Southern becoming: Immigrant incorporation and race relations in the rural United States South

Drawing on one year of ethnographic fieldwork and 129 interviews with Latin American immigrants, U.S.-born Hispanics, and white and black "key native informants" in two nonmetropolitan counties in eastern North Carolina, I examine Hispanic newcomers' incorporation into American life in "new immigrant destinations" in the rural and small-town U.S. South. I examine their economic incorporation in the food processing and routine manufacturing/textiles industries, their intergroup relations and incorporation into the binary rural Southern racial hierarchy, and their institutional incorporation into local schools, social and medical services institutions, law enforcement agencies, court systems, and politics.;My research generates four major findings. First, rural/small-town context does make a difference to Hispanic newcomers' lives in America. It does so primarily by reducing the economic distance between low-skilled newcomers and natives, which eases newcomers' economic incorporation in rural areas. Even in the low-skilled food processing industry, Hispanic newcomers value economic stability and possible upward mobility in an expanding job market. At the same time, rural/small-town context makes newcomers' social incorporation in rural areas more difficult by increasing the cultural and racial distance between newcomers and two established groups of "mainstream" natives who have comparatively low levels of experience with immigration.;Second, Hispanic newcomers appear to be becoming incorporated into the rural Southern racial structure on the nonblack side of an emerging black/nonblack color line. Significantly, this is as much due to blacks' exclusionary treatment of Hispanic newcomers as it is to whites' or newcomers' own negative beliefs about and actions toward blacks.;Third, Hispanic newcomers' incorporation into other parts of rural Southern life differs across institutional spheres and sites, depending on the dual influences of (1) state policies and (2) individual bureaucrats' professional norms and missions.;Fourth, exclusion based on (non)citizenship and factors related to it is more important to Hispanic newcomers' lives in the rural U.S. South than exclusion based on race. (Non)citizenship circumscribes many facets of these newcomers' lives, especially those who are undocumented, endangering their prospects for successful incorporation and upward mobility in the labor market, the racial structure, local politics, and a variety of other social and legal institutions. Policy implications are discussed.