Belonging and Community
For immigrants, the process of "fitting in" and finding a sense of belonging can be complex. It often involves the negotiation of cultural identities and the pursuit of economic and social integration. In Texas, immigrants have formed close-knit communities, blending their cultural heritage with the Texan way of life. Not only do immigrants build communities around shared cultures and religions, they are also frequently at the forefront of promoting inclusion through intercultural and interfaith dialogue.
Jin-Ya Huang
“You can move a girl to Texas, you can never take the Chinese out of her. And the Taiwanese part is so inherently me, that I do introduce myself as Taiwanese-Texan sometimes, and I do embrace that.”
Daniele Volfe
“I talked to somebody, and our stories are not the same. What he wanted was the same that I wanted, because at that point, I wanted to get a green card. But his background, the reasons why he came, the paths he will have to take was completely different than where I was. But at the moment, I identified with him so much, because I knew exactly what he needed.”
Shakeel Rashed
“One of the things that I was really surprised about when I came here was that to everybody, my identity as a Muslim was more important than anything else.”
Nabil Yazdani
“There’s an organization called iACT, which is Interfaith Action of Central Texas. Baha’is participate in that, as do many other wonderful faith communities, and there’s things that we can learn from each other and have a lot of unity with.”
Natividad Quinto