Collaborative Research: Places of Worship and the Politics of Citizenship: Immigrants and Communities of Faith in the New South

肯塔基大学地理系的Patricia Ehrkamp教授和南卡罗来纳大学地理系的Caroline Nagel教授将探讨公民身份作为一套流动的、经常受到争议的规范和期望，这些规范和期望建立了社会归属感。他们的研究集中在移民信仰团体在表达和制定特定的公民概念方面所起的作用。信仰社区是许多移民生活的核心，本研究探讨了信仰社区如何在塑造移民对权利、责任和社会规范的理解方面发挥重要作用。本项目将对基督教、印度教、佛教和穆斯林礼拜场所进行深入的定性案例研究。数据收集将通过与信仰团体领袖的密集访谈和与普通成员（包括信仰团体的移民和非移民）的焦点小组进行。访谈将在美国南部的三个大都市地区进行——北卡罗来纳州的夏洛特、佐治亚州的亚特兰大和南卡罗来纳州的格林维尔-斯帕坦堡。南部，尤其是卡罗来纳州和佐治亚州，经历了美国任何地区中外国出生人口增长率最高的一些地区。通过关注这些南方大都市地区，以及其中发生的种族和宗教多元化，本研究提供了对美国新移民门户正在经历的社会转型的见解。这项研究将通过关注普通人在日常生活中协商公民身份的方式来推进公民身份的理论视角，并将通过调查人们的信仰和精神信仰如何影响公民身份实践来开拓公民身份的研究。本研究还将通过记录新移民群体在南方重新配置区域叙事和种族等级的方式，为区域研究学术做出贡献。最后，这个项目将有助于重塑公众和学术界关于移民和公民身份的辩论，并使这些辩论超越对移民语言技能和入籍率的长期关注。为此目的，研究结果将通过一个项目网站和一个关于南方宗教多样性的巡回摄影展加以传播。本次摄影展将充分发挥本科摄影专业学生的才能。该研究还将为两名博士生提供支持和研究培训。

Professor Patricia Ehrkamp in the Department of Geography at the University of Kentucky and Caroline Nagel in the Department of Geography at the University of South Carolina will explore citizenship as a fluid and often contested set of norms and expectations that establish belonging in society. Their research centers on the role that immigrant faith communities play in articulating and enacting particular conceptions of citizenship. Faith communities are central to the lives of many immigrants, and this research investigates how faith communities may be instrumental in shaping immigrants' understandings of rights, responsibilities, and societal norms. This project will employ in-depth, qualitative case studies of Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, and Muslim places of worship. Data collection will take place through intensive interviews with faith community leaders and focus groups with ordinary members that include both immigrants and non-immigrants of faith communities. Interviews will take place in three metropolitan areas in the American South -- Charlotte, NC, Atlanta, GA, and Greenville-Spartanburg, SC. The South, and especially the Carolinas and Georgia, have experienced some of the highest rates of growth of the foreign-born population of any region in the United States. By focusing on these Southern metropolitan regions, and the ethnic and religious diversification taking place within them, this study offers insights into the social transformations being experienced in America's new immigrant gateways. This research will advance theoretical perspectives on citizenship by focusing on the ways that ordinary people negotiate citizenship in their everyday lives, and will open up the study of citizenship by investigating how people's faith and spiritual beliefs inform citizenship practices. This study will also contribute to regional studies scholarship by documenting the ways in which new immigrant groups are reconfiguring regional narratives and racial hierarchies in the South. Finally, this project will help to reframe public and academic debates about immigrants and citizenship and to move such debates beyond perennial concerns with immigrants' language skills and rates of naturalization. Toward this end, research findings will be disseminated on a project website and through a traveling photo exhibit of religious diversity in the South. This photo exhibit will utilize the talents of undergraduate photography students. The research will also provide support and research training for two doctoral students.