La conformación de uniones mixtas entre personas inmigrantes y nativas se ha considerado un elemento central en el proceso de integración social, sobre todo cuando intervienen atributos como la nacionalidad y la identidad étnica. Aunque este tema ha sido ampliamente investigado en otros contextos, ha recibido menos atención en México. Este artículo busca analizar las dimensiones relacionadas con el proyecto migratorio, los discursos sobre la diferencia en México y el efecto del mestizaje sobre la formación de uniones y dinámicas de socialización de las personas. A partir de un acercamiento cualitativo que comprende el análisis de treinta y dos relatos de vida de inmigrantes latinoamericanos residentes en México, se encontró que este tipo de arreglos sociales no se traducen de manera directa en el debilitamiento de fronteras sociales, sino que pueden constituirse, en algunos casos, en elementos de reforzamiento de las barreras que dificultan la integración en distintas esferas de reproducción social.

This article analyses the scholarly results concerning the social phenomenon of intermarriage. It specifically focuses on the similarities and differences in the latter in Europe, between migrants and host society members, and between national minorities and majorities. The study shows that while intermarriage between migrants and host society members is often seen as a vehicle for bridging social gaps and promoting social cohesion, intermarriages between national minorities and majorities is more likely to lead to erosion of minority identities and cultural traits. Common challenges faced by intermarried couples include resistance from family members and bureaucratic obstacles, with gender dynamics playing a crucial role, particularly in traditional societies where women often bear the brunt of cultural assimilation. Intermarriage also promotes the perspective of the integrative nature of nation-states without requiring intervention by the states themselves. The article underscores the importance of deepening the discourse on intermarriage and focusing on the impact of the latter on both migrant and national minority communities through both quantitative analyses and qualitative approaches. This may improve the understanding of the transformative potential and challenges of these unions.

In this study, I use the type-variety-mode analysis to define the diagnostic ceramic material for the Ik'hubil Ceramic Complex dating to the Terminal Classic (ca. a.d. 780–930/1000). The percentages of shared ceramic content indicate that multiple sites in the mid-to-lower Sibun Valley are members of an Ik'hubil Ceramic Sphere. My preliminary analyses of sites in the lower Belize River valley suggest that the Ik'hubil Sphere may extend across a broader area of north-central Belize during the Terminal Classic, discrete from the Spanish Lookout Sphere in the upper Belize Valley. Northern Yucatec traits are identified in ceramics and architecture in the eastern Sibun and Belize Valleys, along with marked changes in foodways. The presence of trading diasporas and more intimate social relationships, such as intermarriage, may explain this mix of local and hybrid forms of material culture introduced by the ninth century in this part of the eastern Maya Lowlands.

Based on interviews with Lebanese in over 150 mixed-religion marriages and their extended family members, I argue that sect may conceal or stand in for other forms of difference, including ideas about status and hierarchy related to class and regional origin in Lebanon. Because it is the most readily available discourse for understanding social difference, parents often use sectarian rhetoric to describe their concerns about a variety of problems they see in their children's chosen partners. By listening between the lines of parental objections, I suggest that expressions of bias against people of other sects may mask concerns with other forms of social difference, in effect reducing a complex and shifting social field of multiple axes of difference into sect. Rather than assume sectarianism's a priori importance, this approach allows me to bring other discourses of difference and analytic lenses to the foreground.

Latino racial/ethnic intermarriage has grown over time, increases with each generation in the United States, and occurs most frequently with non-Hispanic Whites. This article answers the question: How does intermarriage change racial/ethnic consciousness for both partners? Drawing on in-depth interviews with thirty intermarried Latinos and non-Hispanic Whites, I critique assimilation, Whiteness, and colorblindness theories, finding two predominant racial consciousness outcomes of intermarriage: race cognizance and racial colorblindness. First, intermarriage can enhance Whites’ understanding of race/ethnicity and racism, a phenomenon I call race cognizance. Second, intermarriage can produce colorblind discourse that focuses on similarity, yet in ways inconsistent with colorblind racism. Racial consciousness varies by ethnicity: most intermarried Whites reported race cognizance, an outcome unforeseen by traditional theories of integration, whereas Latinos more often espoused colorblindness. These understandings are used in different contexts: race cognizance is stimulated by the public domain, whereas colorblindness is evoked in private space. These findings demonstrate that racial consciousness is fluid, and influenced by intermarriage and ethnicity.

This paper investigates the labor and marriage market incorporation of individuals originating from Turkey in comparison to other migrant groups in Sweden. Using high-quality register data from Statistics Sweden, the progress of and challenges facing this group are analyzed in comparison to their European and Middle Eastern counterparts, both over time and over generations. The descriptive results point to the economic progress of individuals from Turkey over time and over generations, especially in the case of native-born females. The results show that native-born individuals with an origin from Turkey are more likely to be employed as compared to their counterparts from the New 10 EU member states, Bulgaria and Romania, and the Middle East. However, those originating from Turkey are less likely to intermarry as compared to other groups. Further analyses indicate that individual characteristics are more important for native-born individuals, as compared to immigrants, in explaining the observed gaps in the labor market as well as the marriage market. However, the role of individual characteristics in explaining differences across groups varies by gender as well as by generation.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, Southern states decreed that one drop of African American blood made a multiracial individual Black, and even today, multiracial Blacks are typically perceived as being Black only, underscoring the enduring legacy and entrenchment of the one-drop rule of hypodescent. But how are Asians and Latinos with mixed ancestry perceived? Based on analyses of census data and in-depth interviews with interracial couples with children and multiracial adults, I find that the children of Asian-White and Latino-White couples are much less constrained by strict racial categories. Racial identification often shifts according to situation, and individuals can choose to identify along ethnic lines, as White, or as American. Like their Irish and Italian immigrant forerunners, the Asian and Latino ethnicities of these multiracial Americans are adopting the symbolic character of European, White ethnicity. We appear to be entering a new era of race relations in which the boundaries of Whiteness are beginning to expand to include new non-White groups such as Asians and Latinos, with multiracial Asians and Latinos at the head of the queue. However, even amidst the new racial and ethnic diversity, these processes continue to shut out African Americans, illustrating a pattern of “Black exceptionalism” and the emergence of a Black–non-Black divide in the twenty-first century.

Transnational history and the history of gender and sexuality have both been concerned with the issue of borders and their crossing, but the two fields themselves have not intersected much in the past. This is beginning to change, and this article surveys recent scholarship that draws on both fields, highlighting work in six areas: movements for women’s and gay rights; diverse understandings of sexuality and gender; colonialism and imperialism; intermarriage; national identity and citizenship; and migration. This new research suggests ways in which the subject matter, theory, and methodology in transnational history and the history of gender and sexuality can interconnect: in the two fields’ mutual emphasis on intertwinings, relationships, movement, and hybridity; their interdisciplinarity and stress on multiple perspectives; and their calls for destabilization of binaries.