LL.D. / Please refer to full text to view abstract

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Thesis (Ph. D.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, History Department,2005. / Includes bibliographical references.

The U.S. citizenship application process is a legal and symbolic journey shaped by many cultural processes. This research project aims to bring to light the experiences of immigrants and citizenship applicants living in Dallas, Texas, to promote a better understanding of Dallas' increasingly diverse population. In addition, the purpose of this project is to provide insights to a specific client, the office of Dallas Welcoming Communities and Immigrant Affairs, about Dallas' lawful permanent residents who are eligible for citizenship and their reasons for pursuing citizenship status. The data for this project was collected through observation at various citizenship workshops and community events, as well as through semi-structured interviews with 14 U.S. citizenship applicants. Reasons for applying for U.S. citizenship discussed in this project include a desire for membership in U.S. society, access to better educational and economic opportunities, improved ease of travel and the desire to vote. Barriers to the citizenship process discussed in this project include the amount of time one must dedicate to the application, lack of clear knowledge about the process and the financial cost of the application. Other themes include the effects of capital on applicant's experience with the citizenship process, symbolic meanings of citizenship, transnationalism and ideas of deserving and undeserving surrounding the issues of residency and U.S. citizenship.

This thesis explores the ways in which modern history-writing practices reiterate race-based categories of citizenship. To investigate these practices across time, I have examined discourses produced by the United Farm Women of Alberta (UFWA) in 1925, and discourses produced by the contemporary magazine American Renaissance (AR). The UFWA were concerned with the promotion and definition of citizenship, and in so doing laid race as a foundation of Canadian identity. AR is a magazine that concerns itself with white nationalism in the contemporary United States. Drawing upon Avery Gordon and Wendy Brown’s theories of history and haunting, I have situated these discourses in imaginative relation to one another, illuminating the “past” in the present. I have also critically examined how I am complicit in reproducing the historical practices under study; as an architecture of history, haunting helps to imagine alternatives for the study of history and social life, particularly our own. / vii, 160 leaves : ill. ; 29 cm