Much research on immigrant societies assumes that ethnic groups are obvious units of observation and treat ethnic culture and community as self-explanatory variables. These assumptions are shared by otherwise quite dissimilar approaches, from assimilation theory to the transnational community paradigm, among many others. I show that these theories of immigrant ethnicity rely on a Herderian perspective on the world, which naturalizes its division into a series of distinct "peoples". Then I discuss three major analytical and empirical problems of this perspective. The second section introduces the ethnic boundary-making paradigm which avoids the Herderian conflation of ethnic culture, community, and category. This paradigm reconceives immigrant "assimilation" and "integration" as reversible, power driven processes of boundary shifting, rather than the result of overcoming cultural difference and social distance between distinct "peoples". The final section proposes five possible research designs which are thus well suited to avoid Herderian common sense.

Assimilation multiculturalism Ethnic boundary making essentialism Ethnicity Ethnic studies Theories of immigrant integration

[No Keywords available]