Lives in transition: longitudinal analysis from historical sources

Further, she examines the aspect of social capital by describing the social support networks of the respondents, and analyzing how and why they change over time. Specifically, Chapter 3 demonstrates the importance of strong family ties; Chapter 4, illustrates how isolation due to poor family relationships and friendship can be due to weak work ties and strong intimate ties; Chapter 5 shows how social mobility can be attained when immigrants navigate and leverage social networks by strategically positioning themselves to gain access to information and resources that their social class would not normally permit them to attain; Chapter 6 discusses how domestic violence and abuse shapes and informs life outcomes of individuals by preventing them from developing the tools and insight to take advantage of opportunities when they arise; and lastly, Chapter 7 shades light on a case study of one women who is able to use institutional intervention to gain mental health treatment, get well, and as a result pursue education and career advancement. In general, Getting Ahead provides a rich and detailed analysis of the social advancement of low-income immigrant women, thus making an important contribution to the continuing study of immigrants and social mobility. This is especially prominent in Dominguez’s clear argumentation, deft use of visual information in charts and figures, and specifically her review of the literature on immigrants and African American experiences. The book only has two limitations: first, the assumption that by securing and keeping low-paying jobs the women have gained social mobility while it seems that there are limits to this mobility. Second, the nature of qualitative inquiry research findings of this study is not generalizable to the larger immigrant population. Admittedly, this book is invaluable because of the ethnographic longitudinal research design and its potential to provide information and incisive ideas that can lead to further theorizing and research in studying women at the intersection of transnationalism, labor mobility, immigration, neighborhood organization and social capital.