Social Relationships: Immigrant Children’s Complicated Search for Identity By: Gabrielle Falco

As children of immigrants, many second-generation Germans have trouble feeling at home in the country. When they travel to the countries of their parents' origin, they may have an understanding of the culture, but they still feel alien. When people ask questions such as "Are you more Vietnamese or more German?“ they sometimes say: "I'm both" or "I'm neither.“ They know it secondhand: the sense of having a homeland that our German friends feel because they inherited their place in this country. They lack something that their German friends, acquaintances and coworkers have: a place that they don't just come from, but where they belong, where they can find answers to their own questions and encounter others who are like them. They, on the other hand, come from nowhere and belong nowhere. It lies in the no-man's-land between German and foreign culture.

Two generations of Turkish immigrants at the Ford plant in Cologne, Germany: Alien in Germany and foreign in Turkey

Over the past 50 years, Germany has experienced the first influx of immigrants in its history. One thing unites Khuê Pham, Özlem Topçu and Alice Bota: They are German citizens and the children of migrants in a country that has long struggled to define its relationship with foreigners. Alice Bota was born in Krapkowice, Poland, in 1979 and moved with her parents to Germany at the age of eight. Khuê Pham was born in Berlin in Her parents are from Vietnam. Özlem Topçu was born in 1977 in Flensburg, Germany. She is of Turkish Decent.

Left to right: Khuê Pham, Özlem Topçu and Alice Bota

Seeking a better life and a future for their children, tens of thousands of Roma have come to Germany in recent years. Romanians and Bulgarians have come to the country's Ruhr region in the populous state of North Rhine-Westphalia. They hope to escape the poverty and marginalization they experience in their home countries. They remain outsiders in their new home too. Many of them can’t get jobs. Crime is higher. Once they arrive in Germany, they realize the supposed “promise land” isn’t as welcoming as they’d hoped.

There have also reportedly been attacks on Roma immigrants by people wearing masks.

Quiz 1.Over the past ____ years, Germany has experienced its first influx of immigrants in its history. A)600 B)50 C)10 2.Which group of new immigrants have been treated badly in Germany? A)Roma B)Germans C)Italians

Answers 1. B) 50 years 2. A) Roma

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