This thesis focuses on Albanian-Italian and Albanian-Romanian couples in Italy. Through application of the boundary-making framework to integration and intermarriage, this study looks at the processes by which partners in mixed unions deal with socially constructed boundaries inside and outside the couple and family sphere. The thesis is based on multiple qualitative methods, but primarily on in-depth interviews with 61 Albanian-Italian/Romanian couples in Italy. These research-participant couples differ in terms of marital and family status, place of origin and settlement, education and occupation. The core sample is composed of an Albanian in-between generation, now in their 30s, who emigrated during adolescence for various reasons (asylum, family reunification, healthcare, study, work). Thence, I moved towards an Italian or a Romanian partner of these primary participants. The original contribution of my study is both empirical and theoretical. From an empirical point of view, it explores the topic of intermarriage, which has not been previously examined in the existing literatures on the Albanian and Romanian migrations and is still understudied in Italy. In addition to this, the study specifically takes into account the combination of minority-majority (Albanian-Italian) and minority-minority (Albanian-Romanian) partnerships and marriages, whose conjoint analysis has been largely absent in intermarriage research. From a theoretical point of view, my research shows instead the importance of adopting a relational approach in migration studies through the inclusion of a plurality of social actors within the research design. In fact, while intermarriage in immigrant societies is usually interpreted as an indicator/agent of integration and through the essentialisation of the category of culture, my thesis proposes a novel understanding of intermarriage. I view intermarriage as a site of integration, and I see integration as a multi-way process of boundary change, which involves the national majority as well as multiple immigrant minorities interacting with and identifying each other in the construction of a common social space.

The growing population of the United States is linked to the increasing migration of individuals from other countries. With migration comes the development of cross-cultural and interracial romantic relationships, many leading to marriages. This qualitative grounded theory study sought to understand how a migrant partner's adjustment process, acculturation, contributes to cross-cultural marriages. The main research question and purpose of this study was to investigate the role of acculturation in marital satisfaction among mixed Caucasian and Asian American heterosexual couples. This study utilized multiple data sources and a purposive sampling of 11 mixed Asian and Caucasian heterosexual married couples, with one partner who identified themselves as being Caucasian and U.S. born, and the other as Asian American and an immigrant to the United States. Data were coded and analyzed to identify themes and patterns that emerged from the participants' experiences. The study revealed the following emergent themes representing the couples' common acculturative stressors: (a) challenges related to English language proficiency, (b) communication styles differences, (c) cultural learning, and (d) difficulties due to the lack of social support. The findings of this study provide marriage and family counselors with important data related to how married couples experience acculturation as well as the unique stressors associated with a migrating partner's process. Implications for positive social change include information related to the development of interventions to address common acculturative stressors identified during this study, as well as data to support clinicians and clients when identifying appropriate coping strategies.

Ma thèse explore les rencontres qui eurent lieu entre Français, Amérindiens et Africains en Louisiane, à l’époque de l’Amérique coloniale. C’est plus précisément sur la partie sud du territoire que ce travail s’est penché. Les bornes chronologiques sont 1686, découverte du territoire par Robert La Salle et 1803, vente du territoire, alors Français, aux Américains par Napoléon en 1803. Mon projet était d’analyser les rapports établis entre ces trois groupes en mettant l’accent sur les relations intimes qui se sont créées entre eux (relations sexuelles, concubinage, mariages mixtes), et les liens de parenté sont également des objets d’étude dans cette recherche. De ces relations intimes émergent diverses communautés : ainsi, les « métis » font référence aux enfants nés de Français et d’Amérindiens alors que les « Griffe » désignent une autre communauté, résultat d’unions entre Africains et Amérindiens. L’étude de ces deux groupes représente une partie de ce travail. Cette thèse s’attache aussi à analyser les conséquences de ces unions sur les rapports sociaux, économiques, et diplomatiques entre ces différents peuples. / Historians have agreed that the French were more successful than their competitors in developing cordial relations with Native Americans during the conquest of North America. French diplomatic savoir faire and their skill at trading with Indians are usually cited to explain this success, but the Spaniards relied upon similar policies of trade and gift giving, while enjoying considerably less success with the Indians. I propose an alternative model to understand the relative success of French Colonization in North America. Intimate Frontiers, an ethno-historical examination of the colonial encounters in the Lower French Louisiana, focuses on the social relations between Europeans, Indians and African in colonial Mississippi Valley. It examines the importance of the intimate bonds forged between settlers and natives in maintaining diplomatic alliances in the region even after the French left Louisiana in 1763. My work brings sexuality and intimacy into the political arena, challenging the prevailing view that power was defined solely by political and military alliances.

Based on field research among Czechs living abroad, the diploma thesis introduces the offsprings of the Czech 18th -century exile, members of the Evangelical Reformed Church in Poland, is. While the community decreased due to massive re-emigration after the Second World War, at first it remained endogamous. Eventually though, interfaith marriages with Polish Catholics increased and language usage shifted. However, offsprings of Czechs from Zelów who stayed true to the reformed faith still maintain and pass on their faith which is the main part of their identity even nowadays. Furthermore, some of them still adhere to their Czech origins. They established the Association of Czechs in Poland in 2010 and then the Czech Club in Zelów. This study refers to how members of the Evangelical Reformed congregation in Zelów see their own identity and the existence of mixed marriages within the community of the congregation.

The diploma thesis deals with the Jewish Council of Elders in Prague, whose existence is defined in the years 1943-1945. The administrative body, which was formally established by renaming the wartime Jewish Community of Prague in February 1943, was obliged to carry out orders from superior authorities and act as an intermediary between the Nazi leadership and the persecuted Jewish population. Earlier emigration, retraining and care activities were replaced by the liquidation tasks and the management of other activities, which in consequence were to lead to the complete destruction of Jewish life in the occupied Bohemia and Moravia. The diploma thesis focuses on the historical and organizational development of the above-mentioned Jewish council from its inception to liquidation in the post-war period, as well as on the activities of departments and the fates of some employees. The organization is set in the context of the final phase of Jewish persecution, which in the period under review focused mainly on so-called Mischlinge and Jews from mixed marriages, and the Nazi policy of liquidation of Jewish communities and establish of Jewish councils. The thesis is based on the use and comparison of archival sources, periodicals, source editions or memories of contemporary witnesses. The main part of...