This paper applies Lacy's (2004) concept of “strategic assimilation” to middle-class individuals migrating from the Global South to the U.S. and argues that immigrants can maintain ties to heritage culture as a status-enhancing assimilation strategy – what we call “one-up assimilation.” We draw on the omnivorism literature, which shows that broad cultural fluency and the ability to straddle multiple cultural worlds constitutes a form of cultural capital. We explain that middle-class immigrants who adopt a strategic assimilation approach are particularly well-suited to developing omnivorism and can use this cultural capital to symbolically subvert status hierarchies vis-à-vis middle-class natives. Using in-depth interviews with first-generation middle-class Dominican immigrants, we show that respondents pursue omnivorous lifestyles and perceive their bicultural fluency as an advantage they possess over their white middle-class U.S. counterparts. Consistent with theories on cultural distinction, we find that middle-class immigrants attempt to transmit this omnivore advantage to their children. © 2018 Elsevier B.V.

Immigration Cultural capital Strategic assimilation Omnivorism

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