis of two of the most underprivileged South Florida districts, Little Haiti and Hialeah. The article builds upon the elements of success as identified in the lead article of this volume, which include items relevant to the family, the individual, and the broader community context. The authors add the following to those success factors: (1) ignorance (or disregard) of the barriers to success and the odds against overcoming them; (2) emotionally motivated responses to the surrounding social conditions or to specific (cathartic) events; and (3) exiting underprivileged neighborhoods of origin to facilitate access to resources, mainly educational.

Keywords: immigrant children; Little Haiti; Hialeah; rational choice theory; upward mobility (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002716208322958 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:anname:v:620:y:2008:i:1:p:161-176

DOI: 10.1177/0002716208322958

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().