Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Date of Degree

9-2024

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Program

Psychology

Advisor

Michelle Fine

Committee Members

Colette Daiute

Jason VanOra

Sunil Bhatia

Prithi Kanakamedala

Subject Categories

Multicultural Psychology | Other Psychology | Personality and Social Contexts | Social Psychology

Keywords

Lebanese diaspora, critical archives, emigration, intergenerational, Arab women

Abstract

This dissertation sits at the intersection of critical diaspora studies and Arab feminism, seeking to explore how migrant Lebanese women embody, design, and understand home, examined through the lens of motherhood and daughterhood. The following opening questions guided the study: Which aspects of Lebanese culture do women preserve, adapt, and/or abandon once they emigrate from Lebanon? How do these choices manifest in mother-daughter relationships? How do Lebanese women’s relationships to their culture change over time within the diaspora? To address this complex inquiry, this study employs two methods across three datasets. The first method includes archival data that was collected about early Lebanese immigration to the U.S. from the Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies, with particular attention to how women have interacted with Lebanese cultural traditions in a new host country over the last century. The study also features interviews across Lebanon with mothers whose daughters have emigrated from the country, examining how this geographical change shifted familial, interpersonal, and cultural dynamics. Interviews were also conducted with Lebanese mother-daughter pairs, both individually and together, in various locations in the U.S. (New York, Michigan, California, and Washington, D.C.). These interviews centered questions of individual choice, such as exploring which Lebanese norms and traditions immigrant mothers prioritize passing on to their American-born daughters and how the daughters identify with the country from where they are a generation removed. Qualitative interviews were chosen to capture how women articulate their own thoughts and priorities and engage with their mothers/daughters. To analyze these data, each dataset was coded using an inductive thematic analysis. My analysis revealed how Lebanese culture is a dynamic and everchanging set of choices, relationships, and moving geographies, localized and personalized by its diaspora across the globe. Whereas earlier immigrants emphasized nostalgia and religion more, interviewees cited how Lebanon’s current corruption and sectarianism affected their attachment to its culture and religions. I also found that women in both Lebanon and the U.S. shared an ability to recreate Lebanese culture within their homes, redefining and tweaking various traditions and norms to resonate with their own values. Additional lines of analysis include the importance of land and land sovereignty when discussing migration and culture, as well as cultural conservation to resist erasure. These nuanced findings uncover how, despite Orientalist frameworks, Lebanese women make strategic context-based choices for themselves and their families while navigating emigration. It also helps to preserve Arab women’s histories and voices within our own communities and build toward a grassroots living archive.

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