Loss and mourning in immigration: Using the assimilation model to assess continuing bonds with native culture

Abstract

This study examined the process of loss and mourning associated with immigration. Three broadcast interviews from Al-Jazeera network, an Arabic satellite channel, revealed different responses of Arab immigrants to losing their native culture. Theoretically, clinging to the lost culture may lead to isolation and ethnocentric withdrawal. A healthier response to loss is to mourn it. According to the Continuing Bonds model of mourning, immigrants incorporate elements of their native culture such as their families, friends, identity, language, values and traditions, into their new life structure. Instead of abandoning their emotional attachments to these cultural elements, immigrants may use them as resources that may help them adjust to their new countries and solve many problems they may face. The Assimilation Model, which has been used to assess psychotherapeutic progress, provides a language for describing a sequence through which elements of lost culture are assimilated into the immigrant's new life structure. This study revealed that a continuing bond with the lost culture is a part of the full assimilation and mourning of this culture.

Keywords:

• Acculturation
• immigration
• assimilation model
• loss
• mourning
• continuing bonds