Social structures

African, Russian, and Ukrainian refugee resettlement in Portland, Oregon.

Article Excerpt
Issues related to international migration and its impacts on society and space have increasingly attracted the attention of geographers and other scholars during the past two decades (see, for example, the work of the geographers Boswell and Curtis 1984; McHugh, Miyares, and Skop 1997; Zelinsky 2001; Mountz and others 2002; Chacko 2003; Wright, Ellis, and Parks 2004). Individuals who embark upon the journey from home and travel to a new place of residence are transformed, as are the places where new migrants settle. Perhaps nowhere in the rapidly diversifying landscapes of the U.S. Pacific Northwest is this process as visible as in Portland, Oregon, a metropolitan area in the midst of rapid demographic, cultural, and economic transformation. Today the state of Oregon ranks eleventh in the nation in terms of total numbers of new refugees. Many arrive from places like the former Soviet Union, Somalia, Ethiopia, Bosnia, Vietnam, and Cambodia.

External Links

• African, Russian, and Ukrainian refugee resettlement in Portland, Oregon. Goliath / The Gale Group