Institute for Immigration Research (IIR)

Habib wins New American Voices Award

Colleen Rich — Fri, 08 Nov 2024 13:10:16 +0000

Habib wins New American Voices Award Colleen Rich Fri, 11/08/2024 - 08:10

On Thursday, Oct. 17, during the 2024 Fall for the Book festival, three finalists, three judges, and a group of readers gathered at ��AV’s Center for the Arts to celebrate the seventh annual Institute for Immigration Research New American Voices Award.

Shahnaz Habib, author of Airplane Mode: An Irreverent History of Travel, was awarded this year’s Institute for Immigration Research New American Voices Award. Photo by Fall for the Book

Shahnaz Habib, author of Airplane Mode: An Irreverent History of Travel, was awarded this year’s top prize of $5,000. Finalists Carrie Sun, author of Private Equity: A Memoir, and Alex Espinoza, author of The Sons of El Rey were each awarded $1,000.

The New American Voices Award was created in 2018 by Fall for the Book and Mason’s Institute for Immigration Research (IIR) to recognize recently published works that illuminate the complexity of the human experience as told by immigrants, whose work is historically underrepresented in writing and publishing. IIR Director Jim Witte announced the award.

This year’s judges—Myriam J. A. Chancy, V. V. Ganeshananthan, and Karin Tanabe—praised the strengths they saw in the 70+ submissions to this year’s contest. The books that most stood out “were all taking great risks, they were all very bold, and in ways that I hadn’t always realized you could be,” said Ganeshananthan.

Tanabe mentioned the stereotype of the “good immigrant” and how all the longlist and shortlist books challenged this narrative.

Habib is a writer and translator based in Brooklyn, New York. She translates from her mother tongue, the south Indian language of Malayalam, and has translated two novels. Airplane Mode is her first book.

The judges praised Habib’s book: “Through essays, both personal and well-researched, [Habib] tackles a wide range of travel-related topics from the history of passports to forests, carousels, and pickles. The realities she uncovers in the process are often as startling as they are eye-opening and reshape our sense of what it means to travel as a person from the Third World across disparate geographies, from the streets of Brooklyn to those of Istanbul.”

Fall for the Book is Northern Virginia’s oldest and largest festival of literature and the arts. All events are free and open to the public thanks to the generous support of sponsors including the Fairfax County Public Library, ��AV, the Fairfax Library Foundation, and the City of Fairfax.

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Heng wins 2023 New American Voices Award

Colleen Rich — Mon, 16 Oct 2023 14:50:37 +0000

Heng wins 2023 New American Voices Award Colleen Rich Mon, 10/16/2023 - 10:50

Author Rachel Heng has won the sixth annual New American Voices Award for her novel The Great Reclamation. She accepted the award at a ceremony at ��AV’s Center for the Arts during 25th annual Fall for the Book festival.

“When I first started writing this book, I wondered if anyone in America would want to read a book like this,” said Heng, who was born and raised in Singapore and is currently an assistant professor of English at Wesleyan University, “[but] the longer that I’ve been here, I’ve come to see a lot of similarities [between Singapore and the U.S.]. Both are countries of immigrants, [and] it means the world to me, truly, to have this novel recognized for those commonalities.”

The two other award finalists—Angie Kim, author of Happiness Falls, and DK Nnuro, author of What Napoleon Could Not Do—also read from and discussed their work at the event.

The previous winners of the New American Voices Award are Hernan Diaz’s In the Distance, Melissa Rivero’s The Affairs of the Falcóns, Lysley Tenorio’s The Son of Good Fortune, Patricia Engel’s Infinite Country, and Sindya Bhanoo’s Seeking Fortune Elsewhere.

The IIR is at the forefront of immigration research, producing high-quality research and timely analysis that examines the economic contributions of immigrants in the United States.

Fall for the Book is Northern Virginia’s oldest and largest festival of literature and the arts. All events are free and open to the public thanks to the generous support of sponsors including Mason, the Fairfax County Public Library, the Fairfax Library Foundation, and the City of Fairfax.

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Mason recognizes immigration advocate Diane Portnoy with honorary degree

Colleen Rich — Mon, 17 Jul 2023 14:00:12 +0000

Mason recognizes immigration advocate Diane Portnoy with honorary degree Colleen Rich Mon, 07/17/2023 - 10:00

In May 2023, ��AV honored philanthropist Diane Portnoy with an honorary doctor of humane letters, given in recognition of her extraordinary contribution to society and decades of service in support of immigrants and refugees.

Diane Portnoy, founder and CEO of The Immigrant Learning Center (ILC), speaking at ILC's 30th anniversay gala. Photo provided

Founder and CEO of The Immigrant Learning Center (ILC), Portnoy is a lead donor to Mason’s Institute for Immigration Research (IIR), which is an extension of her commitment through ILC to help more Americans understand the true picture of what immigrants and immigration mean for our country.

An immigrant herself, Portnoy came to the United States at the age of 3 when her family was able to obtain American visas through the Displaced Persons Act of 1948.

“My parents were Polish Jews who survived the Holocaust, but in the process lost their entire families,” said Portnoy. “I saw what immigrants go through; it was part of my upbringing.”

Portnoy barely survived the voyage, coming down with whooping cough. As they reached Ellis Island, her parents were terrified that the United States would not let her enter. After a week-long quarantine with her mother and a name change (Dina to Diane), the family boarded a bus for Malden, Massachusetts, where they settled along with other Holocaust survivors.

Portnoy's parents went on to create a life that seemed to embody the American dream. Along with many of their friends in the community, they bought homes, created businesses (her father opened a sweater store), and sent their children to college.

Portnoy saw firsthand that as her immigrant community took part in the American experience, they were also growing their town. Immigrants were building the local economy, contributing to society and culture in their neighborhoods, and creating a new generation of children who would grow up and do the same.

“Nobody spoke English. Nobody could afford to take English classes,” said Portnoy. “Think about it, many of them, including my parents, had no family, no money, no language, no knowledge of the culture.”

Becoming an entrepreneur like her father, Portnoy honored the challenges her parents had faced and opened the ILC in 1992 to provide free English classes for immigrants and adult refugees. Portnoy saw the positive impact of immigrants on the economy and understood that highlighting that message was a way to combat hostility toward them. She approached Mason with an idea.

“She wanted the institute to focus on the positive economic contributions of immigrants,” said IIR Director Jim Witte. “She said people still don’t get it and view immigrants as having a negative impact on the country. But immigrants have always helped build the United States, and that is continuing to happen today.”

A joint venture between the ILC and Mason, the IIR was established in 2012 with funding from Portnoy, who has donated more than $3 million in support since its inception.

“I had done some research and decided Mason would be a great place for this institute,” explained Portnoy. “It was already a very diverse community, and it was a place where you could get a great education without much money. A lot of immigrants and children of immigrants have gotten degrees there.”

Over the first decade, the institute has produced scholarly research that shows the positive impact of immigrants on the U.S. economy. The IIR’s work has influenced immigration policy on a national level, has been cited in academic publications, and has been featured by media outlets such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, Forbes, and more.

One of the institute's premier capabilities is its Immigration Data on Demand program, a free service that connects people with accurate data on immigrants.

“In just 10 years, the Institute for Immigration Research has become an important contributor to the work of policymakers, local jurisdictions, and government at all levels,” said College of Humanities and Social Sciences Dean Ann Ardis. “Its body of work is as diverse as the immigrants whose stories they bring forward. What Diane has done in establishing both the ILC and the IIR is exemplary; we are all in her debt for helping immigrants be at home and welcome in our country.”

This article originally appeared on the College of Humanities and Social Sciences website in a slightly different form. See the full article.

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Debut writers dominate immigrant writing award shortlist

Colleen Rich — Fri, 12 Aug 2022 20:55:50 +0000

Debut writers dominate immigrant writing award shortlist Colleen Rich Fri, 08/12/2022 - 16:55

Sindya Bhanoo’s “Seeking Fortune Elsewhere,” Daphne Palasi Andreades’s “Brown Girls,” and Aamina Ahmad’s “The Return of Faraz Ali” have been named finalists for ��AV’s Institute for Immigration Research New American Voices Award.

Celebrating its fifth anniversary, this award recognizes recently published works that illuminate the complexity of human experience as told by immigrants, whose work is historically underrepresented in writing and publishing. This year’s book prize was judged by authors Patricia Engel, Huan Hsu and Christopher Castellani. Engel won the award in 2021 and joined the ranks of previous winners Hernan Diaz, Melissa Rivero, and Lysley Tenorio.

The winning writer will receive $5,000, and the two finalists each will receive $1,000. The winner will be announced this fall, and all three finalists will join the judges for an award ceremony and reading to discuss their work. The event will be hosted by the Fall for the Book festival on Thursday, October 13, at 7:30 p.m. at Mason’s Fairfax Campus.

Bhanoo is a longtime newspaper reporter and a frequent contributor to The New York Times and The Washington Post. Castellini praised Bhanoo’s short fiction collection saying, “Bhanoo is an immensely talented writer who packs deep emotional punches into stories told economically and with elegant restraint.”

A graduate of Columbia University’s MFA Fiction program, Andreades was awarded a Henfield Prize and is recipient of a 2021 O. Henry Prize. Engel said of her debut novel: “Andreades offers an electric rendering of urban girls becoming women, their loyalties and fissures amid the wild and dislocating terrain of contemporary diaspora.”

A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Ahmad has received a Stegner Fellowship, a Pushcart Prize, and a Rona Jaffe Writers’ Award. Hsu described her debut novel as “an engrossing, beautifully written saga of identity, loyalty, class, and aspiration, all wrapped in a page-turning crime thriller.”

Fall for the Book, which runs October 12-15, 2022, is Northern Virginia’s oldest and largest festival of literature and the arts. All events are free and open to the public thanks to the generous support of sponsors, including the Mason, Fairfax County Public Library, the Fairfax Library Foundation, and the City of Fairfax. For more information, visit fallforthebook.org

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Foreign-born athletes have opportunity to help foster acceptance, understanding

John Hollis — Mon, 13 Jun 2022 18:43:25 +0000

Foreign-born athletes have opportunity to help foster acceptance, understanding John Hollis Mon, 06/13/2022 - 14:43

Foreign-born professional athletes in the United States can potentially serve as agents of inclusiveness and equality at the intersection of sports, immigration and inclusion.

“We believe that sports can provide an excellent opportunity,” said Marissa Kiss, a research assistant in ��AV’s Institute for Immigrant Research during a recent “Immigrants, Athletes and Inclusion” webinar.

The webinar also featured James Witte, IIR director; Michele Waslin, IIR program coordinator; and former Mason professor Earl Smith, who is now at the University of Delaware.

Today, 14% of the U.S. population is foreign-born, although immigrant representation is far greater in many professional sports, according to IIR figures. In 2019, more than 25% of Major League Baseball players and Women’s National Basketball Association players, 21% of National Basketball Association and more than 50% of Major League Soccer players were born outside the United States.

Their high visibility helps foster greater acceptance and understanding of immigrants and their contributions to America, the panelists said.

“These athletes came to the U.S. in all the same ways as other immigrants and faced the same challenges of starting a new life in a new city, and often a new language,” Kiss said.

Witte noted that the National Football League has never comprised more than 5% of foreign-born players, although those numbers could rise as the league expands its presence abroad, including four scheduled games in Europe for this fall.

Go here to listen to the webinar.

Go here for more about the IIR’s Immigrants, Athletes and Inclusion Initiative.

James Witte can be reached at jwitte@gmu.edu.

For more information, contact John Hollis at jhollis2@gmu.edu.

About George Mason

��AV is Virginia’s largest public research university. Located near Washington, D.C., Mason enrolls nearly 40,000 students from 130 countries and all 50 states. Mason has grown rapidly over the past half-century and is recognized for its innovation and entrepreneurship, remarkable diversity and commitment to accessibility. In 2022, Mason celebrates 50 years as an independent institution. Learn more at www.gmu.edu.

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Patricia Engel wins the 2021 New American Voices Award

Colleen Rich — Fri, 01 Oct 2021 12:33:46 +0000

Patricia Engel wins the 2021 New American Voices Award Colleen Rich Fri, 10/01/2021 - 08:33

Patricia Engel’s novel “Infinite Country” is the winner of the 2021 Institute for Immigration Research New American Voices Award, judged by authors Irena Reyn, Justin Torres, and Melissa Rivero.

Engel will receive $5,000 for the top prize and will accept the award at a virtual ceremony hosted by Fall for the Book on Friday, Oct. 15, at 7 p.m. Engel, born to Colombian parents, and herself a dual citizen, is an associate professor of creative writing at the University of Miami.

Fall for the Book and ��AV’s Institute for Immigration Research created the New American Voices Award in 2018 to recognize recently published works that illuminate the complexity of the human experience as told by immigrants, whose work is historically underrepresented in writing and publishing.

After finding out she won, Engel said: “As the daughter of immigrants, my writing is an offering to the community of millions around the world who make our home in diaspora, and who have our citizenry challenged at every turn. To have my work recognized by the Institute for Immigration Research, which prioritizes the complexity of migration, and among such extraordinary finalists, moves me deeply.”

Engel’s novel explores an immigrant family’s struggle of undocumented status and their divided existence between Bogotá and the United States. With the ever-menacing threat of being deported, a split family must weigh their allegiance to the past and to each other.

The judges described “Infinite Country” as “engrossing and daring from the very first sentence. Engel tells the story . . . masterfully over the course of two decades, shifting perspectives, and employing Andean myths to give us insight into her characters. In the process, she demonstrates how neither time nor borders can contain this family's connection or their love.”

Finalists Daisy Hernández and Anthony Veasna So’s estate each will receive $1,000.

The awards ceremony is virtual, and you can register for free here.