Themes in the Career Development of 1.5-Generation Hmong American Women

Abstract

First and foremost, I would like to say thank you to my participants. I feel fortunate to have had this opportunity to hear each of your stories. It warms my heart and I feel excited to think about what is yet to come in your careers and your personal life journeys. I would like to acknowledge my committee members, Drs Michael Goh, Kay Herting Wahl, Tom Skovholt, and Bic Ngo for their time and their feedback. I would like to say a special thank you to my advisor, Dr. Michael Goh, for his guidance and support throughout my Ph.D. journey and throughout this dissertation process. During the most trying times in my academic, career, and personal journey, my friends, mentors, and family have made all the difference. I would like to acknowledge Patricia Neimanthank you for your mentoring and support. What is life without a little fun? To seasoned friends and new friends made along the waythank you for your friendship, nights of dinners and unexpected events, warm sunny vacations, and precious talks. A very special acknowledgement to my partner Mark Lewisthank you for your affection, your support, and your encouragement. My large family and the unconditional love that circulates within it continue to be my saving grace. To every member of my familyyou have a role in my life and I am thankful for each one of you. I would like to take this time to acknowledge a few selected members. To my parents, Pa Kao Yang and Blia Thaoyour journey of immigration to the United States and your resiliency throughout has been and continues to be my inspiration. To my sister and my brother-in-law, Kayla Yang-Best and Andre Bestyou have been my pillars of support since I moved to Minnesota to pursue my ii Ph.D. studies. Thank you for the delicious home-cooked meals and for your love. Kaylayou have been my role model ever since I can remember. I would not be who I am and where I am today without your inspiration. You are my sister and my best friend.

Asian American women's resilience: An integrative review

“…No theoretical papers that met the inclusion criteria were found in the search. There were nine qualitative research studies (Cheng, 2013;Chu & Leasure, 2010;Lee, 2013;Maruoka, 2008;Singh, Hays, Chung, & Watson, 2010;Soans, 2012;Sung, Szymanski, & Henrichs-Beck-2015;Yang, 2014;Yang & Shin, 2008) and two quantitative research studies (Lee, Brown, Mitchell, & Schiraldi, 2008;Lim & Ashing-Giwa, 2013) that particularly focused on AAPIW. The remaining ten research studies involved women from mixed racial groups (Clauss-Ehlers, Yang, & Chen, 2006;Lawson & Satti, 2016;Wakeel, 2009), both Asian men and women (Dial, 2007;Fujisaki, 2014;Hamid, 2007;Kallampally, 2005;Kodama, 2015;Ta, 2015), and both men and women from mixed racial groups (Kwong, Du, & Xu, 2015).…”

“…Family was the most common source of social support (Dial, 2007;Hamid, 2007;Kallampally, 2005;Lee et al, 2008;Lim & Ashing-Giwa, 2013;Wakeel, 2009). Other sources of social support evident in the studies were individuals from the church or temple, friends, and people of the same ethnic background (Chu & Leasure, 2010;Clauss-Ehlers et al, 2006;Kodama, 2015;Kwong et al, 2015;Lawson & Satti, 2016;Maruoka, 2008;Singh et al 2010;Sung et al, 2015;Ta, 2015;Yang, 2014;Yang & Shin, 2008). However, families, friends, and acquaintances from similar ethnic backgrounds were not always supportive.…”

“…For example, the 1.5-generation (those who immigrated to the United States when they were children) Hmong American women in Yang's (2014) study demonstrated resilience in dealing with the challenges of their career development by adopting positive perspectives instead of negative ones, focusing on achieving goals, and constantly reflecting on their actions to assess what they could improve on going forward. In Ta's (2015) study, Vietnamese American students characterized resilience as a strategy for navigating through different sources of support to achieve their educational goals.…”

“…South Asian young Muslim women demonstrated resilience by enduring discrimination for wearing the hijab and even paradoxically used the stigmatized veil as a symbol of confronting sexism and racism (Maruoka, 2008). Other representations of resilience as perseverance include Hmong American women's ability to broaden their perspectives about the barriers impeding their career development by considering different viewpoints (Yang, 2014); first-generation Vietnamese female students' actions of persevering in the face of numerous obstacles to achieve their academic goals (Ta, 2015); and South Asian women (who were also victims of sexual abuse) describing their resilience as being unyielding, and speaking of having a sense of hope despite living with the burden of a traumatic past (Singh et al, 2010).…”

Txoj Kev Ntshiab: Hmong American undergraduates’ perceptions of intellectual phoniness and psychosociocultural persistence decisions

“…Extending the current work on Hmong American undergraduates (Lin et al, 2015), the study provided an indepth exploration of the differences in and relationships of the psychosociocultural educational experiences of Hmong American undergraduates and their academic persistence decisions. Given the differences in gender roles and expectations for Hmong American males and females (Chiang et al, 2015;Lee, 1997;Moua, 2003;Vue, 2000;Yang, 2014), the study's first question address differences by gender. Similarly, differences by class standing (lower-division and upper-division) were explored as increased time within the environmental context influences their perceptions (Bennett & Okinaka, 1990;Lin et al, 2015;Lor, 2008;Vue, 2013).…”