The Up-and-Down Lives of Soviet Marriage-Immigrants in America: Overcoming Obstacles Through Resilience and Personal Transformation

• In Event: 14.035 - Marginalized Women and Their Quests for Better Lives: Themes of Disequilibrium, Learning, and Adaptation

Abstract

“I feel well adapted but it took me 11 years to come to this conclusion.. . But when we get together with my Russian girls and start remembering, I don’t regret one step or decision I made. All happened for a reason. I was meant to go through certain “circles” in order to understand the value of things whether material or relational . . . my life here was not a fairy tale, it did not happen to me all at once.”

According to (Štulhofer & Sandfort, 2005), the collapse of the Soviet Union brought about numerous political, economic, and cultural changes. Broken administrative and economic ties were responsible for widespread poverty and large-scale unemployment in the countries of the former USSR. Thousands of people were looking for ways to leave the country in search of social stability, job opportunities, and better lives for themselves and their children. Although, the typical emigration profiles in the post-Soviet era consisted primarily of political and ethnic minority refugees, another migration category initiated by women started to emerge. New to the post-Soviet territories, the phenomenon encompassed the emigration of post-Soviet women through the involvement of various international marriage agencies. The existing scholarly polemics on the topic has mainly revolved around the victims-versus-agents dilemma, motivations and intentions of the women involved as well as the legal and other aspects of the international marriage agencies and business, in general. However, a significant gap exists when it comes to exploring the aspects of the learning and adaptation strategies specific to the marriage immigrant women in the U.S. from the post-Soviet Russia. Through ten face-to-face individual bilingual interviews, this study sought to give voice to post-Soviet marriage immigrants with particular emphasis placed on the learning and transformation experiences as they related to the women cross-cultural adaptation in the United States.

In designing this study and planning the data analysis, the decisions were guided by a composite theoretical framework using important ideas from cross-cultural adaptation theory (Kim, 1988), transformative learning theory (Mezirow, 1991), and empowerment theory (Rappaport, 1985).

The study employed individual semi-structured interviews with a convenience sample that met the following criteria:
• Russian-speaking women from the post-Soviet bloc countries
• Came to the United States after 1990
• Used various matchmaking agencies and internet sites to locate an American husband.

As a result of the use of personal networks in recruitment, participants consisted of those who had “successfully” transitioned to life in America, in that they appeared to live reasonably comfortable middle class lives.
Findings
Four major themes emerged from constant comparative analysis. Although space precludes full explication, they are listed here.
1) The women demonstrated agency in making the fundamental life transitions.
2) The women developed resilience in the face of adversity.
3) The women pursued better cultural fitness in the new society.
4) Extensive personal transformation has accompanied each phase of the women psychological and cultural adaptation.

Author

• Tatyana Pavluscenco, Georgia Highlands College