Life lines

the long version

Bacon's study centers upon the engrossing portraits of five immigrant families, each one a complex tapestry woven from the distinctive voices of family members. Attended by extensive field work among community organizations and analysis of ethnic media, Bacon exposes the interplay between the dense social interactions of family life, the primary locus of the experience of "Indianness," and the stylized rhetoric of "Indianness" that emanates from the world of voluntary associations and the ethnic press. This inventive analysis suggests that the process of assimilation which these families undergo parallels that experienced by anyone who conceives of him or herself as a member of a distinctive community in search of a place in American society.