This dissertation seeks to explore the social reality of Iranians living in the United States. The main objective is to find out how Iranians (Iranian Americans) maintain, construct and perceive their Iranian identity and to identify factors that could intervene in this process. Another aim is to examine intra-diasporic social relations, social interactions with American society and stance towards Iran. To fulfill the purpose of this dissertation, a qualitative research method was applied. The selected qualitative data consisted of thirty-one in-depth interviews with Iranians in New York City and Los Angeles. The results of the research indicated a strong sense of Iranian pride among all respondents, regardless their religious, inner ethnic or generational affiliation. This pride stems from ancient Iranian cultural heritage (and from Pahlavi era that adopted ancient symbolism into its ideological repertoire) and is still kept alive through pre-Islamic symbols and religiously indifferent traditions. It is obvious that the "pure Iranian identity" belongs to the first generation Iranians only, while the 1.5 and second generations, in their self-concept, proved to be rather hyphenated or torn between three spaces (typically young Iranian Jews). Research revealed their identity is oftentimes chosen,...

International education served a dual function in the American-Iranian relationship during the thirty-seven-year reign of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. On the one hand, education was the most important component to the shah's project of authoritarian development - a model of rapid socio-economic development predicated on the premise that anti-communist statism, a less vibrant political milieu, and a more forceful role for the security forces would maintain domestic stability, guarantee the westward flow of Iranian oil, and keep Iran firmly entrenched in the American camp in the cold war competition. Iranian alumni of American universities were elected to the majlis, entered the shah's bureaucracy, staffed the Plan Organization, worked in the financial sector, served in the armed forces, joined university faculties, and assumed the premiership. On the other hand, the influx of Iranian students to American campuses spawned debates outside of traditional foreign policymaking communities about international relations, human rights, and development that were quite different from those that took place in the halls of power in Washington or Tehran. What emerged was a coalition of progressive American and Iranian internationalists that rejected the shah's authoritarian model of development, challenged the American assumptions that propelled U.S. ascendance in the Persian Gulf region, and called for the realization of civil and political rights in Iran. These educational networks made the American-Iranian relationship at once the most intimate and volatile of the cold war era. In the end, I argue that international education produced more friction than harmony as proponents of authoritarian development and progressive internationalists negotiated the acceptable boundaries for the exercise of state power. / History