View of the Literature…...………………………………………………

MIAMI UNIVERSITY The Graduate School

Certificate for Approving the Dissertation

We hereby approve the Dissertation

Tela Bayamna

Candidate for the Degree:

Doctor of Philosophy

Director Lisa Weems

Reader Denise Taliaferro Baszile

Reader Thomas Poetter

Graduate School Representative Gwendolyn Etter-Lewis

ABSTRACT

POST-SECONDARY EDUCATIONAL EXPERIENCES OF TOGOLESE IMMIGRANT WOMEN AND EDUCATIONAL ATTAINMENT

Tela Bayamna

Educational researchers are beginning to investigate the lived experiences of African immigrants in the United States. Very few studies documenting the experiences of West African immigrant women are available. Thus, existing literature on West African immigrants is not representative of all immigrants from this part of Africa. By exploring Togolese immigrant women’s migration and educational experiences in the United States, this study expands that literature. Using narrative inquiry methodology and feminist theories of gender identity and intersectionality, I explore the experiences of five Togolese immigrant women who recently pursued post-secondary education in colleges and universities in the United States. The study highlights the strategies Togolese immigrant women create and employ to navigate the patriarchal terrain in U.S. society as African women, as well as the educational system as Black women. This project offers insight to educators interested in improving the educational experiences for diverse students in their colleges and universities. The findings of this study offer guidance to African female immigrants and specifically Togolese female immigrants on how to navigate gender expectations about education and family in the United States. Given that Togolese immigrant women are not well represented in immigration literature, this study gives voice and visibility to an underexplored population.

Keywords: Family, gender identity, patriarchy, gender roles, intersectionality, post- secondary education, Togolese immigrant women, African immigrant women

POST-SECONDARY EDUCATIONAL EXPERIENCES OF TOGOLESE IMMIGRANT WOMEN AND EDUCATIONAL ATTAINMENT

Submitted to the Faculty of

Miami University in partial

fulfillment of the requirements

for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

Department of Educational Leadership

Tela Bayamna

Miami University Oxford, Ohio

2017

Dissertation Director: Lisa Weems

Tela Bayamna

2017 Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Introduction………………………………………………………………… 1

Chapter 2: Review of the Literature…...……………………………………………….. 3

Chapter 3: Theoretical Frameworks.....………………………………………………… 16

Chapter 4: Methodology….………………….……………………………………….… 31

Chapter 5: Data Presentation and Analysis…..…………………………..…………….. 37

Chapter 6: Discussion..…….…………………………………………………………… 71

References……………………………………………………………………………… 82

Appendices……………………………………………………………………………... 89

iii Dedication

To my mother, Kpagnida Bafaya, and my father, Siakou Bayamna, who guided and supported me to achieve the best in my life. The dedication goes specifically to my late father who did not live to see this day.

iv Acknowledgments

I express my sincere gratitude to my advisor, Dr. Lisa Weems, for her patience, her encouragement, her flexibility, and her support. She helped me manage effectively the various barriers I encountered during my research and during the writing of the dissertation. I thank my dissertation committee: Dr. Denise Taliaferro Baszile, Dr. Thomas Poetter, Dr. Gwendolyn Etter- Lewis for their insightful comments, for their time, and for refining my editing skills and revising my work to minor details. I also want to thank Dr. Kelly Waldrop who helped editing. I am grateful to Dr. Kathleen Knight Abowitz, the chair of the Educational Leadership Department, who in many ways supported me and contributed to make this dream come true. I am also grateful to Dr. Kate Rousmaniere for her helpful comments and her insightful critiques, which guided my reflection. I thank Cindie Ulreich, the department’s administrative assistant, for being available whenever I needed any help. I acknowledge Dr. Mary Jane Berman, who always encouraged me with positive remarks on my work. I thank my brothers and sisters for their prayers and support. I also want to thank my husband Georges and my sons, Bill and Christopher, for supporting and bearing with me throughout this journey.

Chapter One: Introduction

1.1 Purpose of the Study My interest in this topic is the result of my experience with gender expectations regarding education and family in Togo and in the United States as a graduate student and a working mother raising a family. Education, and specifically postsecondary education, is considered an essential component of sustainable development in Africa (Assie-Lumumba, 2007; Teferra & Altbachl, 2004). Women are recognized as key actors in the process of human development in Africa because of their responsibility for nurturing, upbringing, socialization, and education of their children (Browne & Barrett, 1991). However, social norms and values regarding gender expectations and identity impact educational outcomes. Tuwor and Sossou (2008) conducted a study on gender discrimination and education in West Africa and argue that, “girls in Togo are 20% less likely than boys to be enrolled in primary school, 25% less likely to reach high school and more than 50% less likely to enter University” (p. 370). Little research addresses the underrepresentation of women in post-secondary education in Africa and particularly in my nation of Togo. Research on female education in Africa includes issues such as female enrollment, retention, and participation in education and identifies socio-economic factors as the main factors that hinder female participation in schooling (Asimeng-Boaheme, 2006; Hyde, 1997; Leaper, Farkas, & Brown, 2012; Tuwor & Sossou, 2008). Research findings on African immigrant women experiences and specifically Togolese immigrant women experiences in the United States have received limited attention. Dion and Dion (2011) suggest that, “Studying the contribution of gender to immigrants’ experiences in the receiving society offers insights about the challenges confronting immigrant families” (p. 511). My curiosity with regards to the struggles of Togolese immigrant women in the United States led to this study. I wonder how Togolese immigrant women challenge gender discrimination. I ask myself what mechanisms or strategies Togolese immigrant women use to engage in oppositional action in their families. I wonder “what secrets, what practical advice and hard-earned wisdom, they might have shared with [me]. Wondering how like or unlike them [I am], how much our lives differ” (Bell-Scott & Johnson-Bailey, 1998, p. xv). I wonder what

experiences are common to Togolese immigrant women and what unexamined barriers may be inhibiting their participation in education in the United States and preventing them from enjoying their immigration. The purpose of this study was to understand how Togolese immigrant women make meaning of their experiences as gendered immigrants in the United States. The following research question guided my study: How do Togolese immigrant women negotiate gender expectations about education, culture, and family in the United States?

1.2 Significance of the Study Docquier, Lowell, and Marfouk (2009) suggest that women are poorly represented in immigration scholarship, and their invisibility is due to the fact that they “have long been viewed as dependents, moving as wives, mothers, or daughters of male migrants” (p. 297). Arthur (2009) also suggests another reason that explains the invisibility of women in immigration scholarship. In the view of Arthur (2009), African women are often invisible due to “being overshadowed by their male counterparts and immigrants from Latin America and Asia” (p. 2). This study is significant for a number of reasons. First, the experiences of Togolese immigrant women in the United States have not been studied. Thus, my research gives voice and visibility to an underexplored population. Second, it is important to explore the experiences of Togolese immigrant women to understand how they experience gender expectations about education, culture, and family and how those expectations affect them individually, their education, and, implicitly, their place in society. Third, no attention has been paid to whether Togolese women’s educations “remain secondary to their primary roles as wives, and under what structural conditions such changes take place” (Purkayastha, 2005, p. 181). Finally, with this study, I add to a larger body of knowledge about African female immigrants in the United States. This dissertation is organized into six chapters. The review of the literature in Chapter Two focuses on the background of gender politics in West Africa, education in Togo, im/migration, and international students in higher education. Chapter Three focuses on my theoretical framework of intersectional feminist theories. Chapter Four discusses the methodological approach used and makes an argument for the relevance of my method of inquiry. Chapter Five provides an interpretation of a brief life story of the participants. Chapter Six discusses the finding of the interviews in relation to the research topic.

Chapter Two: Review of the Literature

2.1 Gender Politics in West Africa The challenges that education faces in the 21st century in Africa include the low representation of women in more advanced levels of education, such as secondary education and higher education. For example, according to Daddieh (2007), in Ghana there is “significant gender segregation by discipline from senior secondary schools and above” (p. 157). In higher education, females tend to dominate in disciplines such as home economics, social science, and business studies, all of which prepare them for traditional female professions including catering, secretarial work, teaching, and social work, with important implications for postgraduate income disparities and social status (Daddieh, 2007). In other words, the schools channel men toward science and engineering fields, whereas women go to domestic fields, which are seen as female territories. According to Arthur (2009), historically, many women, especially those in rural Africa, were denied access to primary and elementary education because of cultural norms, which constrained them to “taking care of children and elderly relatives” (p. 16). Boys were given the privilege of being educated, and this preference prevented girls from participating and being included in education. Boys were expected “to carry the family name and legacy, inherit the family property, and manage the family business….Girls were often cast in the role of reproducers of future mothers and were groomed for marriage usually after the onset of puberty” (p. 16). Girls received training that tailored them toward domestic roles, such as “tilling the land and planting subsistence and cash crops with their mothers” (p. 16). Girls and women worked on harvesting and preparing produce for sale on market days. On the other hand, When boys complete elementary school, they may again be encouraged and given the financial support to pursue secondary education….The opportunities open to males to pursue secondary and tertiary education, unhindered by discrimination and sex stereotypes, ultimately position them to become favorable candidates for international migration. (Arthur, 2009, p. 16) This politics of socialization of children ensuress that boys and girls grow up in an environment that is not advantageous for girls.

Similarly, Asimeng-Boaheme (2006) posits that the prejudice about women’s academic and intellectual ability is developed from the early ages of boys and girls in Africa. Boys and girls are brought up under different environmental settings. Boys tend to be encouraged to be physically active, self-confident, courageous, and independent, while girls are socialized to be submissive, affectionate, and obedient. In this environment, the parents believe in the ability of the sons to care for themselves but become emotional when it comes to their daughters. This kind of environment affects boys and girls differently and leads boys to be better prepared than girls for education and for life. Hyde (1997) adds that the environment in which girls grow up in West Africa affects their participation in education. Parents’ attitudes toward girls’ education in West Africa have been a way of protecting them from foreign influence. Families protect their girls from foreign influence so that they can help perpetuate the culture. For example, Mazonde (2001) studied the influence culture and education had on each other in Africa over time, from the pre-colonial through the colonial to the post-colonial period, and sheds light on the socio-cultural practices and assumptions that challenge girls’ education in Africa. According to Mazonde (2001), girls are viewed by family members as eventually having responsibility for passing the culture on to their children. Primary schooling is viewed by families as a mostly foreign process that might negatively impact their daughters’ ability to pass on the culture. Many families also become concerned about the length of primary schooling, and as their daughters enter into puberty, they worry about the possibility of pregnancy. In some cultures, daughters are married at puberty. Thus, marriage is thought to be incompatible with sustained primary school attendance. Families are likely to withdraw their daughters from primary school as they approach puberty (Mazonde, 2001, p. 12). Girls’ education in Western schools was viewed as bad, and it was regarded in Northern Nigeria as “a threat to both Muslim and Hausa values” (Hyde, 1997, p. 20). In Northern Nigeria, girls’ education is not considered advantageous by women who consider their girls a commodity for their economic activity. Girls are discouraged from participating in education and are encouraged to participate in economic activities so that they can contribute to the family income. So, sending their girls to school may be viewed as counter to their family’s interest. The tradition demands that girls become married or undergo ritual initiations that prevent them from enrolling in school or continuing their education. Pregnancy and marriage channel females out of school at

an early age, and parents who decide to keep their children in school, and particularly their girls, only do it when it is cost effective. Another reason why parents do not want to send their girls to school is because the cost becomes greater as a child progresses through school, and the relative balance of costs and perceived benefits changes (Hyde, 1997). Since education is not free for all ages of students and levels of schooling, parents must make decisions about which children to educate and for how long. For example, in Togo, “In 1970, the government introduced a six-year basic compulsory and free education for all children between the ages of 2 and 15 years” (Tuwor and Sossou, 2008, p. 366). After 15 years, education is not free in Togo, and parents choose to invest in the education of their boys rather than that of their girls, assuming that their girls will get married and their husbands will provide for them; therefore, investing in the education of their girls is not cost effective. Moreover, even when African women manage to complete their education, they still face oppression and discrimination in the workplace. For example, Hyde (1997) posits that: There was some evidence that those women who did manage to complete their education successfully may have suffered pronounced discrimination on the job. For example, female engineers were sometimes not allowed on site or had great difficulty obtaining internship during their training. (p. 29) The oppression and discrimination that women face in the workplace can be traced back to the colonial period. According to Mama (2003), colonial colleges were dedicated to: the production of good colonial subjects intended to inherit the exclusive masculine mantle of colonial leadership and further the existing imperial interests dominating the African political and economic landscapes….The African universities established after independence did not mark a radical departure from the colonial modes of organizational and intellectual life already prevailing in the West….From a gender perspective, it is worth noting that colonial primary and secondary schooling was already heavily gendered, with women’s capacities being channeled almost exclusively into imported bourgeois notions of femininity centered on domesticity and wifehood….Women’s conventional nurturing roles also meant that they bore substantial responsibility for the raising and schooling of successive generations, often supporting the educational advancement of their own spouses and extended kin networks. (pp. 106-107)

In other words, leaders that African universities produced during the colonial period worked for the benefit of the rulers in the West, and even after independence, the modes of organizational and intellectual life in African universities mirrored those of the West and did not reflect the realities and life in African countries. In colonial primary and secondary schooling, women were not educated in college preparatory curricula. Rather, they were trained to become good wives and good domestic workers. The training women received in primary and secondary schooling can be compared to the training that Black female students received in the U.S. South between 1860 and 1935. This training included learning to sew and cook (Anderson, 1988). Arthur’s (2009) argument on education during colonial and postcolonial periods echoes Mama’s (2003) work and is in line with Anderson’s (1988) scholarship that explains, “The colonial and postcolonial systems of education continue to foster a climate where women’s roles become marginalized from full participation and access to economic and political decision making” (p. 15). Arthur (2009) adds that the period after colonization and the advent of mass primary and secondary school education gave many African women the opportunities to compete shoulder to shoulder with their male counterparts in all aspects of education (p. 16). However, injustice against women in society led to discrimination against them, in spite of educational achievement. The discrimination against women is revealed in Okeke-Ihejirika’s (2004) scholarship where she explored the personal and professional lives of four educated women in Nigeria. Okeke-Ihejirika’s (2004) argues that, even with education, Igbo women in Nigeria face cultural barriers that prevent them from achieving their personal and professional goals. The stories of these women can apply to a wide audience in Sub-Saharan Africa, and many women can relate to their experiences. Women try to negotiate power and privilege in the society even with higher degrees, and they are oppressed in their fight for social justice because of the social expectations that put them in a disadvantaged position and privilege men. Their husbands may support their decision to be in school, but they do not care about how their wives cope with education and insist that they run the home smoothly at the same time. Domestic demands are some of the challenges highly educated women face in their educational journeys; these demands are also a major constraint to the professional advancement of wives and mothers (Okeke-Ihejirika, 2004). According to Varghese (2006), there is a general belief that many of the private universities in Africa attract more male students than female students. The gender balance

depends on the subjects offered and fees charged. Courses offered in the colleges of Arts and Humanities with low levels of fees attract a larger number of female candidates. Courses such as arts and the humanities, communication, community development, and marketing are areas in which women outnumber men. However, courses offered in economics, business management, information technology, and accounting attract more male candidates. The motivation of females to conform to traditional gender roles and avoid male-dominated domains shows the extent to which African society is sexist.

2.2 Gender Politics in Togo The purpose of this study is to understand how Togolese immigrant women negotiate gender expectations about education and family in the United States. Tuwor and Sossou (2008) examined the issues of girls’ education from gender and socio-cultural perspectives with regards to Ghana, Nigeria, and Togo in West Africa and argue that gender inequality and discrimination takes its roots in patriarchy and socio-cultural practices, such as early marriage, child slavery, poverty, multiple household duties, and lack of economic and social opportunities, which are the root causes of low retention of girls in school as compared with boys. According to Tuwor and Sossou (2008), formal education was introduced in West Africa after the advent of various colonial governments and foreign missionaries, and it educated females to become competent within their domestic roles. Females were trained to become good wives and mothers as compared with boys who were trained to “earn livelihood for themselves and their families” (p. 365). In Togo in terms of female education, separate schools were established for them and the policy behind separate schools for girls was to afford them a little education along the lines of that given in the primary schools with emphasis on sewing, washing, ironing, and personal hygiene. (Tuwor & Sossou, 2008, p. 366) The education of females for domestic roles in Togo has its roots in formal education. Tuwor and Sossou’s (2008) findings are consistent with Teferra and Altbachl’s (2004) argument when they indicate that colonial authorities created school to train a limited number of African nationals to assist them in administrating the colonies. According to Ampofo, Beoku- Betts, Njambi, and Osirim, (2004), in Zimbabwe colonial women’s education was designed to prepare women as housewives and subsistence farmers. Additionally, Fafunwa (1967) indicated

that, “The French system of education in Africa was devised to create a society of ‘Black Frenchmen’ in Africa” (p. 6). The French system of education was created to incorporate French values, cultures, and institutions into French colonies, and this goal was achieved by sending a small number of students from these colonies to study in French universities (Tefferra & Altbachl, 2004). Fafunwa (1967) also demonstrates that, after African countries gained their sovereignty in the1960s, the curriculum content changed very little, and it still follows the colonial pattern of making African countries slaves of a system that may be working well in meeting the needs of the colonizers, but that is, in fact, unsuitable for the colonized. For example, regarding the executive secretary curriculum in Togo, Goura and Seltzer-Kelly (2013) indicate that despite the five decades since Togo achieved independence, the “curriculum still almost completely lacks Togolese references; much of the content of the curriculum is neither useful to, nor adapted for Togolese interests and social needs” (p. 50). In other words, the curriculum content does not reflect students’ lives; it does not reflect the reality in the local context and does not respond to students’ needs and the needs of people in Togo. The curriculum does not teach students their history, who they are, or what their culture is. The curriculum reflects Western civilization and way of life. Freire (1968/1993) believes that the lack of inclusion of local needs in the curriculum shows a negation of history. Fafunwa ‘s (1967) arguments support Teferra and Altbachl’s (2004) view that the legacy of colonialism remains a central factor in the educational system of African countries even years after they have gained their sovereignty. Teferra and Altbachl (2004) explain that the fact that the education of African students is done in the language of the former colonizers signifies that African countries still have some ties with their former colonizers, and these ties remain strong.

2.3 The Educational System in Togo Bafei (2011) indicated that the late 19th century is marked by the presence of European colonizers in their colonies, including Togo. Colonizers created schools in their colonies for the essential needs of administration and economic exploitation of the colonies. After the Berlin Conference in 1885, Germany took control of the coast until it withdrew from World War I in August 1914. France and Britain divided Togo, and France took a part of the territory called French Togo, and the British took the other part of the territory called British Togo. From 1920,

the English language was forbidden in the French zone, and in 1922, French was imposed in schools as the official language of Togo, and public education was dispensed only in French, reflecting Western civilization. Togo kept the education system imposed by the colonizer even after independence from France on April 27, 1960. However, the current Togolese system is organized by the Education Reform of 1975, which dictates six years of elementary school, four years of junior high school, and three years of senior high school (Bafei, 2011). Each of the three stages of school in Togo (elementary, junior high, and senior high) ends in a national test. French is still the official educational language of Togo. High school in Togo is designed to provide students with a fundamental education and a certain degree of specialization, which permits students to pursue higher education. In Togo, there are two major streams: general high school (lycee general) and technical high school/ vocational education (lycee techninique) (Bafei, 2011). The general high school is organized in different cycles: the letters cycle (serie A), where students specialize in literary studies and philosophy, and the science cycles (serie C and serie D), where students specialize in science, mathematics, economics, chemistry, and physics. Students in technical high school specialize in technical fields in addition to their general studies. At the end of the second year in high school (called Premiere in Togo and equivalent to 11th grade in the United States), students sit for a national test. Students who pass the exam receive the BAC I (the first part of Baccalaureate) or the “School-leaving certificate part 1” (Bafei, 2011, p. 252) and have access to Terminal class (12th grade in the United States). In completing Terminal, students sit again for another national test. Students who pass the exam receive the BAC II (the Baccalaureate in Togo, equivalent to the high school diploma in the United States) or “the School-leaving certificate part 2” (Bafei, 2011, p. 252), and they are admitted into higher education. In higher education, the degree programs vary between 3 to 8 years in length (Bafei, 2011). Students who receive their high school diplomas can go to university in the country, to vocational schools, and universities abroad. The tests that students take at each level of education are standardized tests that students pass or fail. Students who do not pass their tests must retake their year and take the tests again. Besides general education described above, the technical and vocational training schools were created after World War II, they were seen as a useful support to the enhancement of economic growth for France and her colonial possessions.

In reference to gender politics in Togo, Goura and Seltzer-Kelly (2013) suggest that the curriculum in technical and vocational training schools entails specific gender norms. For example, in post-baccalaureate vocational educational programs, generally there is a predominance of male students, and engineering and industrial fields enroll very few female students. There are few female students in male dominated fields. This is in part the consequence of gender discrimination, as it has been established in schools since the colonial period. In 1986, at the beginning of the executive secretary program, the entrance examination and admission decisions disregarded gender, and still the majority of students were male (Goura & Seltzer- Kelly, 2013). The executive secretary program is a program in which curriculum is “comprised of two groups: the principals…and the subsidiaries. The principals are: computer science, typing, professional writing, administration skills, stenography, French, and English. The subsidiaries are: economy, accountancy, law, and statistics” (Goura & Seltzer-Kelly, 2013, p. 49). The educational system strove to close the gender gap by recruiting and training more females in the program, and it gave the impression that the goal of female emancipation was being realized. Tuwor and Sossou (2008) add that with the advent of the education reform in Togo, the government created a law stipulating that all children between the ages of 2 and 15 must receive free education. This allowed nearly all primary school aged children to attend school and 27% of students to attend secondary school. Despite the free education for all children to age 15, a gender gap still exists in Togo with a current net enrolment of 67.7% for boys and 59.1% for girls at the primary school level and 67% for boys and only 33% for girls at the high school and secondary level (Tuwor & Sossou, 2008, p. 366). UNICEF strove to alleviate this gender gap in Togo through the African Girls’ Education Initiative, which hired female daycare center personnel, provided materials and equipment, and partially paid school fees of about 60% of females and 25% of males to help them stay in school. Even though the initiative has contributed to an increase of female enrollment and demand for educational services in Togo, female participation in education is still an issue due to several factors including “the weight of tradition such as early and forced marriages of young girls to elderly men, girls’ low self-esteem, a lack of female role models, and the trafficking of young girls to work as domestic servants” (Tuwor & Sossou, 2008, pp. 366-367).

2.4 Education as Reminiscence of Colonization in Togo The education system in Togo supports, enhances, and perpetuates European colonial exploitation and domination of the African peoples (Johnson, 1987). Our schools do not supply an environment that stimulates students’ responses or their intellectual and emotional dispositions to learn. Since the educators know that students must sit for standardized testing at the end of the different education levels, they spend all their time in the classroom preparing them for the tests. Teachers focus on topics that are included in the tests and devote their time acclimating students to the tests questions. The tests have very high stakes both for the students and for the teachers. Students’ futures are often dependent on their performances on the exams, and the exams are used as accountability measures to ensure that teachers are properly preparing students (Dowd, 2003). Per Dowd (2003), in Togo students are often expected to memorize responses to the exam questions like students in China. This form of education is tied to colonial education because students are not supplied an environment that can stimulate their responses; students study in an environment in which the future is not different from the past. They deal with a subject-matter that “consists of bodies of information and of skills that have been worked out in the past; therefore, the chief business of the school is to transmit them to the new generation” (Dewey, 1938/1997, p. 17). Compared to Anglophone areas, countries in Francophone areas, like Togo tend to require their students to take more formal examinations. The examinations in Francophone areas reflect the strong influence of the French baccalaureate as a colonial precursor (Dowd, 2003). The exams serve as selection tools used as the major component of entrance to our universities “much as the Scholastic Aptitude Tests in the United States were some years ago” (Dowd, 2003, p. 11). The examinations are also used to hold schools accountable. The administration of the tests in public and private schools is another aspect of Togolese schools that reflects the French model of examination even years after the independence of the country. Goura and Selter-Kelly (2013) indicate that: The criterion of knowledge is framed according to what is considered valuable for France, revealing the “copy and paste” model. Most critically, the entire system is focused upon preparing students to work in an economic system modeled along the lines

of the French system-even though this is no longer appropriate in the postcolonial era. (p. 50) Teachers reproduce over and over in their classrooms what is considered knowledge in the French educational system. This educational philosophy does not allow students to learn something new or to contribute to knowledge in the classroom. During tests, students are required to regurgitate what has been given to them by their teachers.

2.5 Im/Migration, Female Im/migration 2.5.A Im/migration. This study explores the experiences of Togolese immigrant women in the United States. Hagen‐Zanker (2008) suggests that, “Migration is the temporary or permanent move of individuals or groups of people from one geographic location to another for various reasons ranging from better employment possibilities to persecution” (p. 4). Immigrants are referred to by the U.S. Census Bureau as “foreign born.” The foreign-born population is comprised of those individuals who were not U.S. citizens at birth and includes naturalized citizens, legal permanent residents, temporary workers, and foreign students. It excludes those born to immigrants in the United States, including illegal immigrant parents (Zeigler & Camarota, 2015). The United States has a diverse group of immigrants in terms of their national origins. The Immigration Act of 1965 permitted the growth of immigration from poorer countries to the United States (Freeman, 1993). The apparent pre-9/11 relaxation of U.S. immigration policy, particularly the passage of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act, made it easier for students and professionals to remain in the United States. The Diversity Visa Program, in 1990, aimed at promoting immigration from underrepresented countries and regions of the world, contributed to strengthening African immigration to the United States (Thomas, 2011). According to McCabe (2011), significant voluntary migration from Africa to the United States did not begin until the 1980s. From 1980 to 2009, the African born population in the United States grew from just under 200,000 to almost 1.5 million. In 2009, almost two-thirds of African immigrants were from Eastern and Western Africa. The top countries of origin for African immigrants were Nigeria, Ethiopia, Egypt, Ghana, and Kenya. Over one third of all African immigrants resided in New York, California, Texas, and Maryland (McCabe, 2011, pp. 1- 4).

Thomas (2011) further suggests that, “considerable increase in African emigration to the U.S. occurred during much of 1980s, which was a period of declining African economic performance, otherwise referred to as the lost decade” (p. 6). Additionally, the U.S. Diversity Visa (DV) Program, created as part of the 1990 immigration reforms, facilitated the migration of approximately 20,000 Africans per year since its inception (Thomas, 2011, p. 8). According to Thomas (2011), “contemporary African immigrants arriving in the U.S. are more linguistically and culturally diverse….Nationals of French-, Portuguese-, and Arabic-speaking countries in Africa are becoming more willing to move beyond their traditional migrant destinations abroad (e.g., those in Europe)" (p. 22). Arthur (2000) surveyed African immigrants on the reasons for coming to the United States, and the four main reasons given were “the desire to pursue postsecondary education, to reunite with family members, to take advantage of economic opportunities, and finally to escape from political terror and instability” (p. 20). Moreover, Kamya (1997) indicated that the most important factors that account for the migration of Africans to the United States include kinship and the social, economic, and political landscape around the world. Further, Takougang and Tidjani (2009) observe that the failure by African states to provide economic opportunities for their citizens and the prevalence of corrupt and highly repressive regimes that have suffocated a vast range of individual freedoms contributed to the increased immigration. For example, Arthur (2000) indicated in his study that the past and present political climate in Africa is one of the reasons for African immigration. Economic conditions also justify the immigration of Africans. According to Arthur (2000), Africa’s rulers enrich “themselves at the expense of their citizens and use their ill-gotten wealth to consolidate their power and wage political terror” (p. 23). All this literature indicates that immigration scholars have focused on the “trends in African immigration” (Thomas, 2011) and have overlooked the experiences of African immigrants and, specifically, African immigrant women in the United States. The reason for the lack of literature on female immigration in the United States is explained below by immigration scholars.

2.5.B Female im/migration in the United States. According to Pessar (1999), scholarship on immigrant women in the United States was absent in the empirical research and the writing produced in the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s because of theoretical assumptions; the tendency

to disregard women’s contributions to economic, political, and social life; and a male bias. Most immigration scholars were influenced by neoclassical theory, and a male bias also existed in the works of many immigration historians of the period who assumed that only male immigrants’ lives were worthy of official documentation. Oishi (2002) points out that a “Neo-classical economic theory…attributes the patterns of international migration to the economic factors such as labor demand and supply, wage differentials, etc.” (p. 4). The differences in wages between sending and receiving countries are the cause of the labor migration. When looking at migration from a gender perspective, neoclassical theorists assume that most migrant workers are men; women follow their husbands or fathers and do not migrate in their own capacities as workers (Oishi, 2002). Women are men’s dependents, and they “migrate not only because of economic motives, but also to get married” (Hagen‐Zanker, 2008, p. 12). In the 1970s and 1980s, researchers devoted to the study of immigrant women attempted to fill the gaps, but they tended to treat gender as a mere variable rather than as a central theoretical concept (Pessar, 1999, pp. 578-579). Further, Brettell and Simon (1986) point out that women have been essentially left out of theoretical models about migration; they have generally been perceived either as non-migrants who wait in the sending areas for their spouses to return or as passive reactors who simply follow a male migrant. Immigrant women are viewed as dependents moving as wives, mothers, or daughters of male migrants (Docquier, Lowell, & Marfouk, 2009). According to Hattar-Pollara and Meleis (1995), immigrant women of West Africa come from cultures that are significantly different from that of the United States. In their new environment, they are often required to learn a new language and incorporate a variety of added roles without relinquishing those that are already established. They are expected to maintain an African cultural continuity through their traditional roles, while espousing new ones to establish a balanced family and, often, a professional life in Western society. With regards to cultural continuity, African women are not expected to redefine their roles or become independent from their husbands in their host countries. These expectations lead an African immigrant woman to be confronted with “several problems in her role as mother-wife in a different cultural system. The process of integrating her new role as immigrant and mother with her minority status is complex and filled with stress” (Arthur, 2000, p. 112). Moreover, as they attempt to forge or negotiate entrance into mainstream society, African women are pressured to become acculturated or accept assimilation into the

broader patterns of social roles in the host society. They are faced with the traditional gender roles that they have brought with them from Africa, and they have to confront gender discrimination and sexism as they seek incorporation into the work place. The resolution of these role conflicts ultimately determines which roles they will validate and which they will redefine (Arthur, 2000, p. 123).

Chapter Three: Theoretical Frameworks

The understanding of the experiences of Togolese immigrant women is important to make sense of how they negotiate gender expectations about education, culture and family in the United States. In my work, I highlight intersectionality, family, patriarchy, gender identity, and gender roles for my theoretical frameworks. I use an intersectionality framework to envision how the “intersecting patterns” (Crenshaw, 1991) of these cultural, familial, patriarchal, gender identity, and gender roles contribute to the oppression of Togolese immigrant women in the United States. The theory of intersectionality will assist in creating a view of the factors that influence the experiences of Togolese immigrant women.

3.1 Intersectionality Crenshaw (1991) uses intersectionality in her scholarship to help us understand the lives of Black American women in the United States. In the view of Crenshaw (1991), the lived experiences of Black women can be understood through the different oppressions that they experience in the society, as well as in their families. According to Crenshaw (1991), the experiences of women of color are frequently the product of intersecting patterns of racism, sexism, and classism, three elements that are structurally defined and institutionalized. For example, for the purpose of this study, the understanding of the experience of being African immigrant women in the United States cannot be understood in terms of being African and being a woman, considered independently. According to Mikell (1997): African women think of their responsibility as dual: the bearing of children is a primary responsibility, and their status as “women” depends on this, but their responsibility for maintaining the family, village and community is also crucial. No self-respecting African woman fails to bear children. (p. 9) In other words, African women take their reproductive task seriously and celebrate it because, in their view, their identity as African women depends on their ability to give birth, the most important responsibility, and take care of their family, village, and community needs. The understanding of African women experiences must include these interactions that reinforce each other.

Like Mikell (1997), I believe that the understanding of the experience of being a Togolese immigrant woman in the United States cannot be understood in terms of being African and being a woman, considered independently. The understanding of the interconnections that exist between being African and a woman is important for the understanding of their experiences. With regards to African women, Davis and Graves (1986) point out that: Black woman of Africa suffers threefold oppression: by virtue of her sex, she is dominated by man in a patriarchal society; by virtue of her class she is at the mercy of capitalist exploitation; by virtue of her race she suffers from the appropriation of her country by colonial or neo-colonial powers. Sexism, racism, class division; three plagues. (p. 32) Davis and Graves (1986) refer to the interaction that exists between the multiple forms of oppressions (three plagues) that African women suffer. These multiple forms of oppression reinforce each other, and the experience of an African woman cannot be understood without the understanding of the intersectionality between these three plagues. This African feminism has some affinity with the U.S. Black feminism and intersectionality that Crenshaw (1991) talks about in her scholarship. However, U.S. Black feminism distinguishes itself from African feminism with regards to racism. The racism African women suffer comes from the appropriation of their country by colonial or neo-colonial powers, whereas the racism Black women suffer in the U.S. comes from the segregation that exists between Whites and people of color due to the history of slavery and economic and structural domination. African women and Black women in U.S. both experience domination, but the sources of the structural domination are somewhat different. Johnson (2014) also believes that the experiences of African women can be understood through the framework of intersectionality and gender performance. Johnson (2014) studied the career paths of five senior administrators from different countries in sub-Saharan Africa, including Zimbabwe, Ghana, Madagascar, and Nigeria, and indicates that female education is undervalued in Africa, and women who defy the culture and make a place for themselves in higher education deal with difficulties associated with ridicule as a result of efforts to overcome obstructions. The research participants in Johnson’s (2014) study revealed that they were prescribed a litany of expectations in their careers and felt like being a woman in higher

education required a specialized effort that involves social practices predetermined by the African context. For example, they were expected to serve as role models in their positions as administrators and as mothers who provide motherly support to colleagues, faculty, and students. They were both rewarded and burdened as a result of assuming these expectations (Johnson, 2014, pp. 843-846). These women struggled daily to perform their duties as administrators because of the expectations in their workplace. Like Davis and Graves (1986), I define intersectionality as the interlocking forms of oppression including racism, sexism, and class divisions faced by Black women of Africa. The understanding of the interaction that exists between family, patriarchy, gender identity, and gender roles contributes to the understanding of the experiences of Togolese immigrant women. Among all these elements, in this study, community members rise to the top and pressure the individual more so than any other element. The understanding of the importance Togolese immigrant women place on their gender roles and gender identities contributes to the understanding of their experiences in the United States. The characteristics of the Togolese immigrant women I interviewed in terms of understanding the education/family balance and gender expectations contributed in the understanding of their experiences in the United States; it also contributes to the understanding of the mobility of gender expectations from Togo to the United States and how they play out.

3.2 Family The place of women in African families explains the process of gender construction and maintenance through beliefs and pressure. According to Arthur (2000): To most Africans, the family is a community of people related by blood and marriage. The maternal and paternal ancestry of the family members, together, determine the spirit and personality of the individual. Families have a governing structure that is responsible for the management of family resources, assets, and conflicts. Families are extended...the African family generally remains extended. (p. 96) In the Togolese family, the extended family is composed of people related by blood and marriage, such as the legal parents and children including grandparents, cousins, nieces, and nephews. In other words, in Togo, “It is unusual to have a father, mother, kids in a household…exclusively” (Sellers, Ward, & Pate, 2006, p. 54), as is the case in most

Industrialized western countries like the United States. Another aspect of Togolese family is that, in the family: Women’s workload is generally extensive and includes taking care of children and elders, cooking, housework, and potentially farming, fishing and trade. Due to their important domestic roles women are always influential, but to a varying degree depending on the size and composition by age and sex of the household and its economic conditions. The general norm for women in relation to the extended family is to care for the kinship group when necessary by supporting the members economically and socially according to their demands and expectations (Skjortnes & Zachariassenb, 2010, p. 197). Women perform a wider range of roles, and the power they have over members of the family depend on many factors including the size and composition by age and sex of the household and how active they are economically. In Togo, family members, especially parents, are the earliest sources of influence. Family members help people assert their identities by categorizing them and putting them in different boxes. The social categorization starts from a very young age, and girls and boys construct their identities through their interactions with their peers and through their participation in social activities. The participation in social activities helps increase their sense of belonging to a specific group. In the Togolese context, a woman is considered a woman by virtue of her abiding by gender expectations. In other words, the ideal Togolese woman is: content with her subordinate position as wife, mother and beast of burden. She is passive in the face of abuse, tolerant of all forms of infidelity; her only real ambition is to retain respectability by laboring for the maintenance of a stable marriage and family and seeing to the satisfaction of her husband’s desires. (Goredema, 2010, p. 38) The understanding of womanhood is embedded in the traditional understanding of women’s subjectivities. One of the main characteristics of womanhood is submissiveness. The submissiveness of women is highlighted in a study done by Kevane (2000) in Burkina Faso, where he indicates that women are submissive in terms of personal ritualized gestures toward men, such as kneeling with bowed head when talking with men. Other rituals performed by women include lowering their voices when talking, not voicing their opinions, or not confronting their partners and elders. These practices are nonchalant rituals performed by women because the culture manipulates them “to accept their oppression, to cooperate in maintaining it and to resist

their liberation” (Uchem, 2001). Like Black mothers in the United States, women in Africa are expected to live lives of sacrifice (Hill Collins, 1990). Mora (2006) posits that Chilean women are extremely self-sacrificing and limited in their knowledge of themselves; women give everything and often get nothing in exchange. Women are submissive, they limit themselves, and accept the limitation that others impose on them, but they are also fighters. They limit themselves in the sense that it is often assumed that they cannot study beyond a certain point because they are supposed to get married and be provided for by their husbands. When they migrate abroad, African immigrants’ families replicate their family life. For example, Arthur (2000) did a study to understand the experiences of African immigrants in the United States and indicates that, during their immigration process: Immigrant families replicate African Kinship structures that are central to their survival in the United States. They tend to cluster in particular neighborhoods for collective security in dealing with the problems of daily living….For the women, traditional roles and expectations defining how children are to be raised are predetermined and deviations from those roles are rare. (p. 112) In other words, in the United States, African immigrant families perpetuate the traditional family values, and women are not expected to redefine their roles as mothers or caretakers. In my view, during their time in the United States, African immigrant women experience pressure in their families while accomplishing constructed gender roles such us caring for children and doing household chores.

3.3 Patriarchy In this section, I discuss the relationship between sexism and patriarchy. Different theories in different social contexts address patriarchy differently, and it is different from one society to the other. For example, according to Goredema (2010), in Africa: Patriarchy and how it is practiced presents many problems for the African woman. Many theorists have used the term “patriarchy” in African contexts to refer to the organization of social life and institutional structures in which men have ultimate control over most aspects of women’s lives and actions. For instance, men have access to and benefit from women’s labor more than the reverse. Historically, the sexual division of labor was

organized in such a way that women were (and still are) the primary caregivers, and were responsible for the bulk of food cultivation and/or processing. Women therefore played central, but socially subordinate roles in African society. (p. 39) Shankar and Northcott (2009) point out that patriarchy refers to social systems that promote the economic and political oppression and selfish utilization of women by men; it often takes place in discussions of women of color in developing countries and immigrant women within North America (p. 425). This means that patriarchy is a relationship of domination between men and women and affects every aspect of life. Patriarchy is viewed by Coetzee (2001) as an ideology, a false value or belief system, that can be described as: A set of social relations between men, which have a material base, and which create interdependence and solidarity among men that enable them to dominate women….In the sphere of morality, the ideology of patriarchy suggests that women and men ought to demonstrate different (fixed) characteristics, in terms of which masculine values are viewed as appropriate to the public sphere (of social power) and feminine values relate to the private sphere (of domestic interchange). (pp. 301-302) Kandiyoti (1988) also suggests that, “of all the concepts generated by contemporary feminist theory, patriarchy is probably the most overused and, in some respects, the most under theorized” (p. 247). This is complicated by the usage of the concept by radical feminists who on one hand identify patriarchy to “virtually any form or instance of male domination” and on the other hand social feminists who mainly “restrict themselves to analyzing the relationships between patriarchy and class under capitalism” (Kandiyoti, 1988, p. 274). Consequently, the usage of the term patriarchy “obfuscates rather than reveals the intimate inner workings of culturally and historically distinct arrangement between the genders” (Kandiyoti, 1988, p. 275). For the purpose of this study, I focus on patriarchy in a general sense of male dominance. The patriarchal system in Togo inscribes acceptable behavior and undesirable behaviors. Women are not expected to be ambitious and brave, rather they should be passive, timid, and show some lack of confidence in themselves. They should not have much going for them and should seem to need a man in a relationship. Women who do not have these qualities have a hard time getting married and remaining married because they humiliate male pride with their behavior. In this patriarchal system,

If you do something out of the ordinary, men are more inclined to see you as a fellow man than to acknowledge that you have accomplished something important as a woman. That would present too much of a threat. (Nfah-Abbenyi, 1997, p. 12) The social regard for what women do every day of their lives is powerful and aids in the construction of gender. When women are prescribed certain positions in the society, it distances them from other positions they could hold. We know from the French philosopher Descartes that when one can think, one becomes aware of existence. Implicitly, if one cannot think, one cannot be critical about existence and can be easily oppressed. The lack of critical thinking leads to the oppression of women. Mariama Bâ, a Senegalese writer, believes that it is the responsibility of the woman writer to write about the condition of African women. According to Bâ (as cited in Nfah-Abbenyi, 1997): Plus qu’ailleurs, le context social africain etant caracterise par l’inegalite criante entre l’homme et la femme, par l’exploitation et l’oppression seculaires et barbares du sexe dit faible, la femme-ecrivain a une mission particuliere. Elle doit, plus que ses pairs masculins, dresser un tableau de la condition de la femme africaine. [More than anywhere else, the African social context being characterized by the glaring inequality between man and woman, by the exploitation and the centuries-old, savage oppression of the so-called weaker sex, the woman writer has a special task. She must, more that her male counterparts, paint a picture of the African woman’s condition]. (p. 13) The picture of the African woman’s condition has been explored by Ogundipe-Leslie (1994) who used metaphors in her work to help us understand how the historical, material context of the culturally diverse condition of Africa contributed to the oppression of women though patriarchy. In the view of Ogundipe-Leslie (1994), an African woman has six mountains on her back including colonialism, tradition, backwardness, men, her race, and herself. In reference to colonialism, Ogundipe-Leslie argues that “The African woman lives in or comes from a continent that has been subjected to nearly five hundred years of assault, battery, and mastery of various kinds” (pp. 107-108). Ogundipe-Leslie (1994) adds that, The colonial systems negatively encouraged or brought to the fore the traditional ideologies of patriarchy or male superiority which existed in African societies originally….Colonization has affected the legal structures of African societies,

introducing into them nineteenth-century European ideas of patriarchy. Women lost inherited special rights and became more subordinated. (pp. 109-110) Tradition, the second mountain on an African woman’s back, represents gender hierarchy or male supremacy, which was taken for granted in “most African societies, whether patrilineal or matrilineal” (Ogundipe-Leslie, 1994, p. 112). The third mountain, “Her backwardness, is a product of colonialism and neo-colonialism, comprising poverty, ignorance, and the lack of a scientific attitude to experience and nature” (p. 113). Race, the fourth mountain, “affects the economics and politics of North-South interaction” (p. 113). The fifth mountain that the African woman has on her back and that she must throw off is man because “he does not wish to abandon” (p. 113) the privilege of patriarchy, and the sixth mountain on woman’s back—herself—is the most important. Women are shackled by their own negative self-images, by centuries of the interiorization of the ideologies of patriarchy and gender hierarchy. Their own reactions to objective problems, therefore, are often self-defeating and self-crippling. (p. 114) In reference to the sixth mountain that an African woman has on her back, we can understand Valian’s (2004) argument when he indicates that women have a self-perception of low entitlement, and this attitude impacts them negatively. It is important to mention that women themselves contribute to oppression by oppressing their peers. In her article, “Bargaining with Patriarchy,” Kandiyoti (1988) describes how women contribute to their own oppression. Kandiyoti (1988) suggests that: Woman’s life cycle in the patriarchally extended family is such that the deprivation and hardship she experiences as a young bride is eventually superseded by the control and authority she will have over her own subservient daughters-in-law. The cyclical nature of women’s power in the household and their anticipation of inheriting the authority of senior women encourages a thorough internalization of this form of patriarchy by women themselves….The cyclical fluctuations of their power position, combined with status considerations, result in their active collusion in the reproduction of their own subordination. (p. 279-280) A young bride accepts and cooperates in maintaining her oppression because she knows that, when she becomes a mother-in-law, she will have the opportunity to oppress her daughters-in-

law the same exact way she was oppressed. It is a vicious circle in which women, themselves, participate in oppression and resist their liberation. Women also contribute to their own oppression in academia in many ways. For example, when women perceive themselves as worth less and entitled to less, it conversely affects men, leading them to see themselves as worth more and entitled to more. Women’s lack of entitlement, and people’s expectations that they will not behave in an entitled manner, influences the jobs that they are called upon to do and accept doing (Valian, 2004, p. 212). Additionally, Courville (1993) analyzed the patriarchal relations in pre-capitalist Zimbabwe and specifically in Shona and Ndebele feudal states and explained how the division of work, women’s exploitation, and oppression were structured in precolonial patriarchal societies and in postcolonial patriarchal societies and how they played a crucial role in women’s oppression in Africa. Courville (1993) points out that, “The exploitation and oppression of African women were shaped within the context of patriarchy and simple commodity production” (p. 34). Despite the oppressive and exploitative nature of precolonial patriarchal societies, African women were not powerless victims. During this precolonial time, colonial administrators and Europeans missionaries did not like “the killing of widows, the use of women and children as collateral for debt, and child marriage” (p. 38). In the view of Nnaemeka (2004), women learned to survive in the patriarchal system through negotiation, which: has the double meaning of “give and take/exchange” and “cope with successfully/go around.” African feminism (or feminism as [she has seen it] practiced in Africa) challenges through negotiation and compromise. It knows when, where, and how to detonate patriarchal land mines; it also knows when, where, and how to go around patriarchal land mines. In other words, it knows when, where, and how to negotiate with or negotiate around patriarchy in different contexts. (p. 378) African women negotiate patriarchy to their advantage by coping with situations and compromising rather than quarreling about gender inequality. For example, African women cope with situations by catering more to their husbands’ needs, becoming silent, and making themselves invisible in the family. These behaviors reinforce the power of the man as head of the household and decision maker. Regarding African women’s survival in the patriarchal system, Nnaemeka (2004) notes that, when informed that some state governments had refused to

implement the federal government policy of giving a housing allowance to married female public servants, Ifeyinwa Nzeako, the National President of Nigerian National Council of Women’s Societies (NCWS): rather than quarrel about the gender inequality in the allocation of fringe benefits, issued a statement pointing out that the discrimination policy hurts women by depriving them of the benefits to provide for their children. Knowing how to negotiate cultural spaces, the NCWS leadership shifted the argument from gender equity to family wellbeing/children’s welfare and accomplished its goals. (p. 381) Johnson (1987) also posits that, “While ‘unwanted improvisations’ of gender are punished in most contexts, women may be able to discover how to use gender expectations, norms and acts to their benefit within sub-Saharan Africa” (p. 838). Ogundipe-Leslie (1994) argues that African feminists fight against the oppression of women in Africa, and African feminism did not start with the assimilation of Euro-American values by Africans. During pre-colonial times, there were indigenous feminists who fought for women’s rights. African cultural practices that indigenous feminists fought against before precolonial times and throughout the period of colonial domination still and today “allow men to inherit women as a form of property/as slaves of male controlled families” (as cited in Davis & Graves, 1986 p. 4). Mekgwe (2008) posits that one thing that differentiates African feminism from feminism in the West is that African feminism includes the opposite sex, the male, and does not accept separatism from it (p. 16). A typical example on the inclusion of the opposite sex is illuminated in Davis and Graves’ (1986) scholarship: African feminism…is not antagonistic to African men but challenges them to be aware of certain salient aspects of women’s subjugation which differ from the generalized oppression of all African peoples…[it] recognizes that certain inequities and limitations existed/exist in traditional societies and that colonialism reinforced them and introduced others….It acknowledges its affinities with international feminism, but delineates a specific African feminism with certain specific needs and goals arising out of the concrete realities of women’s lives in African societies…[it] examines African societies for institutions which are of value to women and rejects those which work to their detriment and does not simply import Western women’s agendas. Thus, it respects

African woman’s status as mother but questions obligatory motherhood and the traditional favoring of sons…it respects African woman’s self-reliance and the penchant to cooperative work and social organization…[it] understands the interconnectedness of race, class, and sex oppression. (pp. 8-10) According to Davis and Graves (1986), African feminism should focus on the culture in African countries. In other words, African feminism should reflect the realities and culture of African women. The rationale behind this argument is that African feminists should include men in the struggle for positive change and the humanization of women in Africa. Men are only challenged to become aware of women’s oppression and act accordingly for a positive change that will be beneficial for men, women, and the whole society. This view on African feminism is shared by Mekgwe (2008) in his scholarship where he suggests that, “Feminist practitioners, in writing and in activism, sought to demonstrate that they were relevant to the African context and in particular, that they did not simply seek to emulate their western’s feminist counterparts” (p. 13). Similarly, Goredema (2010) added that: African feminism is a feminist epistemology and a form of rhetoric that has provided arguments, which validate the experience of women of Africa and of African origin against a mainstream feminist discourse. It is a justice…a social movement that aims to raise a global consciousness which sympathizes with African women’s histories, present realities and future expectations. African feminism concerns itself not only with the rights of women from Africa but is also inclusive of those living in the Diaspora as many of the contributors to the literature have often lived “abroad”.…African feminism returns to the iconic categories that put a spotlight on the differences between African and Western Feminisms initially. They are the following: 1.) Culture/Tradition, 2.) Socio-economic and socio-political issues, 3.) The role of men. 4.) Race, and 5.) Sex and/or sexuality. These categories are fundamental because they are the cement that holds the discourse of African feminism. (p. 34) African feminism is a knowledge; it is a framework against injustice that validates the experiences of women of Africa and of African origin. African feminism wants to bring social justice to the lives of African women living in Africa and abroad through global consciousness.

It is my hope that, by exploring the experiences of Togolese immigrant women in the United States, I have responded to the goal of African feminism, which concerns itself not only with the rights of women from Africa, but also with the rights of those living abroad.

3.4 Gender Identity The term gender as it pertains to the study cannot be analyzed in isolation. It is in conversation with the cultural meaning and the contexts that are attached to it. Many theorists of gender are in common agreement that gender is not biological; it is socially constructed, so perceived differences between men and women are cultural, not biological. Feminists’ perspectives on gender and sex shed light on how the understanding of the concept gender could help us in the understanding of gender roles in Togo. Nfah-Abbenyi (1997) interprets feminists’ explanation of the difference between sex and gender in the following way: Most feminists differentiate sex from gender. Sex is understood as a person’s biological maleness or femaleness, while gender refers to the non-physiological aspects of sex, a group of attributes and/or behaviours, shaped by society and culture that are defined as appropriate for the male sex or the female sex. Gender is not given at birth; only the actual biological sex is. Gender identity then begins to intervene through the individual’s developing self-conception and experience of whether he or she is male or female. (pp. 16-17) In her early work on gender, Simone de Beauvoir, a French philosopher, shares the above perspective on gender and sex, and she is to be commended for arguing that one is not born a woman. According to Butler (1986), in the view of de Beauvoir, sex should be distinguished from gender because gender is an aspect of identity gradually acquired. Gender is a received cultural construction imposed upon identity; gender is constructed by a personified system of patriarchy (pp. 35-36). West and Zimmerman (1987) reinforce de Beauvoir’s idea about gender and sex when they argue that: Sex is a determination made through application of socially agreed upon biological criteria for classifying persons as females or males….Sex category is…established and sustained by the socially required identificatory displays that proclaim one’s membership

in one or the other category….Gender, in contrast, is the activity of managing situated activities appropriate for one’s sex category. (p. 127) The social construction of gender impacts our identity, and we tend to want to have the appearance that is consistent with the social construction of our gender. The social division of labor also impacts our identity and leads us to want to perform specific activities. A typical example on labor division and gender roles in Togo is shown in Goura and Seltzer-Kelly’s (2013) scholarship, which indicates that: In Togo, as in most African countries, current social roles still carry traditional norms. Boys are considered the heirs to the cultural heritage and the principal earners, while the women bear the responsibility for children’s education and the household. Gendered differentiation of roles is a longstanding practice throughout Africa, although the traditional model was typically one of complementary rather than of strict hierarchy. For example, while both sexes might work in farming or trade, the individual tasks may be sex-specific: men prepare the land for planting while women tend crops; women transport crops to market while men fell trees and cut brush, etc. (p. 57) Current social roles in Togo still reflect traditional norms. They reflect labor division between boys and girls, as well as men and women, and deviation from the norms is not encouraged.

3.5 Gender Roles For the purpose of this study, I argue that gender roles refer to specific roles a person is expected to accomplish in the society as a male or a female. Fischer and Arnold (1990) indicate that, “Gender-role attitude refers to an individual's level of agreement with traditional views regarding the roles and behaviors stereotypically allocated to each sex” (p. 335). The performance of these roles contributes to the development of behaviors that are acceptable within specific contexts and that men versus women are expected to have. Helmreich and Spence (1978) observed that gender-role attitudes reflect the extent to which a person agrees or disagrees with norms regarding appropriate behaviors for men and women. The development of gender roles depends on peoples’ attitudes toward these roles and the contexts in which they are developed. Women learn and internalize the beliefs that they express in their behavior. These behaviors are culturally specific. Helmreich and Spence (1978) suggest that:

Relative to women with more egalitarian attitudes, women with more traditional gender- role attitudes may do more to fulfill their role-related expectations….Relative to men with traditional attitudes, men with more egalitarian role attitudes are likely to view behavior typically considered appropriate for women as acceptable for themselves. (p. 337) Fischer and Arnold (1990) also share Helmreich and Spence’s (1978) ideas about gender role attitudes. They argue that: People with more traditional attitudes tend to conform to norms that prescribe involvement in gender-traditional activities and prohibit involvement in less traditional activities….Conversely, people with more egalitarian views are more likely to be involved in nontraditional activities for persons of their sex. Note that similar gender-role attitudes, be they traditional or more egalitarian, will have different behavioral implications for women and men. (p.335) According to Adler, Kless, and Adler (1992), gender images are embedded within the idealized models of masculinity and femininity (p. 170). These idealized models of masculinity and femininity are context specific. Despite the many hats women wear during the day, their work is not valued, and they are not compensated for their effort. Like African immigrants, Togolese immigrant women even experience “the increased demands and expanded role of the primary caregiver to their spouse and children…traditional values related to division of labor [are] maintained, such that the women [continue] to do most of the domestic tasks” (Sellers, Ward, & Pate, 2006, p. 53). Hattar-Pollara and Meleis (1995) add that immigrant women of West Africa come from cultures that are significantly different from that of the United States. These women, who were generally homemakers in a culturally consistent and stable environment, are often required to learn a new language and absorb and incorporate a variety of added roles, without relinquishing those that are already established. They are expected to maintain an African cultural continuity through their traditional roles, while espousing new ones to establish a balanced family, and, often times, professional life in a Western society (p. 522). Arthur (2000) elaborates how African women immigrants attempt to forge or negotiate entrance into mainstream U.S. society. First African women find themselves playing new roles; they become acculturated or accept assimilation into the broader patterns of social roles in the

host society. Second, they are faced with the traditional gender roles that they have brought with them from Africa. Third, they have to confront gender discrimination and sexism as they seek incorporation into the work place. The resolution of these role conflicts ultimately determines which roles they will validate and which they will redefine (p. 123). Social context plays an important role in the assertion of gender roles. Through activities and experiences in specific social contexts, individual identities can change. For example, Arthur (2000) indicates that, in the United States: No longer do the women define their marital roles exclusively in terms of providing maximum satisfaction and happiness to their husbands. A sense of collective egalitarianism enters the world of the women, especially in their relationship with their husbands. The dominance of husbands and brothers is considerably diminished. The majority of the women no longer allow their husbands to claim the rights of dominance that the patriarchal system confers on males in Africa. Some men however, try to retain this dominance through physical and psychological abuse. (p. 112) The redefinition of the gender roles by African immigrant women in the United States asserts a measure of independence from their husbands and a redefinition of their gender identities. Now I turn to the methodological approach to the study.

Chapter Four: Methodology

The study was conducted to understand the experiences of Togolese immigrant women in the United States and, specifically, how they negotiate gender role expectations about education, culture, and family in the United States. The study expands existing literature on immigrant women in the United States, generally, and Togolese immigrant women, specifically. Thus, it gives voice and visibility to an underexplored population. The findings of this study are intended to guide Togolese immigrant women to negotiate gender expectations about education and family in the United States. By exploring Togolese immigrant women’s experiences, I hoped to shed the light on the following question: What do Togolese immigrant women’s narratives tell us about how they negotiate gender expectations about education and family in the United States? In order to participate in the study, the research participants identified as Togolese immigrant women who are pursuing or have pursued post-secondary education within the past year and Togolese women who did not pursue post-secondary education in the United States. I gave consent forms (in English) to all participants prior to conducting the interviews in addition to a copy of the research questions used in the study. This allowed participants to consider and prepare their responses to the questions prior to the interviews. I explained to the women to what extent Togolese immigrant women’s voices are not represented in research in the United States and how their voices will help fill this gap in the literature. I contacted the individuals about participation in the study via Skype and in person in order to answer any question they may have had before the study. I did not limit the participants’ age for this study, because I felt that, whatever age they are, their lived experiences would be interesting, especially since I placed them into their time, space, and place. I also felt that by not limiting the participant age, I would have a diverse range of experiences among Togolese immigrant women to report and analyze. I informed participants that, if they decided to participate in the research, I would interview them. Their participation in the research was voluntary, so they could withdraw at any time or decline to answer any question that made them uncomfortable. They also could terminate the interview at any time and subsequently reschedule or drop from the study without explanation. They could refuse to talk about any topic or end the interview session whenever they wished.

There was no penalty for withdrawing. They were not asked to do anything that might expose them to risks beyond those of everyday life. I recorded our conversations, and the recorder was always in full view so they knew that I was recording. The participants were made aware that my advisor, my dissertation committee, and I may listen to the recordings. I asked them to contact me Tela Bayamna at [email protected] or my advisor Dr. Lisa Weems at [email protected] if they had questions regarding the study. I used pseudonyms with the agreement of the participants to protect their privacy. Personally identifiable information was not released in any form that would make research participants’ identities easily traceable (unless there was written consent). No sensitive data files were left on the computer or in any office. I chose narrative inquiry as the most effective approach to explore these experiences because it is a methodology that recognizes the importance of the cultural, the social, and the context. I turned to narrative inquiry to pay attention to the symbolic lessons about maneuvering with family regarding gendered expectations. Narrative analysis reveals "truths about human experience" (Riessman, 2008, p.10). Narrative inquiry is a method that allows us to understand experiences from the perspectives of those being studied and offers the promise of making significant contribution to knowledge (Connelly & Clandinin, 2000; Herman, Phelan, Rabinowitz, Richardson, & Warhol, 2012; Riesman, 2008; Schaafsma & Vinz, 2011). Five Togolese immigrant women were interviewed after being recruited for the study through snowball sampling. Snowball sampling is a method that "yields a study sample through referrals made among people who share or know of others who possess some characteristics that are of research interest" (Biernacki & Waldorf, 1981, p. 141). Four of the research participants pursued post-secondary education in the United States, and one research participant did not pursue post-secondary education in the United States. For the purpose of this study, post-secondary means participants continuing education toward associates, bachelors, and/or doctoral degrees. I collected data from a pilot study of two Togolese immigrant women: one of them was a woman who pursued post-secondary education in the United States and the other one was a woman who did not pursue post-secondary education in the United States. According to van Teijlingen and Hundley (2001): The term “pilot studies” refers to mini versions of a full-scale study (also called “feasibility” studies), as well as the specific pre-testing of a particular research instrument such as a

questionnaire or interview schedule….One of the advantages of conducting a pilot study is that it might give advance warning about where the main research project could fail, where research protocols may not be followed, or whether proposed methods or instruments are inappropriate or too complicated. (p.1) The data from the interview of my pilot study were not included here as part of my findings, but they are discussed briefly in Chapter 5 in regards to how they guided me to know which of the questions I asked during the pilot study interviews were good questions to use in the full study and what questions I should add for this full study. In other words, the pilot study helped me workout some the procedural burden and collect preliminary data and decide if I needed to make adjustments before the full study. The participants’ voices were collected through face-to-face and open-ended interviews. As an insider of the culture of the participants, I framed the questions making sure that they were culturally appropriate. In other words, I framed the questions making sure they took into account our shared norms. The first interviews lasted 30 to 90 minutes. I transcribed the interviews, read the transcription data, and looked for potential places for follow-up questions. Riessman (2008) suggests that researchers “ask questions that open up topics, and allow respondents to construct answers in ways they find meaningful” (pp. 24-25). The second interviews lasted 20 to 25 minutes. The second interviews were used to collect more information about the participants’ experiences in the United States. Participants shared their experiences in the United States as well as the importance of having post-secondary education for better opportunities in the United States. All the Togolese immigrant women interviewed were born and raised in Togo before coming to the United States. Four of the participants lived in the Western Midwest region, one Togolese immigrant woman lived in the Eastern Midwest region of the United States. One hairstylist/nurse, one nurse, one corporate manager, and a team leader represented Togolese immigrant women who pursued post-secondary education in the United States. A sales associate represented Togolese immigrant women who did not pursue post-secondary education in the United States. All the Togolese immigrant women who participated in the study were married. Four of the participants were married with children. One participant was married without children. All the interviews were conducted between May 2016 and March 2017. The interviews were conducted at different locations based on participants’ preferences, including in their homes and apartments. English and French languages were used depending on the

participant’s preferences. Four interviews were done in English, and one interview was done in French because it was the preference of the participant. I translated into English the interview done in French before transcribing all the interviews and searching for epiphanies that could reflect their life experiences in the Unites States. The transcription of the data was used as a tool to identify the themes and the insights that helped guide the analysis of the data.

4.1 Making an Argument for Narrative According to Riessman (2008), “Among serious scholars working in the social sciences with personal (first person) accounts for research purposes, there is a range of definitions of narrative, often linked to discipline…but all work with contingent sequences” (p. 5). With social linguistics, narrative refers to discrete units of discourse, an extended answer by a research participant to a single question, topically centered and temporally organized; in social history and anthropology, narrative can refer to an entire life story, woven from threads of interviews, observations, and documents; in psychology and sociology, personal narrative encompasses long sections of extended accounts of lives in context that develop over the course of single or multiple research interviews or therapeutic conversations (p. 5). Riessman (2008) points out that “The diversity of working definitions… underscores the absence of a single meaning” (p. 6). The term narrative in human sciences can refer to texts at several levels that overlap: stories told by research participants. Riessman, (2008) adds that the “stories reveal truths about human experience…telling stories about difficult times in our lives creates order and contain emotions, allowing a search for meaning and enabling connection with others” (p. 10). Narrative interviewing allows us to “generate detailed accounts rather than brief answers or general statements” (Riessman, 2008, p. 23) According to Connelly and Clandinin (2000), narrative inquiry is a “process of learning to think narratively, to attend to lives as lived narratively, and to position inquiries within a metaphorical three-dimensional space” (p. 120). Like Connelly and Clandinin (2000) and Herman et al. (2012), I believe that the world can be comprehended through people’s narratives by the act of telling, and I also believe that time, space, and character are key parameters to narrative world building (Connelly & Clandinin, 2000). That is the reason why I turned to narrative inquiry in my study. I explored the experiences of Togolese immigrant women as narrated in told and lived stories. By understanding Togolese women through their narratives, I

explored “their experiences in terms of the three-dimensional inquiry space; that is, along temporal dimensions, personal-social dimensions, and within place” (Connelly & Clandinin, 2000, p. 129). Togolese immigrant women’s narratives allowed me to explore the environment (United States) in which they lived along with the moments (weeks, months, years) during which their experiences occurred and their interactions with the people within these spaces. The use of the three-dimensional inquiry space helped me reduce the stories of my research participants to a “set of understandings” (Connelly & Clandinin, 2000, p. 54). Space and place have been presented in international immigration studies as important factors to consider in the development of the research methodology. I conceptualized spaces as bounded in the ways that the people living within them actually perceive them (Levitt & Jaworsky, 2007).

4.2 Limitations of the Study My position as an insider to Togolese culture provided me with the ability to understand the context being studied, ask meaningful questions, and produce a description and an understanding of the culture. However, the number of Togolese women (five women) that I interviewed is not representative of the entire group of Togolese immigrant women in the United States. My position as an insider also impacted my choices and my interpretation of the results. I hope that the experiences of my research participants will be somehow reflective of the whole group of Togolese immigrant women in the United States.

4.2.A My position in the study. I grew up in Togo, a patriarchal society with the traditional belief that men had to work and earn money to support their families financially, whereas women had to stay home and care for children and the household. If a woman should work, it should be somewhere close to home so that she can come home in time to care for the family and the household chores. If she must get secondary education, the years of education should not last long. It is preferable that she enroll in domestic fields such as nursing, social work, or sewing so that she can gain skills that can help enhance her caring for the family. The pressure to conform to these expectations comes not just from the society, but also from the family. After graduating from high school, most parents expect their daughters to get married. Many parents worry that their daughters may not find suitors after reaching a certain age.

In my family, my parents wanted all their children, regardless of their gender, to be educated. My father specifically advocated for girls’ education, and his advocacy contributed to the development of my own critical thoughts about the place of girls and women in the society. My father always believed that his daughters could achieve in life like his sons, if he gave all of us the same chances. This experience has influenced my belief that I have the capacity to pursue education, have a career, and also take on the responsibility of providing for a family. My father’s support was coupled with that of my mother who wanted us to get a formal education to enhance the home skills both were teaching us. Although my mother did not have a high school diploma, she wanted a better life for her daughters and believed that a better life could come with education. My father’s wisdom had a big impact in my life to the extent that it gave me the strength to disrupt the ideas about women’s inferiority. I could choose my own course of life and become critical about the place of women in the society. I grew older and got married, but I remain critical about women’s conditions in Togo because, during my time in the United States, I have been haunted by the expectations of the patriarchal system I was brought up in when I was in Togo. In the United States, I am expected to raise the family based on Togolese traditional gender expectations while studying and working at the same time. I am reminded that, even with secondary education, I “remain a woman” (Skjortnes & Zachariassen, 2010). Daily, I find myself challenging established norms and values connected to gender expectation in order to pursue my education. I juggle modern and traditional gender roles and family relations, but it has burdened me. Through this study, I have found a space to study and write about this pain.

Chapter Five: Data Presentation and Analysis

In this chapter, I discuss brief life stories of five Togolese immigrant women in the United States. I talk about some general characteristics of the women, starting with their lives in Togo and continuing with their lives in the United States. I then talk about each of the participants’ stories. Sandelowski (1991) suggests that, Generally, narratives are understood as stories that include a temporal ordering of events and an effort to make something out of those events; to render, or to signify, the experiences of person-in-flux in a personally and culturally coherent, plausible manner. (p. 162) The stories of the women were produced at a given time and place and are influenced by the culture of the milieu in which they lived. Five life-story interviews are reported here in the order that they were conducted: Bagy’s story, Kila’s story, Abra’s story, Akou’s story, and Lacy’s story. The stories are analyzed in relation to the influence of gender expectations, culture, and family in their lives in the United States. The stories highlight what it is like to be a Togolese immigrant woman (the woman responsible for child care, housework, and focused on being wife and mother) in the United States. The results of the study show that the participants identified adjustment difficulties, language barriers, discrimination, culturally specific gender roles, bargaining with patriarchy, and married life as the most important challenges they faced in the United States. The participants in this study were born and raised in Togo before coming to the United States. All of the women spoke French, their official language in Togo, and they had their first encounter with English in High School. The educational levels of the research participants varied from high school diploma to bachelor’s degree. One Togolese immigrant woman received her bachelors’ degree in Togo, and the other four Togolese immigrant women received their High School diploma in Togo before coming to the United States. The respondent who had received her bachelor’s degree in Togo has been in the United States for two years, and she is trying to figure out how to go about going back to graduate school. All of the others had pursued post- secondary education in the United States. Participants who pursued post-secondary education in the United States attributed their positions in their work places to their education. Most of them have been in the United States for more than a decade, with only one of them having been in the

U.S for as little as two years. Since they grew up in Togo before coming to the United States, the lives of most of them have been shaped by the patriarchal structure of the family. In other words, the experiences of these Togolese immigrant women were different and yet similar to women in the United States with regards to gender expectations, culture, and status, both in terms of class and education. Despite the amount of time spent in the United States, most of them lived life based on the hierarchical structure of the family in Togo with the male being the head of the family, the provider of the family, and the decision maker whose instructions should not be questioned and the female being the house wife catering to the needs of her family and of her husband. During their time in the United States, some of the respondents strove to disrupt this pre-established structure of the family and by providing for the family. Some of the research participants explained that they were encouraged and supported by their parents, specifically their fathers, during their schooling in Togo. For example, Abra said, I had a dad that was always behind my back. As the oldest of the family, for him, it was like you have to go to school, you must study. He was always behind me and knowing that I am the first girl and I have 2 siblings that follow me, both always look up to me a lot so everything that I do they try to follow it. On the other hand, one of the respondents explained that she did not have a choice but to go to school as directed by her parents. Kila one of the interviewees explained, In Togo, in my family, there is not a second option, when you are born, you have to go to school until you get a high school diploma, and it does not stop there. After high school diploma, you have to go to the University.

5.1 Pilot Study I conducted a pilot study in spring 2016 with two Togolese immigrant women to understand their immigration experiences and specifically how they negotiate gender role expectations about education, culture, and family in the United States. One Togolese immigrant woman, Belavi, pursued post-secondary education in the United States after her high school diploma. She lived in the rural, Eastern Midwest region of the U.S. She was young and single, without children. She had been in the United States for 9 years.

The other Togolese immigrant woman, Dede, did not pursue post-secondary education in the United States after her high school diploma, and she lived in the Eastern Midwest region of the U.S. She was married with two children, a son and a daughter. She had been in the United States for 17 years. The first interviews with the participants in the pilot study lasted 45 minutes to an hour and a half. The second interviews lasted 20 to 25 minutes. The interviews were audiotaped and transcribed. The analysis of the narratives in the pilot study revealed experiences similar to the experiences in the full study. For example, they indicated that they were challenged with language barriers during the adjustment period in the host country. Belavi reflected: It is very hard coming from another culture and trying to adjust to a brand new culture. The language barrier, and just the way things are done here in difference to how they are done where we come from. That has been very hard for me. I still find myself struggling sometimes to adjust to being here; whereas, I believe, even if I go back home right now, it would not be that hard of the switch for me. Participants in the pilot study also reflected on gender expectations in their narratives. For example, Dede stated: I take care of my family. My dear, I go to work. Everybody in my house works, except my 15 years old, my daughter; she is 15 years old. My husband, my son, and I, when we wake up in the morning, everybody finds his way. When we come back home it is my responsibility to cook for them, take care of the home, and everything. The analysis of the narratives in the pilot study informed the need to add questions about the size of their family, the degrees held (if any) by their parents, the career expectations of their parents, and how they came to the United States, in order to get a better understanding of the stories I present below.

5.2 Participants’ Stories in the Full Study 5.2.A Bagy’s story. Bagy is from the northern part of Togo. There were eight people in her family including her mother, her father, her brother, four sisters, and herself. She was married with two children, a boy and a girl. She was catholic. She studied business management and she was an team leader at the time of the interview. When she was young, her parents did not

have any discussion with her regarding the career she wanted to pursue in the future. She was free to decide what she wanted to become. Her mother was a seamstress. She worked from home, and she did not go to school. Her mother learned French from the white nuns she worked with when she was a young girl. Her father had a high school diploma and worked with the military in Togo. Bagy’s first encounter with English was through English classes in high school. She got information about the United States through Peace Corps volunteers and through school. She had a relative in the United States who sponsored her to come here to study. She identified as an African woman. Bagy was a Togolese immigrant woman who lived in the Eastern Midwest region of the U.S. She has been my friend for many years. We lived in the same neighborhood in Togo. It was convenient for me to invite her to participate in the study to understand her experiences as a Togolese immigrant woman in the United States and specifically how she negotiates gender role expectations about education, culture, and family in the United States. We met in Bagy’s house where I conducted the interview. Bagy and I have always shared our passion for education and our responsibilities as women to make sure we further our education despite the ups and downs of life. Our goal is to show other women, and specifically Togolese women, that post-secondary education is not just for men as is the norm in Togolese culture. The empowerment of women can be done through participation in education. Kamal (2011) suggests that: the empowerment process seeks to help individuals realize themselves and their abilities and skills to improve their quality of life and to make strategic decisions related to their lives. The concept of empowerment is associated with power relations between men and women and their ability to access resources and control them. (pp. 25-26) Medel-Anonuevo and Bernhardt (2011) point out that women who have achieved influential positions have to empower their peers with their competences and skills to advance female education. Women leaders must build on their experience to lead their peers and empower them for their participation in education. The empowerment of women by women will motivate them to want to be educated and to want their daughters to be educated. Malhotra and Mather (1997) indicate that “plans of action universally stress improved educational and employment opportunities as critical means for women to attain greater control over their lives” (p. 600).

Bagy and I know that in Africa women have been underrepresented in higher education for many years, and we agree with Assie-Lumumba (2007) that: Under such prolonged conditions of under-representation, dating back decades to the inception of European education in Africa, if rigorous analysis and relevant policies are not consistently considered and implemented, inequalities may reach a level at which future generations of Africans may consider them as societal norms or natural social phenomena. (p. 5) The common interest we have developed in education led me to invite her to participate in the research study to explore her experience as a Togolese immigrant woman in the United States and she agreed. Bagy described herself as someone who is grateful, humble, and honest, and she say she strives to be fair and helpful to people if she can. Bagy received her high school diploma in Togo and learned how to grow a farm and handle household chores. She came to the United States to further her education approximately 16 years ago. Since then, Bagy has received an associate’s degree in Business Administration. One of the most important challenges she faced in the United States was the language barrier. The official language in Togo is French, and the schooling is done in French. She had to take English language classes in a community college in the evening to become confident speaking English before her post-secondary education in the United States. She described her experience as an immigrant and as a woman with a better wage after pursuing post-secondary education in the United States: When I came here, English was a little difficult for me. I went back to school to learn how to write and speak fluently with people, and that also helped me in school when I went back to get my college degree. So, the most difficult thing was language barriers. Here, with my college degree, I was able to get a better job, a better career. So, I can say that it is because of my college degree that I have a better position. My advice is, it is better going to school to get more education. If I could go back to school and get my Master’s degree, I would do so. Bagy wanted to go back to graduate school and get her Master’s degree after she pays the student loan she took to pay for her associate’s degree. Before her college degree, she worked as a packer in a warehouse. Education opened doors that would not have been opened to her if she

had not received a college degree. After a college degree, she got a job as a team leader. She admitted that without her college degree she would not have had the position she had. Bagy wanted to become fluent in English for better opportunities and to be able to help her children with their homework. Helping her children with their homework is part of her daily routine. She managed to accomplish it whether her husband was there or not. I am a mom, ok, and I have two children, a husband, I have my mother who lives with me. I go to work from Monday to Friday but every day when I get back home I have to feed them. I cook, I clean, and when my children go to school and I come back from work, I got to help them with their homework. I got to make sure they have their homework ready for the next day for school. I mean I got to make sure that I do what I have to do to make sure everything is on time every day and get ready the next day for work. Bagy felt overwhelmed by all of the activities she had to fulfill in her household as a wife, a mother, and a daughter. However, she did not mind doing everything she had to do to raise her family and take care of her mother. These tensions got solved through her resiliency and her determination not to let anything prevent her from achieving her goals. She enjoyed her new challenges. Bagy felt like she was wearing many hats while fulfilling all the activities in the household. However, she enjoyed her new challenges specifically because she could show people who made fun of her during her schooling in the United States to what extent with her education she was able to have a good career and help her children with their homework. Her challenges helped her become a stronger woman and show that being a woman is not a handicap, and African women should not feel that without a man they cannot do anything for themselves. She measured her capacities through the college degree she received, the completion of her chores in the household, and how she managed to get through the day without complaining. Somehow, it was her way of bargaining with patriarchy. Bagy invested a lot in her education. She worked hard to pay part of her education and also took out some loans to help pay for the rest. She worked full time while taking classes part time, and everything she faced during her education led her to feel that she did it against all the odds in her life. She was pregnant when she was pursuing post-secondary education in the United States. People tried hard to discourage her from pursuing her education:

When I started school here in the United States, I was pregnant. I was pregnant going to school, and sometimes people will make comments trying to make fun of me thinking that they are going to make me drop out of school or make me not believe in myself. But people saying things about me and my pregnancy never made me think of dropping out of school. It kept me really strong, and I kept saying to myself, “ok, you can do this.” Usually, when you are pregnant going to school, people think of you like your life is over. Ok! you know, why going to school while pregnant? You should not be going to school. You got to be a mom at home. Stay home. No! It is not like that. Being pregnant cannot stop any woman from pursuing her education. I think these comments about me being pregnant, hearing people saying negative comments, made me really strong. It led me to want to prove them wrong. To prove them that, well, I am pregnant; that cannot stop me from going to school and getting my degree. It does not matter your gender. Being male or female. It is what you have in your mind. Every day you wake, you look at yourself, you tell yourself I am a female, and a man is not better than a female. Being a female doesn’t mean a female should be kept down. I think that we are all smart, ok, so being a female doesn’t mean that you are not smart. We can do better than men, and we have proved it, and I think if every woman can think the same way, we will move forward. In her statement, Bagy refers to community members (some Togolese community members and specifically her husbands’ community members. Her husband is from Senegal.) who wanted to discourage her from pursuing her dream. But her teachers and her family members supported her during her education. She explained that some community members said to her face that she looked ridiculous striving to further her education while pregnant; they made fun of her when they saw her and they said things like, “Ou est ce que tu vas avec ton gros ventre la? Tu penses que l’ecole c’est pour des gens come toi dans ta condition? Tu ferais mieux de rester a la maison et t’occuper de tes travausx domestics.” That is, “Where do you think that you are going with this, your fat belly? Do you think that schooling is for people like you in your condition? It will be wise for you to stay home and take care of your home chores.” When people started making fun of her condition when she got pregnant while going to school, she did not let them intimidate her. In other words, she was out going, ignoring them, minding her business as if

she was not perceiving the discrimination against her. She decided to prove them wrong. She started to create an identity that developed through everything she was able to achieve. The formation of her identity as a strong and educated woman was influenced by her status as a Togolese female immigrant among other Togolese female immigrants in the United States, who was changing her narrative through everything she could achieve. She had to confront and cope with the obstacles she encountered in her host country. She remained firm in her determination not to have her life be defined for her by members of her community who had not experienced what it means to be a female, a mother, a wife, a full-time worker, and a student studying in a foreign country, in a different educational system, and in English, a language different from her official language, French. She wanted to overcome all obstacles, do well for herself, and stand out among all females who have being put down by people who believe that the place of women is at home. Her success in education generated her self-esteem and nourished her identity as an educated woman. She felt comfortable and happy that, through her commitment to success, she created her new identity. The commitment to success was done through the creation of a space for herself, a space in which she was building her future and the future of her children. It was a space away from members of her community who were not supportive of her education. The discourse in Togolese culture is dominated by the belief that the place of a womn is at home, where she is viewed as the homemaker to be provided for by her husband, the bread winner. Since the mindset in the country is that the place of woman is at home, the educational degrees of a woman do not change her status in the society. People treat those who went to school with respect, but I can say men in Africa do not treat women with respect. They do not care about your degree. All they think is: you are a woman; you are just a woman with your degree. They do not think of you like you are somebody they have to respect because you are doing good in your life. They do not care….In the United States, I can say women are respected. I can tell. I can tell because I have experienced it and in the United States, most companies want you to have a high school diploma, and you can get a job. Bagy enjoyed life in the United States after the adjustment period. The enjoyment of life comes from the fact that, with her college degree, she had a leadership position at work where she felt respected, and her income increased. With her education, she helped her children with their

homework; her children were doing better in school; and they were more likely to graduate from college. On the other hand, she felt like African men care less about a woman’s degree and that, even with a college degree, a woman remains a woman. In other words, the gender expectation remained the same. A woman’s degree does not reduce her responsibilities at home as the female of the household.

5.2.B Kila’s story. Kila is from the northern part of Togo. Her parents had five children. She had two brothers and two sisters. Kila was married with one daughter, and she was a Christian. She met her husband in the United States. Kila studied nursing in the United States and worked part-time as a nurse at the time of the interview. Her mother dropped out of elementary school, and she was a seamstress, one of the most popular activities performed by Togolese women in Togo. Her father worked as an economist in Togo, and he received a PhD in economics from France before coming back to Togo. Her father did not have a specific professional expectation for her. However, he wanted her to focus on her education and pursue higher education like him. She explained that she had two hours of English classes every week in high school, but she was never interested in languages. She had information about the United States through school, television, music, and discussions with friends. She was referred to me by one of my relatives who lived in the Western Midwest. After she graduated from high school in Togo, she wanted to go abroad, and she had two choices. Her father had the means to send her abroad for education, and this privilege enabled her to come to the United States and pursue higher education. Her father believed in education and all the doors it could open to his daughter. His decision to send his daughter abroad for higher education challenged the norm in many families in Togo because: In Africa, male migration is encouraged…for rural young men, traveling, working, and living in the major cities are considered part of the rites of passage from youth to adulthood….When young women have been sponsored by family members to migrate to urban employment centers, they have usually been sent to be married women living in the urban centers to serve as helpers or maidservants. (Arthur, 2000, p. 109) Her father’s decision to sponsor her to go abroad for her education intertwined with female’s place in Togolese society. However, is it important to add that, “The introduction of compulsory primary education following decolonization has significantly altered the

expectations and roles of women and children” (Arthur, 2000, p. 110) in Africa. Since her father got his graduate degree in France and a good paying job in Togo, he realized the benefits to be gained by getting educated abroad. Her father’s decision to send Kila abroad for her education was also due to issues students face on university campuses. According to Beoku-Betts (2004), On many university campuses, classes are overcrowded and students have to stand outside lecture halls or report early to their classrooms in order to secure a seat…[and] the academic qualifications of faculty at most universities have declined to a level where many of the faculty are not Ph.D. holders. (p. 118) The first choice was to go to Europe and pursue post-secondary education, and the second choice was to come to the United States. She had friends in France but not in the United States. She received both a visa for France and a visa for the United States, but she chose to come to the United States even though she was not proficient in English. She chose to come to the United States because she told herself that there are better opportunities in the United States and once here she could learn the language. When talking about better opportunities, Kila referred to many things. Unlike in Togo, there are a lot of employment opportunities for people with higher education in the U.S., and with a degree, she could become marketable everywhere in the world. The United States is one of the preferred destinations for those in Africa who desire to pursue higher education. In the United States, she only had one relative. She identified as a Black Togolese American woman and explained that she held both cultures, including American culture and Togolese culture. She brought with her “traditional gender roles” (Arthur, 2000, p. 123) from Togo, and “As [she attempts] to forge or negotiate entrance into mainstream society… [she plays] new roles” (Arthur, 2000. p. 123). Her exposure to American culture helped shape her African identity, and these experiences interact and give her a new identity she referred to as a “Black Togolese American woman.” She lived in the Western Midwest of the United States. She came to the United States to study and gain opportunities to better her life. In Africa, the “Deteriorating economic conditions, crumbling infrastructure, poor sanitation, lack of housing, and lack of quality healthcare impose constraints upon Africans seeking a better life for themselves and their families” (Arthur, 2000, pp. 22-23). Kila needed quality healthcare that was not available for her in Togo. In Togo, Kila had a poor health condition, and her health condition improved in the United States because of

the quality of healthcare in the country. She had asthma, and she suffered a lot with this sickness since her childhood. She felt much better in the United States with the treatments she received. Her sickness was the most important reason that led her to enroll in nursing when she went back to school to pursue post-secondary education. She felt that she was giving back by working in the healthcare field after her degree and by taking care specifically of the elderly in nursing homes. She has been in the U.S. for more than a decade. After receiving her high school diploma in Togo, she pursued her post-secondary education in the United States and received an associate’s degree in Nursing. I went to the Western Midwest during summer break 2016, and I conducted the interview with Kila in her home. Kila describes herself as a very caring, loving, reliable, and passionate person. She also believes that she is pessimistic; however, she stated that she is working on that. She shared with me that, during her first few years in the U.S., she faced challenges related to the language barriers, the choice of field of study, and most important, how to navigate education in the United States and succeed in her studies. In the United States, she studied nursing, a field that was completely different from the accounting field she studied in Togo. There was nobody competent to guide her in making good choices based on what she studied in Togo before coming to the U.S. The classroom environment was presented as source of stress to Kila because she felt like the “teacher was not really involved.” She felt lost; she did not have any support system that could help her adjust to her new environment or get acclimated to the educational system. Olivas and Li (2006) explored the stressors of international students in higher education and concluded, “When coming to the U.S. to study, many international students are faced with an unfamiliar social and educational culture. Consequently, the adjustment issues and the difficulty international students may face when coming to the U.S. are not surprising” (p. 218) Olivas and Li (2006) suggest that college counselors need to become competent in counseling international students from diverse backgrounds by focusing on their values, their beliefs, and multicultural issues (p. 217). They should avoid “reductionism in the counseling process. In other words, attempts should be made not to substitute cultural stereotypes for the phemenological perspective of each client. The pursuit of cultural competency is an active and indefinite one” (Olivas & Li, 2006, p. 217). The social and educational culture was unfamiliar to Kila. She had difficulties transitioning to college compared to U.S. students. In addition to the transition issues, she also

experienced difficulties seeking the assistance of her instructors. The adjustment issues she faced were “related to cultural differences, language challenges, and the U.S. educational system” (Olivas & Li, 2006, p. 218). Despites the ups and downs of life, she decided not to give up until she made it. Kila described her experience with language barriers, the choice of field of study, nursing, and the navigation of the educational system in the United States as, You know one of the problems when you come in this country and you do not speak English, it is really hard. The transition is very slow, to be honest. From my experience when it comes to schooling, I mean, in nursing it was kind of hard because everything was fresh to me. I did not study nursing in Togo. Kila was helped in her schooling by friends who studied nursing and were working in the health care field. With their help and support, she succeeded in her education. Kila studied accounting in Togo before coming to the United States and she did not have strong skills in the nursing field in which she pursued her education in the United States. She explained, It was a new major for me and a totally new world. It was just fresh to me compared to where other people were because they have a base in science, and I did not have any base. All I did was accounting. The road was bumpy. It was not a smooth transition. I struggled. Science is the basic foundation in nursing, so it took me a while to be there. I had to work three times more than everybody to be at their level, and it was very frustrating, but at the end of the day, I did get there. The main thing that led Kila to further her education in the healthcare field was her health condition. She was asthmatic and she wanted to know how to take care of herself using her nursing skills. Since nursing was a subject in which she was not competent, she always had questions to ask her instructors. However, her language barriers prevented her from communicating fluently with her instructors and having the answers she expected from them. She shared: Sometimes you want to ask questions, but you do not know if they understand what you are trying to ask, and they pretend to understand what you are saying, and sometimes out of frustration you also pretend that you know and you just let it go. Kila did not feel like she had enough support from her instructors. In other words, “the quality of relationship [she] had with faculty, the perceived quality of instruction and the

presence of faculty interest in [her] professional development [did not] all act as a protective function to [her] mental well-being [as a student] undergoing stress” (Olivas & Li, 2006, p. 218). Kila was undergoing stress, and she wanted some type of social support from her instructors for her mental well-being, and she did not feel like she got it. She managed to overcome the difficulties she had in the classroom by letting go of her frustration and her anxiety about speaking in the classroom. Kila measured the involvement of her teachers through their communication and dialogue with their students, specifically international students. The ability of the teachers to answer their questions and help them succeed in their new educational journeys in the United States was very significant in her view, and without the language proficiency, their performance in the classroom was poor. For example, because she decided not to ask questions, she could not perform as well in the classroom as her classmates. Zhai (2002) suggests that the language challenge is one of the most significant adjustment issues international students face in the U.S. Language proficiency may be such an important factor that it can affect the self-concept and self-efficacy of an international student's performance. Olivas and Li (2006) add that language barriers “can in turn affect their tendency to seek out social interaction within the new host culture. Thus, they may not gain useful knowledge that may help them successfully adapt to this new culture” (p. 218). Kila was not able to gain useful knowledge because of her language barriers, and she could not interact with her teachers in the classroom. She reflected that she would not want to have this experience again, and she stated: If I have to do it again, I do not think that I will be willing to do it. I will not travel to a country where I do not speak the language. Maybe other people will do it, but I, personally, would not want to try it again. It takes you back and puts so much stress and pressure on you. Kila felt that she would not be willing to to travel again to a foreign country where she does not have the knowledge of the language, the culture, and the educational system, because it is very stressful. It is stressful to have to start learning everything from the scratch to succeed. It puts a lot of pressure on you. The stressful situation in which she lived during her first years in the United States because of her inability to speak the language and navigate the educational system led her to

comment that Togolese who want to come to the United States should learn English in Togo before coming. They should also spend at least 2 years studying in higher education in Togo before coming to study in higher education in the United States. She advised: Honestly, my advice to anybody back home would be to just continue there. Get your bachelor’s and after a bachelor’s you can come over here. So, after a bachelor’s you come here, transfer your degree. You have experience on campus and you know what to expect. Coming here and not speaking the language, you might not continue with what you have studied back there. It is always good to continue there. At least two years at the university level before you move over here. Try to learn the language before you come. If they ask me if they should continue their education in the United States, I would say they should continue. Kila advised that the number of years it will take students to get their bachelor’s degrees will help them become acclimated to college life and the expectations in post-secondary education regardless of the geographical local and the educational system. Despite the fact that these experiences may not be the same in a foreign country, they could be used as tools of reference for a smooth transition. With the knowledge of the expectations in post-secondary and the knowledge of the language of the country, it will be less stressful for them to adjust in their new country. She felt that if she had had experience in post-secondary education in Togo, it could have helped her to know what to expect in post-secondary education in the United States, and it would not have been so stressful for her to settle in. Based on her personal experience, she did not want anybody to make the same mistakes she made. In Togo, her parents, and specifically her father, wanted her to pursue higher education after her high school diploma. She could not choose to just get some training to become a seamstress like her mother. She appreciated the fact that she got out of her comfort zone and had new experiences that helped her to grow. In her perspective, getting out of your comfort zone means taking risks to be challenged, to learn, and to act. She shared: It is good to get out of your comfort zone, learn something and be willing to go back because in our country, nothing works. We all want the best for ourselves. It is a good thing to come here and try to do the things for which you came. One thing is to say I want to go, and another thing is to go through so many obstacles. It is hard. You have to be prepared, financially, morally, and you have to have the support. It is not that easy.

Kila referred to the lack of job opportunities, the lack of possibilities of self-employment for young graduates, the lack of housing, quality health care, and so forth when she said “nothing really works” in Togo. Young graduates are jobless in the country, and this condition pushes them to go abroad and take advantage of economic opportunities in their host countries. For example, Arthur (2000) suggests that in Africa, multicultural economic organizations failed to develop sustained economic, industrial, and cultural development programs to improve the lives of Africans. The result is that many of Africa’s young and better educated people are forced to look beyond the continent to fulfill their economic aspirations. (p. 20) Many of Africa’s young educated people voluntarily migrate to foreign countries to improve their lives, and in the view of Kila, the voluntary migration does not go without challenges. Before going abroad, students should make sure they have enough financial resources upon arrival and while adjusting to their new environment. With enough financial resources, they can survive before they start taking advantage of the economic opportunities in their host countries. They should also have families, relatives, and friends to help them and support them during their adjustment period. It is not be easy to navigate a new environment without any support. Kila argues that, during her schooling in Togo, she did not have the same challenges she faced in the United States. She lived with her family and basically depended on her family for everything. However, she had to deal with traditional norms or common ways of doing things or behaving. In her family, only her parents had power, and the children had to abide by everything their parents told them to do without challenging them. The only thing her parents wanted her to focus on was her education and nothing else. She believed that her parents were too harsh on her, and they did not give her any room to date anybody. The power relationship between her and her parents was very significant, and it affected her negatively to the point where she decided to lie to her parents so she could have a love life. In her words, she had to become a “hypocrite;” she had to lie to them whenever possible because that was the only solution to her situation. Despite the toughness of her parents, she could still feel that she was loved by them because they provided for her and cared for her. Her story reflects the power of parents in traditional African families when it comes to decision-making. She recalled her experiences and the challenges of being a daughter, the challenges of being subjected to the rules of her parents.

Back in Togo, life is completely different. There, I lived with my parents. They took care of me. They basically did everything. When you live with your family, you can still have somebody in your life, but our tradition is so different. You are not free to date somebody like here, so you are always under your parents. They scare you. We live a life of hypocrisy. You cannot be honest with your parents because you are scared of them, because you depend on them, and they are not open to the idea that, ok, she is old, or she is there now; she is allowed to have a boyfriend or something like that. It was kind of complicated, and back home, our parents, the only thing they want, expect, from you is to go to school and succeed. That is it. From back home, that is what I remember. Even though our parents were very harsh on us because of our social life, you always feel loved when you are around your loved ones, but at the same time, you fear them. You love them, but there is more fear. The relationship we had with our parents is not what we have with our own children today. The way we live with our children, I am not saying it is the best, but it allows communication and openness. I felt like, after God, it was my parents. When they say something, it stops there. It is like they do not have to explain to you why. Just do it. If you do not do it, it was a lot of corporal punishment, and there is nothing you can do about it. In Togo, Kila depended on her parents. She did not have to work while going to school to care for herself. Since her parents took care of her and her needs, they could decide how she lived her life. She was not free to make decisions for herself without their consent, especially her father. Her parents could decide when she should start dating somebody and at what age she should marry. The full age to start dating may vary from one family to another in Togo. It may be as early as 15 years old or as late as 19 years old. Kila started dating somebody without the consent of her parents, and she could not do it openly because it is a sign of disrespect to them. She could not have her boyfriend come home or let her parent know when she went to visit him. Kila’s parents did not want her to have sex before marriage to prevent her from becoming pregnant. They were in favor of abstinence before marriage. One way they made “abstinence seem necessary [was] to make sex (outside of marriage) dirty. (Pillow, 2004, p. 185). Kila’s parent also made sex outside of marriage seem “dangerous emotionally and physically.” (Pillow, 2004, p. 191). She loved her parents and at the same time she feared them

because of the consequences she could face if she went against the rules of the family or the norms of the tradition. Her experience in the United States was different from that of Togo. She commented on racial and gender bias and how it affected her ability as a Black female to have a job. She states: As an African American, you do not have the same opportunities like everybody. You might have the same degree, but the chances of getting the job is sometimes challenging. Some people are willing to give you the job, but others are not. It is there; people do not always like to talk about it. I have experienced it. You fill out an application, sometimes they will take you, but it is not a guarantee. You just need to keep fighting. Keep going. Eventually somebody will hire you, somebody will look at your degree and experiences and not worry about any other issues, things, or whatever it is. The interconnections of her gender and race were not in her advantage in dealing with both her husband and locating a job in general. She was aware of the racial and the gender discrimination in the workplace and described her experience as a Black female in the United States. Kila finally got a job as a nurse with her nursing degree. She worked fulltime for a while until her husband asked her to stop working fulltime so that she could stay home and take care of their daughter. She reached and amicable agreement with her husband to care for their daughter without being forced to stop working. She stopped working during the weekdays and worked only two weekends in a month. Kila enjoyed the fact that she did not have to work fulltime outside of the house. Kila felt relieved from the burden of working fulltime outside the house and fulltime in the house cooking, cleaning, and caring for their daughter without being paid. When she had to work fulltime outside the house, it did not lessen her responsibilities at home as a female. She was still expected to perform her home chores as required by Togolese culture. Life in the United States did not change anything about the culture. She stated: It has been almost 2 years. I stopped working because my husband does not want me to work. Because of our daughter, we are having problems with babysitting, so I stopped working. I have been home, and I only work every other weekend. In Togolese culture, motherhood is defined by the capacity of women to care for children. In Togo, childcare is shared when women live among their extended family. When women go abroad they lose this privilege, and childcare becomes a challenge. It becomes difficult for them

to meet domestic expectations without help from their husbands, and it becomes frustrating not to have alternative ways to meet changing domestic needs abroad. Besides caring for her daughter at home, Kila continued to fulfill her household chores. She shared: It does not matter if you live over here. An African woman will always be an African woman, especially when you have married an African man. The duties in the house lay on you. We do not share house chores. You are the frontrunner! You have to multitask! You do everything at home. The man usually does not step in. It does not change. Gender expectations do not change for African women in the United States. The expectations remain the same, and they even add more roles to their former roles. Arthur (2000) suggests that: As they attempt to forge or negotiate entrance into mainstream society, African female immigrants find themselves in a double bind. First, there is a pressure to play new roles, become acculturated, or accept assimilation into the broader patterns of social roles in the host society. Second, they are faced with the traditional gender roles that they have brought with them from Africa. (p. 123) Shankar and Northcott (2009) explored the experiences of older female of Indo-Fijian immigrants residing in Canada, and the respondents to their study expressed the same concerns regarding bargaining with patriarchy. They bargained with patriarchy by renegotiating their traditional roles as grandmothers for their grandchildren. These women would “assist in childcare and household activities in exchange for support and care from their adult children” (p. 429). Older female Indo-Fijian immigrants in this study renegotiated their relationship with their grandchildren for their material welfare. In other words, these women provided care for their grandchildren and perceived some financial support from their adult children. Like Kila, the interviewees in this study shared their perspectives on the female education and how a female is perceived in the family with regards to her gender roles: “you know how it is, education does not matter for girls. It is more important for them to wash dishes and do housework” (Shankar & Northcott, 2009, p. 327) This status quo is visible in families where the wife and the husband are both from Togo. Women are likely to continue to assume traditional gender roles in their host countries and add new roles to their traditional roles. In other words, in the United States, their traditional gender

roles do not change: “Traditional roles and expectations defining how children are to be raised are predetermined and deviations from these roles are rare” (Arthur, 2000, p. 112). Kila commented that: It is frustrating being an African woman in America for so many people out there. In the beginning, it was frustrating when I was working fulltime outside the house and working another fulltime job at home doing the cooking, taking care of the baby, doing house chores. Everything has to be done by you so you feel like you are working two jobs without being helped by your partner. The lived experience of Togolese immigrant women in the United States is similar to that of Jordanian women in the United States. Like immigrant women of Arab origin, Togolese immigrant women: come from cultures that are significantly different from that of the United States. These women, who were generally homemaker in a culturally consistent and stable environment, are often required to learn a new language and absorb and incorporate a variety of added roles, without relinquishing those that are already established. In addition to the many roles they play, they are expected to maintain a cultural continuity while establishing a balanced family life in a Western society. (Hattar-Pollara & Meleis,1995, p. 522) Although Kila was a stay-at-home mother and worked part time and enjoyed the fact that she did not have to work full time, she encouraged every woman to pursue her education after the high school diploma whenever the opportunity arose. She believed that married life should not be taken for granted, and every woman should be prepared to face the challenges of life with or without their husbands. She commented: After high school, I truly believe every woman should pursue an education and go as far as possible because nothing keeps us from doing the things men do. It is just that, at the same time, you have to be the one doing everything. You have to juggle everything if you persevere. If you expect something from your husband or your partner to get there, you will never get there. That was the mistake I made. You just have to keep going, do not expect much from him. If he brings it, fine; if he doesn’t, you have to continue. Do what you can do for your own sake because, today, he might be your husband, but nothing

guarantees that tomorrow he is yours. You have to be prepared to face life with or without him. It is my assumption that in the view of Kila a woman should make sure she has some financial resources without depending solely on her husband to provide for her.

5.2.C Abra’s story. Abra was friend to Kila, and she was referred to me by Kila as a potential participant to my study. She also lived in the Western Midwest region of the United States. She came to the United States to study. Abra was a corporate manager at the time of the interview. She has been here for 14 years, and she earned an associate’s degree in electronic telecommunications before coming to the United States. In the United States, she received an MBA with an emphasis in accounting, and she had double major in computer information systems. Before coming to the U.S., Abra worked for about a month in Togo. The interview with her was conducted in Kila’s house. She worked close to Kila’s house, and it was convenient to her to have the interview with me after work before she got back home. The interview with her lasted for an hour and a half. When asked to talk about her experiences as a Togolese immigrant woman in the United States, she shared the following: One thing that I would say, coming here is a journey. It is a journey that you do not know how it is going to really end, like the unknown world. Living back home, I had a dream that here would be better than back home because you have the reality that you watch on the television, and it is a big dream. People have nice cars, living very well. So, you think it is going to be the same way when you come here. Many people back in Togo think that the American Dream “have nice cars, nice homes living very well” is easy to achieve. Television portrays this big dream without showing how hard it is to realize this dream. For example, Takougang, (2003) suggests that to realize the American dream, African immigrants choose to live in place where they have: friends and relatives who are able to provide temporary residence for [them] until they are able to situate themselves. Another advantage of living with these acquaintances, albeit on a temporary basis, is the fact that they also provide the new immigrants with important advice on surviving in the United States….[African immigrants] desire to live a more tranquil life and raise their children in safer environments than can be provided in

some of the larger cities….Often, these immigrants are quick to take any employment opportunity that they can get….Despite their dedication, hard work and determination to realize the American dream, African immigrants are often faced with the reality of…the "innocence about race relations"….As they struggle to make a living in their new homeland…first, they encounter some of the same stereotypes often associated with their African American counterparts….They are often perceived as lazy, criminals, drug dealers and welfare cheats. (pp. 6-8) Abra also had fantasies about the American dream back in Togo until she got here and had to deal with the “uncertainties of life” (Arthur, 2000. p. 122) in the United States. When she got here, the first challenge she encountered when trying to achieve the American dream was the language barrier. Abra stated that: It was so difficult to first settle down and not knowing the language, English. Back home my first language was French. Even though I took classes at the American Embassy back home and I took TOEFL coming here, it still was different because I came here for school, so I was in class, but every time the professor would speak, it is a total different, like, tone. So, you have to figure the way to understand the accent because it is different from a British accent. So, first that was not easy to cope with. You come home, you have to learn to adjust how you can work at the same time, how you can go to school, and how you can survive and everything. Unlike other research participants in the study, Abra took English classes at the American Embassy in Togo and the TOEFL exam before coming to the United States to study. However, the beginning of her adjustment in the country was not smooth because of language barriers. Abra was supported by her friend’s sister who helped her to cope with her challenges. She shared this experience as follows: I would say I was blessed I came to stay with one of my friend’s sister, and she helped me. The first year it was good to have somebody that you can come home to, and she would help you to start a move. Even though it was difficult, at least I had somebody that can guide me. She was lucky to have someone who had been in the United States for a while and who could give her the guidance she needed to navigate the cultural and the educational environment of the country. She was thankful for the support that she had as a new immigrant in the United States.

Abra was helped and supported by a friend, and she pursued her education while working. She reflected: I finished the degree working fulltime. Some days, I remember my friend’s sister, she used to drop me early in school, like 5:00 am, because she has to be at work, but we made it work because I finished and left. Her friend’s sister woke up very early in the morning before her work schedule time so that she could drop Abra in school by 5:00 am. It was a sacrifice made to assist Abra who was grateful to her. Abra was also lucky in her work place to meet with a woman who helped her in her career. The woman guided her and gave her insights and encouragement she needed to work. She identified her as someone who played a significant role in her life. Lucky for me enough, Mana, a Cameroonian lady, she had a heart for African people ,especially if you really want it, if you are a person who wants to survive. She was really helpful. So, she gave me advice; she connected me. Through that connection, I got a fulltime job. That was my first fulltime job as an auditor, through that connection. So, that is how it started for me. The encouragement she got from the woman was critical in motivating her to stand up for her rights as a woman in the work place because women “have to confront gender discrimination and sexism as they seek incorporation into the work place” (Arthur, 2000, p. 123). Abra shared the following: I always still feel like girls have to prove themselves. Even though, in the U.S.A, they cannot show it, as a woman you still have to prove yourself. You go to meetings, and you have all of those big managers, they are all guys, and they are just looking at you. On top of that, not being from here, it is a total different story but you have to, again, learn. You are here for something. You have to stand for what is yours. You have to build that strong mentality and say you are not going to let anybody put you down. You have to learn who you are. After getting the position of manager, she struggled to validate her ability as an educated woman to do the job. Her struggles were due to gender discrimination, sexism, and the fact that she was a foreigner.

Abra’s struggles in the workplace, her confrontation with gender discrimination in the United States, were similar to the gender discrimination and sexism she faced in Togo during her schooling. She studied electronics in Togo. This field is male dominated in Togo, and girls are not expected to study in the field. In other words, she was dealing with a “gender structuring” in school (Davison & Kanyuka, 1992, p. 455). In the view of Davison and Kanyuka (1992): The behavioral norms and expectations that result from gender structuring begin in the home and community and are subsequently taught and reinforced in the school setting. Too often girls learn at an early age that they are expected to limit themselves to activities at home and are tracked to courses at school that reinforce their roles as domestic producers and reproducers and that may exclude them from other productive careers. (p. 455) Electronics is a scientific field that does not prepare females to perform their traditional gender roles in their families, and when girls study in this field and get degrees, it positions them as women who want to renegotiate their place in the society and achieve a “more egalitarian relationship” (Arthur, 2000, p. 123) with men. So, because of this perception and the traditional norms and values, you “do not really see girls in that field” as stated by Abra. Abra commented that: Back home was challenging a little bit because, as a girl and in the field that I was in back home, you know electronics is only for guys. So, you do not really see girls in that field. So, it was very challenging. I started my first job back home, and I was the only girl in the workplace, and it was very challenging. Because guys just do not see that girls can do it. It does not matter. Abra was discriminated against in Togo, when she was studying electronics, but she was strong in the face of discrimination and it helped her get her degree. She demonstrated her determination of getting a degree in the field that she liked. Abra also compared her experience in Togo and in the United States: At the beginning, it was difficult for me. I used to be shy back home, but my life here changed me. You have to be strong. You do not want to let anybody put you down. You have to stand for your rights.

Abra said back home she used to be shy. In other words, she did not know how to socialize with other girls and speak up for herself. However, in the United States, she learned to work through these problems. In school, they were encouraged to work in teams, and working in teams helped her to learn to face challenges and become confident. Her participation in activities like the Girl Scouts gave her the opportunity to master her challenges. Teamwork boosted her self-esteem and she learned to act and do positive things like empowering Girl Scouts through her company. She described: They have what they call here the Girl Scout club that I joined. The one that I joined was through my company. I was on the committee to work with the girls and kind of inspire them for things to do and that is my passion. In her position as an auditor, Abra joined the Girl Scouts club through her company, a financial services company, and got involved with empowering the girls to better their lives. She enjoyed working with the girls, and she was mentoring them as a way of giving back to her community. Abra empowered the girls to make constructive choices about their lives. Through her leadership position in her company, she modeled the values that she wanted the girls to develop as they grew. She encouraged them to feel good about themselves and avoid thinking that their gender can limit them from achieving their goals. She empowered them to have a positive attitude about themselves. While working fulltime and participating in the Girl Scouts as a leader, her schedule became busy, but she managed to make it work for her so that she can take care of her duties as a woman in the household. She described: It is not easy, because of being a fulltime person working and coming home. My husband loves to eat, so I have to balance. You have to plan. I learned quickly the first year we got married; you have to plan or otherwise you will not have a happy husband. Especially being a person that was by herself and old enough. I got married a little late, at 31. You have to plan. I plan pretty much all of our meals on Saturday. That is why, when my Saturday is gone, I am not really happy. I plan our days like that so that I can have food and things that I need to cook, pack, put in the refrigerator as much as I can, plenty that day.

Abra made great friends through the Girl Scouts, and it helped her to get a job in another company after working for 3 years in her company. She stayed in the committee because in her new company they needed somebody to represent them in the committee. She did fundraising. She met people on the committee to raise funds for Girl Scouts or different things. She took a higher position in the committee. Her last position was a senior financial sales accountant, because she has a background in IT. After gaining experience in those companies, she developed an interest in creating her own organization one day. She reflected: I have that dream. I want to have, one day, my own business. That is my big dream. So, that is why I keep learning different things. I keep trying to get different connections.

5.2.D Akou’s story. Akou was Bagy’s friend. She is from the north of Togo, but she was born and grew up in a southern city of Togo. She had five siblings, including two brothers and three sisters. At the time of the interview, she was married with three sons; she studied nursing, and she worked as a fulltime nurse. She is Catholic. Her father had a college degree and worked in the military. Her mother was a homemaker and did not work outside the home. Her mother did not have a high school diploma. Akou took English classes in high school and learned about the United States in school, as well as from family members who lived in the United States. She lived in the Western Midwest region of the United States. She identified as a Togolese woman and an African woman. She said, “I identify as a Togolese woman, first of all, and as an African woman because I like the culture. I like everything about being a woman and about an African woman.” She came to the United States with her husband who won a Green Card through the diversity visa lottery program. The lottery program is a United States congressionally mandated Diversity Immigrant Visa program for receiving a United States Permanent Resident Card (U.S. Department of State, 2017). To enter the lottery, applicants must have been born in an eligible country. If selected to qualify for the immigrant visa, they must have completed at least a high school education or at least two years of work experience in an occupation that requires at least two other years of training or experience. They must also satisfy general immigration requirements, such as a means of support, no criminal background, and good health (U.S. Department of State, 2017). Akou has been in the United States for 15 years. She has an associate’s degree in cosmetology and is a hair stylist. She also did some nursing assistance classes for one year and medication aid training for a few months.

Akou received her high school diploma in Togo before coming to the United States. During her first years in the United States, she also took English classes before going back to school for her associate’s degree in cosmetology. She also did some nursing training because she likes being in contact with people. She commented: When I first came to the U.S., my first problem was the language, how to learn the language and be able to talk with other people. Education helped me to have a job that I like. I am doing hair, and I like what I am doing. I also like helping people, and that is why I did nursing. I noticed that being a nurse can help me be in contact with a lot of people and be helpful to them. When I first came here, and I did go to school, I used to do some jobs which were very hard for me, which required a lot of strength. But now that I went to school, and I achieved my goal, I do not work so hard, but I am making better money than what I used to make before. Akou worked outside the house making better money. However, she did not relinquish her home chores as a wife and a mother raising a family. Arthur (2000) suggests that African immigrant women: are fiercely traditional and deeply committed to African culture when it comes to household organization, child raising…and expectations about children. Holding advanced degrees and well-compensated jobs has not altered the commitment of the women to African ideals.” (pp. 118-119) She has three sons, and she trained her oldest son on how to accomplish some household chores, and he helped her from time to time with her chores. She shared: When I wake up in the morning, I have to make breakfast for my kids. When I have to go to work, I make some food and put it on the table. When it comes to brushing their teeth, and taking them to school, their dad does that. But when I am home, I have to make breakfast, make sure they wake up, get their showers, brush their teeth. I get them ready, take them to school, and when I drop them in school, I come back, and I have to go do some shopping, cook their meals for lunch, and when it is time to go get them from school, around 3:00 pm or 3:30 pm, I go get them, and I give them lunch. After lunch, I get a little rest, and I have to cook dinner. When we finish eating dinner, I get them ready for bed. To help myself, I teach my 8 year old how to do small things around the house like cleaning the table after they eat, putting their dishes in the sink and try to rinse them

for me so that I can put them in the dish washer, or if I have to wash them, I wash them, and he rinses them and puts them in the cleaning bin. Picking up after themselves around the house so that it can help me; if not, I am going to have to clean after them and do all of that ,and it is going to be so overwhelming. I just try to teach him how to do some little stuff to help me. With the workload she had on a daily basis, Akou may perceive that significant traditional demands are being placed upon her, and this can be a source of stress. However, she does not explicitly point it out in her narrative. This might be her way of bargaining with patriarchy. She bargained with patriarchy by not complaining and making sure that her actions and choices do not go against the norms of Togolese culture. Shankar and Northcott (2009) suggets that: the theoretical framework of patriarchal bargaining allows us to examine the various ways in which women contest, negotiate, participate and reproduce patriarchal relations….Furthermore, the use of bargaining with patriarchy as a theoretical framework allows for a more nuanced understanding of patriarchy whereby women are not merely passive recipients of oppression but are at times actively involved in negotiating, resisting and even propagating patriarchal relations. (p. 435) Women negotiate and resist patriarchal relations by easing the pressure on them. They no longer provide maxim satisfaction and happiness to their husbands. They no longer allow their husbands to claim the rights of dominance that the patriarchal system confers on males in Africa (Arthur, 2000, p. 112). Akou’s strategies while bargaining with patriarchy gave her recognition within Togolese community. People praised her and gave her credit for her commitment to her traditional roles. Akou stated: For most of them, I am a good wife, a good mother, because some of them when they come in the house, they see what I am doing and how I am teaching my kids and for most of them I am a good wife and a good mom. Gender in Togolese culture is characterized by performance and expectation. For example women are expected to perform as mothers not only for their children, but also to the extended family and the community. In this sense, there is a saying in Togo that has it that “la femme est la maison,” meaning “The woman is the house.” This means it is the woman who takes charge

of the house for the wellbeing of the family. The proverb illustrates the value of a woman and emphasizes womanhood in Togolese culture. It views women’s role in the household as critical for the wellbeing of the family. Akou does not portray an egalitarian behavior in her relationship with her husband, and she does not deviate from traditional gender roles and expectations. For this reason, people in her community praised her for her exemplary behavior. Akou was compromising rather than quarreling about the gender inequality. She negotiated gender expectations by having her son help her with her chores instead of asking her husband to do it. Gender in Togolese culture is characterized by expectations. Women are expected to be mother not only for their children, but for her community. A second important element in Akou’s story is the comparison of gender roles in Africa and the United States. She remarked: Back in Togo, parents always make girls feel like they do not need to work hard and go far in their education. But when I came here, I noticed that we have different age ranges in school. We have a lot of girls in school. There is not difference in gender or age when it comes to studying. That helped me a lot to achieve my goal in the United States. In Togo, women do not have the opportunities to go back to school after getting married and giving birth to children. It is not as common to find adult students and young students together in the same classroom in Togo as it is in the United States. Unlike Togo, in the United States, females and males have the same chances to further their education. The fact that Akou saw adults going back to school to get their degrees in the U.S. encouraged her to go back to school and achieve her goal of getting higher degrees and a better paying job. But back in Africa, we always think that girls are not supposed to pursue higher education. My opinion is that, in Africa, they do not encourage us girls to achieve goals in education. They always think that women are to stay home and take care of kids and husbands. My opinion concerning the education of women in the United States is that there is no difference whether you are a man or a woman you can achieve a goal you are aiming for. When you talk to someone who is from Africa, the expectation is almost the same. The role of the lady in the house is to take care of the family and the kids. When you talk with a woman who was born here and grew up here, it is not the same

expectation. It is different, because for people who were born here and raised here, a woman is not supposed to stay home and do everything when the man goes to work and bring the money home. Women and men work; we all take care of the kids and the family. In an African family, the man is always the boss of the house. The woman is supposed to respect and do everything the man says. But in the United States, it is not the same maybe, I do not know, but that is what I think. Akou focuses on the opportunities girls and women have in the United States versus Africa and feels that the cultural expectations in the United States do not demand that women abide by everything their husbands say. Akou assumes that, in the United States for example, girls and women can continue their education at any age. The educational opportunities available in the United States, provide “women with the chance to work and at the same time attend school. By combining work and education, the women are able to prepare themselves for lucrative positions.” (Arthur, 2000, p. 118).

5.2.E Lacy’s story. Lacy was born and raised in the southern part of Togo. She was a Jehovah’s Witness. Her father had two wives who lived in two different homes. She had two brothers and one sister in her immediate family. Her father died when she was 13 years old. Her father supported her in her education by tutoring her at home on subjects in which he was competent like math and science. At the time of the interview, Lacy was a sales associate, and she had not studied in the United States. She never had the opportunity to discuss professional expectations with her parents. Her father worked as a telecommunications agent. Her mother had a small business, and she did not graduate from high school. Her husband and she had a friend in the United States, and he was the sponsor for their immigration in the United States. Lacy lived in the Western Midwest region of the United States for two and a half years. She came to the United States with her son and her husband, who also won a Green Card in the Diversity Visa program. Lacy took English as a major in college and learned about the United States through school. However, she was still struggling with understanding accents in the U.S. She decided to have her interview in French because she felt more confident speaking French than English. Below are her narratives in French and translated in English. Avant de venir ici, j’avais eu ma licence en Anglais. Etant donnee que dans notre pays on a est un pays Francophone, on a appris l’anglais britanique on pouvait ecrire, respecter

la grammaire. Quant on est venue ici, ca a ete vraiment un problem pour comprendre les gens; comprendre ce qu’ils dissent, l’accent, leur anglais. C’etait difficile de comprendre ce qu’ ils veulent dire. C’etait notre lute depuis notre arrive jusqu’a maintemant. Before coming here, I had my bachelor’s degree in English. Given that, in our country, we are a Francophone country, we learned British English. We could write with correct grammar. When we came here, it was really a problem to understand people; understand what they are saying, their accent, their English. It was difficult to understand what they meant. It was our struggle from our arrival until now. She also had transportation problems as a new comer, and she and her husband depended on people to take them to work and bring them back home. She was thankful that these people were available for them, because without them, they could not afford to go to work and pay the bills of the apartment in which they lived. She said: Au debut on etait reste chez une connaissance de quartier. Il n’y avait pas eu de problem. On n’est rester avec lui pendant un mois et demi and comme on est des adults, il fallait ne pas etre une charge pour la person pour longtemps donc on a cherche du travail, et petit a petit, ce travail nous a permis de chercher un apartment pour nous. Donc apres deux mois de notre arrive aux Etat Unis, on a demenager ou nous sommes presentment. Et depuis la on est ici, on s’arrange pour payer le loyer. La difficulte qu’on a eu c’est le problem de deplacement. Ce sont les amis, les copins que tu vas appeller pour te deposer a ton lieu de travail et te ramener aussi. Parceque le bus ne va pas partout, vous connnaisez bien Omaha. Meme si c’est dans les grandes villes, il parait que le bus ne vas pas partout. Donc, c’est la difficulte. Et le premier employ qu’on a eu, on travaillait de bonne heure. Le matin vous devez vous levez tot et les gens qui doivent vous deposer doivent faire aussi ce sacrifice la. On est reconnaissant enver eux. A 5 heure deja on partait. Le boulot etait dans un fast food. C’est ce schedule la qu’on nous a donne. Parfois celui qui nous amene le matin n’est pas disponible alors a l’heure de sortie, un autre personne vient nous chercher. In the beginning, we lived with a local acquaintance. There was no problem. We lived with him for a month and a half. Since we are adults, we must not be a burden for the person for a long time, so we looked for work. Little by little, this work allowed us to

look for an apartment for us. So, after two months of our arrival in the United States, we moved where we are now. And since we're here, we have managed to pay the rent. The difficulty we had was the problem of transportation. It is your friends, your buddies, that you call to drop you at your workplace and bring you back because the bus does not go everywhere. You know {this city} well. Even though it is a big city, it seems that the bus does not go everywhere. So that's the difficulty. And the first job we had, we worked early in the morning. In the morning, you must get up early, and the people who have to drop you off must also make this sacrifice. We are grateful to them. We had to leave home at 5 am. The job was in fast food. This is the schedule we were given. Sometimes the one who brings us in the morning is not available, so at the time we leave work, another person comes to pick us up. When Lacy and her husband came to the United States, they did not have enough financial resources to rent and buy a car to drive to work. The lack of resources led them to live with an acquaintance for a month and a half and they moved out. Lacy and her husband also depended on people to take them to work and back home. Like Lacy and her husband: Upon arriving in the United States, the immigrants settle in cities with large concentrations of African immigrant or ethnic minority populations. The settlement areas are chosen to enable the new immigrants to tap into existing networks of support and interpersonal bonds that previous immigrants have formed among themselves. The network of support assists the newly arrived. They provide access to temporary housing, job opportunities, possibilities of self-employment, and knowledge of the city. (Arthur, 2000, p. 30) Education added an important value in Lacy’s life in Togo as well as in the United States. In Togo, she took care of her small business, and she was also able to file all of the required documents in English for their immigration to the United States without having to depend on her husband or on another person to help her get her visa for her immigration to the United States. L’education a joue un grand role dans ma vie parceque pour gerer ses propre affairs, il te faut un minimum de niveau d’etudes ou d’education. Je dirais que l’education m’a aide a pouvoir gerer mon proper affair et me prendre en charge sur certain domains. Le mari ne peux pas tout te faire. Tu dois aussi te battre. Je dirais que l’education continue de jouer un role dans ma vie aux Etats Unis parceque j’image que si je n’avais pas ete a

l’ecole, les papier qu’on devait faire et tout et quant on est arrive ici, je devais toujours dependre de mon mari ou de quelqu’un d’autre. C’est bien vrai que nous avons dependu de quelqu’un quant on venait ici. Ceux qui sont dans le pays depuis, ils on l’accent et ils comprenemt pour etre notre interpret dans certain domaine. Mais a un moment donne, comme j’ai fais mes etudes en Anglais, ca m’a permit de me liberer vite. Je n’appelle pas les gens chaque fois que un problem se pose. Mon education m’a permis d’etre autonome tres tot, tres rapidement. Education has played a big part in my life, because to manage your own affairs, you need a minimum of education. I would say that education has helped me to manage my own affairs and take charge in certain areas. The husband cannot do it all. You also have to fight. I would say that education continues to play a role in my life in the United States, because I imagine that if I had not been to school, the documents we had to file before coming here and everything, and even after our arrival here, I would have always depended on my husband or someone else. It is true that we depended on someone when we came here. Those who are in the country for a long time, they understand the accent of people in the country, and they are our interpreters in certain areas. But at a given moment, as I did my studies in English, it allowed me to release myself quickly. I do not call people whenever a problem arises. My education allowed me to be autonomous very early, very quickly. In the United States, Lacy took ESL classes, and she felt that those classes helped her a lot to start feeling confident to communicate with people at work. In their ESL classes, they were required to do their presentations standing before their classmates. Although she has not yet furthered her education in United States, she recommends any woman who wants to pursue post-secondary education to do so. In her view, without higher education, they will not have better paying jobs. When asked what she would say if a Togolese woman or an African woman asked her if it would be well to continue their study here, she said: Je lui dirai bravo. Je luis conseilerais de continuer les etudes ici. Je sais que ce n’est pas gagner d’avance d’etre eduquer ou bien d’avoir un gros niveau d’etude mais ca joue beaucoup parceque si tu n’as pas ete a l’ecole ou si tu ne continue pas les etudes, tu seras toujours dans le manoeuvrage comme on le fait maintemant parceque tu n’a pas un niveau eleve d’etude aux Etats Unis ou alors parceque ils ne considerent pas ton diplome

ou bien tes etudes que tu as fait aux pays. Il faut t’integrer dans leur culture, dans leur education pour pouvoir te trouver une place mieux que ce que tu as. Quant ils parlent, tu n’as plus besoin qu’ils te fasse des gestes, tu comprend puisque tu commences a t’habituer a l’accent. L’oreille s’habitue. Le ESL m’ a aide parceque, a l’ecole, vous avez des exposes. Vous vous tenez devant la class pour vous exprimer I will say, “Bravo!” I would advise them to continue the studies here. I know that it is not a win to be educated or to have a high level of study, but it has an important role because if you have not been in school or if you do not further your education, you will always be in lower paying jobs like what we do now because you do not have a high level of education in the United States or because they do not consider your diploma or the education that you have done in your country. You have to integrate into their culture, their education, so you can find a place better than what you have. As they speak, you no longer need them to make gestures, you understand because you begin to get accustomed to the accent. The ears get used. The ESL helped me because, in school, you have presentations, you stand before the class to express yourself. From Lacy’s perspective, there is a “link between quality higher education and well- compensated jobs” (Arthur, 2000, p. 118), and with a post-secondary education degree, women can have higher paying jobs. She felt that Togolese immigrant women or African immigrant women need to get exposed to American culture, to “experiment with alternate lifestyles that complement African culture” (Arthur, 2000, p. 122). Like other respondents in the study, Lacy also mentioned the impact of cultural expectations on her life in the United States. J’avoue que ce n’est pas facile. Surtout aux Etats Unis, tu dois travailer et remplir ton role de femme au foyer. Quant je reviens, je n’ai meme pas le temps. Je fais ce que je dois faire pour que la famille puisse manger a temps. Je le fais toujours la veille et s’il n’ya pas quelque chose a faire, le weekend je prepare. Le samedi je suis libre; je fais le maximum pour preparer et mettre ca au frigo pour qu’on puisse chauffer ca pendant la semaine. S’il manque quelque se sera la pate ou le riz que tu dois preparer rapidement. Je suis aussi mere. Je dois eduquer un enfant. Les difficultes qu’il rencontre a l’ecole, il faut qu’il m’en parle. On lui demande ce qu’il a eu comme difficulte a l’ecole, quel sont ses inquietudes. Des fois il faut amener les enfants a parler surtout quant ils sont des

adolescents. Ils veulent faire leur choix et on attaque les difficultes qu’il a et ensemble on l’aide a vraiment affronter ces difficulties. On lui donne des conseils pour ce surpasser ou bien eviter certain problems. I confess that it is not easy. Especially in the United States, you have to work and fulfill your role as a housewife. When I come back, I do not even have time. I do what I have to do to make the family eat on time. I always do it the day before, and if there isn’t anything to do on the weekend, I cook. On Saturday, I am free; I do my best to cook and put it in the fridge so that we can heat it during the week. If it happens that we miss something, it might be “la pate” or rice that you need to prepare quickly. I am also a mother. I have to educate a child. The difficulties he encounters in school, he must speak to me about them. He is asked to talk about the kind of difficulties he has in school, what were his anxieties. Sometimes you have to bring the children to talk especially when they are teenagers. They want to make their choices, and we attack the difficulties he has, and together, we help him to really face these difficulties. He is advised to surpass or to avoid certain problems. Lacy fulfilled her role as a housewife while maintaining her traditional roles she brought with her from Africa, and as a care giver nurturing an adolescent boy, she had to “define the parameters of African cultural identity for [him and provide] guidance and direction to enable [him] to negotiate the complex cultural maze of adolescent life in America” (Arthur, 2000, p. 123). The findings from the data presented in this chapter are discussed in Chapter Six.

Chapter Six: Discussion

This study was conducted to understand the experiences of Togolese immigrant women in the United States and, specifically, how they negotiate gender role expectations about education, culture, and family in the United States. The following research question guided the study: How do Togolese immigrant women negotiate gender expectations about education, culture, and family in the United States? To analyze the question, I utilized a combination of African feminism theory and intersectionality theory. I chose intersectionality because I wanted a framework that would “enhance activist efforts in Africa” (Mekgwe, 2008, p. 22). From these frameworks, I analyzed the data according to this concept of bargaining with patriarchy. Herzog and Yahia-Younis (2007) suggest that: The concept of bargaining…is concerned with the theoretical question of how marginalized groups within dominant sociocultural regimes strategize to advance change while also seeking to maximize security and to optimize their life options. (p. 579) In this study, the participants shared their experiences with gender expectations. They struggled with gender expectations at home while working fulltime or part-time. They were expected to be mothers and wives. In other words, they were expected to be the primary caregivers of their children regardless of their other duties. They accomplished their duties by bargaining with patriarchy. In this study, bargaining with patriarchy comes to light as a way of life for the research participants in Togo and during their time in the United States. Bargaining with patriarchy is the product of the patriarchal structure of the family, and once implemented in a family, it becomes difficult to change the lifestyle of the family. The result of the study shows that there is a consistency between participants’ experiences in the family with regard to bargaining with patriarchy in Togo and in the United States, with few differences between participants who worked fulltime and the one who worked part-time with their degrees, after pursuing post- secondary education in the United States. Since patriarchy has a strong impact on the lives of Togolese immigrant women, it can be assumed that it developed early in their lives in Togo before they came to the United States.

Bargaining with patriarchy is part of Togolese culture, and men expect women to always bargain. Generally, Togolese women bargain with patriarchy in ways that do not bring tension in the family. In this study, the narratives of the participants tell us that they negotiated patriarchy to their advantage by compromising and coping with new situations. For example, one participant did not challenge her father’s decision to go abroad and pursue post-secondary education. After she got married in the United States and had a child, she compromised with the decision of her husband to stay home and care for their child. While this participant described bargaining with patriarchy as advantageous, I see two drawbacks. First, I feel that when she decided to compromise with her husband and stay home to care for their daughter, the money her father spent for her education became a waste. She was not fully benefiting from her education by working part-time. Second, her decision to stay home and care for their daughter lent support people in Togo who believe that there is no need for a girl to have college education because she will eventually get married one day and her husband will care for her, and it also reinforces the belief that females are homemakers and males are breadwinners. In Togolese families, how well women bargain with patriarchy determines how strong their relationship with their partners will be. On the other hand, another participant bargained with patriarchy by accomplishing the household chores without quarreling with her husband. She trained her son to help her accomplish the chores instead of asking her husband to help her. Her behavior reinforced the power of her husband as the head of the household and decision maker. As African immigrants, it was not evident that Togolese immigrant women could completely adapt to a new culture. Arthur’s (2000) suggests that: African women have rejected wholesale assimilation into the dominant culture. They are fiercely traditional and deeply committed to African values when it comes to household organization, child raising…and expectations about children. (p. 118) The length of time Togolese immigrant women spent in the United States did not change much in the culture they brought with them from Africa. As we can see, each woman had her own way of bargaining with patriarchy. Some women “cope with” patriarchy, and some “go around” in their bargaining with patriarchy (Nnaemeka, 2004, p. 378). In other words, women challenge patriarchy through “negotiation and compromise” (Nnaemeka, 2004, p. 378).

Bargaining with patriarchy is reflected in, Bâ’s (1981) narrative about her marriage life. Bâ (1981) reflected: I was surviving. In addition to my former duties, I took over Modou’s as well. The purchase of basic foodstuffs kept me occupied at the end of every month; I made sure that I was never short of tomatoes or of oil, potatoes or onions during those periods when they become rare in the markets; I stored bags of ‘Siam’ rice, much loved by the Senegalese. My brain was taxed by new financial gymnastics. The last date for payment of electricity bills and of water rates demanded my attention. I was often the only woman in the queue. Replacing the locks and latches of broken doors, replacing broken windows was a bother, as well as looking for a plumber to deal with blocked sinks. My son Mawdo Fall complained about burnt-out bulbs that needed replacement. I survived. I overcame my shyness at going alone to cinemas; I would take a seat with less and less embarrassment as the months went by. People stared at the middle-aged lady without a partner. I would feign indifference, while anger hammered against my nerves and the tears I held back welled up behind my eyes….I survived. (pp. 51-52) Bâ (1981) described the lifestyle she was forced to live after her husband married another wife. Although her husband abandoned her and moved out of their house to live in another house with his new wife, she did not divorce him. She remained in the house with their children and accomplished her role as the woman and mother in the family and took over the role of her husband as the man and father in the house. Bâ (1981) demonstrated the bargaining process of African women in this situation and how they struggle to find space. She also contests the legacy of male dominance by writing about it. By talking about the role she accomplished in the house as a female and the new role (that of her husband) she took over in the house, Bâ (1981) explored different aspects of identities that intertwined and oppressed her. When she took over her husband’s role, it put a lot of burden on her, and she was no longer able to enjoy her life. Like Bâ (1981), few African feminists (Beoku-Betts, 2004; Davis & Graves, 1986; Ogundipe-Leslie, 1994) have incorporated an intersectional analysis in their studies to explore the experiences of African women. In her study, Beoku-Betts (2004): focused on how issues of race and gender bias and marginality as Third World subjects affected their experiences as graduate students in scientific disciplines. She also

examined the extent to which the women were aware of how particular educational contexts such as mentoring, peer group interaction, and juggling the demands of marriage and graduate school, affected their lives and shaped their ways of coping. (p.117) Like Beoku-Betts (2004), I use intersectionality as a framework to produce an understanding of Togolese immigrant women’s experiences in the United States. I agree with Crenshaw (1991) that the experiences of women of color are frequently the product of intersecting patterns of racism and sexism and classism, three elements that are structurally defined and institutionalized. In other words, a combination of those categories, including race, class, and gender help to show how Black women are discriminated against. Crenshaw’s (1991) understanding of the experience of Black women is consistent with Ogundipe Leslie’s (1994) understanding of the experiences of African woman. Ogundipe-Leslie (1994) posits that the African woman should be “studied in the complexity of her existential reality; her classes, cultures, races, and ethnicities among other variables” (p. 9), and “to understand [the] multi-faceted identities [of African women] beyond wifehood, we must look for their roles and statuses in sites other than that of marriage” (p. 13). In the view of Ogundipe- Leslie (1994), we have to be aware of the fact that an African woman has different identities. For example, an African woman is a woman, she is an African, she is a third world person, she is a mother, and a wife. Crenshaw’s (1991) and Ogundipe-Leslie’s (1994) arguments are also consistent with Butler’s (1990) argument on what it means to be a woman. Butler (1990) posits that: If one “is” a woman, that is surely not all one is; the term fails to be exhaustive… because gender is not always constituted coherently or consistently in different historical contexts, and because gender intersects with racial, class, ethnic, sexual, and regional modalities of discursively constituted identities. As a result, it becomes impossible to separate out “gender” from the political and cultural intersections in which it is invariably produced and maintained. (p. 3) I understand that in the view of Crenshaw (1991) and Ogundipe-Leslie (1994), different identities intersect in the experiences of Black women, and their analysis should not be done separately. Togolese immigrant women identified as immigrants, Black women, former post- secondary students, wives, mothers, workers, and females, and these social categories are part of

their experiences in the United States. I considered these social identities in the analysis of the narratives. The results of the study suggest that Togolese immigrant women were aware that they have different identities, and therefore, their awareness provides evidence of how they embody intersectionality in their experiences. For example, one participant’s narrative about gender expectation illustrates that she was aware of the interconnections of identities in her life: You are the frontrunner. You have to multitask. You do everything at home. The man usually does not step in. Togolese immigrant women were at the same time wives, mothers, and women who worked for wages because of the job opportunities we have in this country, and they welcome these opportunities. Unlike the United States, Togolese women in Togo have limited employment opportunities, and they remain home as the homemakers of the family while their husbands earn money outside their homes as breadwinners. Research participants emphasized the fact that they are mothers and wives and demonstrated an understanding of how their various identities interact to oppress them while they were fulfilling their gender roles. The participants did so by referencing the roles they accomplished as females in their houses. The findings in this study are consistent with Beoku- Betts’ (2004) findings. One of the research participants in Beoku-Betts’ (2004) study reflected: I could not perform to my maximum, because I was a mother and wife. My husband was supportive, but once he enrolled in school, things changed a bit. At the beginning of one academic year, I drew up a timetable to share household chores. I asked him what he would be able to do. He flared up and was very angry. He felt a woman should not dictate to her husband. He decided on his own volition to do the laundry, etc. I had to study hard, because with all the negative perceptions about me, I wanted to prove them wrong. I finished my Ph.D. in four and a half years. (p. 130) Beoku-Betts’ (2004) research participant provided in her narrative an understanding of what is means to be an African woman in a foreign country and the gender expectations in the family. Although African immigrant women add new roles to the roles they brought with them from Africa, they are expected not to disturb the patriarchal structure of the family or change gender roles even when their new condition requires it.

In this sense we can understand Kila’s narrative where she states that: It does not matter if you live over here. An African woman will always be an African woman, especially when you have married an African man. The duties in the house lay on you. Togolese women are expected to conform to Togolese norms (cooking, cleaning, catering to the needs of their husbands, raising children) of being African women wherever they live in the world. In other words, “The African woman is generally expected to be conformist, affectionate, and sensitive. Power, prestige, and status are often lacking in their relationships with male partners (Arthur, 2000, p. 122). However, it is important to add that: Exposure to American culture is changing the routine interactions between African women and their husbands. Their expressive and nurturing roles have been combined with instrumental and decision making roles thus lessening the unequal kinship structures that characterized their relationships with men in Africa. (p. 122) When asked how they identify, one of the participant said she identifies as a “Black Togolese American woman.” This identity illustrates the fact that the participant was experiencing an interconnection of identities. She had to grapple with intersectional effects of both the African culture she brought with her from Africa and the American culture she was learning. Both cultures were intersecting in her experiences, and their intersection led to her new identity. In other words, the research participant understood that she was not a Black American or any other race in the country. Rather, she understood that she belonged to a minority group among the other minority groups in the country. For example, the post-secondary degree she received in the United States put her into a specific social class or a minority group of educated women. The research participant was negotiating her identity in her host culture. The negotiation of identity also emphasizes the fact that Togolese immigrant women were getting acclimated to their new culture, and they were less and less dealing with adjustment issues. The findings in this study also indicated that research participants’ parents did not have specific career aspirations for them. Although the parents did not have specific career aspirations for their daughters, they wanted them to be educated. The educational level of their parents, specifically their fathers, influenced the decision making about participants’ educations. In this study, their mothers had completed at least primary school education or had not received their high school diploma. All the fathers had at least a high school diploma, and the highest level of

education was doctorate. The level of education of their fathers and their support affected participants’ achievement in education and their motivation to do well for themselves and their siblings who were looking up to them. Since the participants’ fathers guided their education and they had a strong influence on them, it shows the power of patriarchy in Togolese families. Participants’ mothers had less influence on them. After their post-secondary education, research participants secured paid employment, and their wages increased. The increase in the wages was influenced by their post-secondary education and the improvement of their language skills. Through their wages, they contributed to maintaining a strong family economy. Regarding their adjustment in the United States, Togolese immigrant women mentioned the language barrier as the most important issue they faced. All the participants discussed their experiences with the language barrier. They commented on how the lack of language skills affected their abilities to communicate with people in school, as well as in the workplace. They also commented that they took ESL classes in the beginning of their stays in the United States, and these classes helped improve their language skills and also helped them become confident in pursuing post-secondary education in the United States. One participant discussed her experiences with racist behavior in school and the ways in which she was affected by the issue. She felt that her identity as an international student kept her from being able to communicate with her instructors and accessing knowledge. She experienced isolation in her interaction with her instructors in the classroom. This experience is reported in Beoku-Betts’ (2004) study addressing the experiences African women who pursued graduate studies in scientific disciplines at western universities between the 1960s and 1990s. In Beoku- Betts’ (2004) study, one of the research participants commented on the doubts by White professors about their ability to do the work, feelings of exclusion, lack of support, perceptions about their inability to speak English, and negative perceptions of African societies. (p. 120) Another participant in the same study reflected: My graduate experience was very difficult. Being in a White institution, it was like, what is this girl doing here? I lost my identity. I became the Black girl. A lot of them assumed I couldn't understand English or [that I was dumb]. After the first semester, their attitudes changed. (p. 121)

Like in Beoku-Betts’ (2004) study, the research participants in this study did not mention that they experienced overt racism. Their awareness with racial stereotypes came from the fact that they felt excluded in the classroom and that they were not supported by instructors. They felt as the “other” in the classroom. I suggest that being the other is being taken as the stranger. It makes you become someone who has to deal with loneliness because you do not belong. In other words: being the “other” of a dominant culture involves living in a bifurcated universe of meaning. On the one hand, one must produce oneself as a self for oneself. That is survival. At the same time the system also requires that you produce yourself as an “other.” (Kenway & Bullen, 2003, p. 8) Togolese immigrant women’s experiences of intersectional discrimination reflect are reflected in Abra’s narrative: I always still feel like girls have to prove themselves. Even though in the U.S.A, they cannot show it, as a woman you still have to prove yourself. You go to meetings and you have all of those big managers, they are all guys and they are just looking at you. On top of that, not being from here, it is a total different story, but you have to, again, learn. The intersectional discrimination is salient, and as a woman, you have to make a choice of striving hard to rise to the top and show that you deserve to be there and your gender is not a handicap for you in performing your duties. Gender discrimination from community members was another issue one of the research participant’s experienced in the United States. The struggles the research participant encountered as a woman in Togo, a patriarchal society, prepared her to be able to face gender discrimination in the U.S. In response to gender discrimination from community members, the participants in my study became resilient and worked hard to succeed in their educations. Their narratives indicate to what extent it is challenging for African women to pursue post-secondary education as a mother and a wife in a host culture without the presence of extended family to help her with her duties as a woman. The findings of this study suggest a number of recommendations and future directions for research. The results of the study suggested that language barriers were one of the most important challenges Togolese immigrant women faced during the first years of their stay in the United States. The findings have implications for college counselors. As Olivas and Li (2006)

suggested, it is recommended that college counselors in the United States become competent in counseling international students from diverse backgrounds by focusing on their values, their beliefs, and multicultural issues (p. 217). College counselors should avoid “reductionism in the counseling process. In other words, attempts should be made not to substitute cultural stereotypes for the phenomenological perspective of each client. The pursuit of cultural competency is an active and indefinite one” (Olivas & Li, 2006, p. 217). By cultural competency, I mean college counselors should understand the cultures of the international students with whom they work so that they can work effectively with them, because international students come from cultures other than their own. The result of the study suggests that Togolese immigrant women should take ESL classes upon arrival in the United States, whether they are interested in pursuing post-secondary education or not, because it will help them improve their language skills, communicate with people in the country, find jobs, navigate the culture, and navigate their new environment. By taking ESL classes, Togolese immigrant women who want to pursue their educations in the country can get advice from the ESL instructors to know when, how, and where to go to further their educations. In other words, the language skills will ease their transition and the navigation of the educational system in the country. Even if it happens that Togolese women still experience difficulties after taking ESL classes in the United States or prior to their arrival, I feel that they can quickly overcome these difficulties compared to Togolese women who do not have language skills. Togolese community members need to understand the intersectional identities that Togolese immigrant women experience in order to assist them in their endeavors in the United States. Togolese community members need to understand that, in the United States, Togolese women need help, because they live in a foreign country where they do not have family members or relatives to help them raise the family as it is the case in Togo, while they pursue their educations or while they are working. There is a saying in Africa that has it that: “A child belongs not to one parent or home,” meaning that the upbringing of a child belongs to the community, regardless of his/her biological parents. Therefore, Togolese immigrant women will have the ability to succeed in their endeavors if Togolese community members contribute to their success.

Educators working with Togolese immigrant women should consider the different identities Togolese immigrant women bring with them in school so that their interactions with them may impact their success. Educators can support Togolese immigrant women by collaborating with international colleagues to learn from them how to interact and educate Togolese women. Another tangible way that educators can support Togolese women is by having resources to be used to educate them. The participants in this study were all married. A study could be done using intersectional analysis to understand the experiences of single, African, immigrant women in the United States. This study might be a valuable study given the fact that single women might have some intersectional identities that we might not know of unless we read their stories. The findings in the study suggest that the level of education of the father influenced the participants’ educational choices. In the study, the father had at least a high school diploma and the highest degree of education of the fathers was a doctorate in Economics. The fathers’ educational experiences and views on education helped them to be influential in the lives of their daughters. It is also important to know that, in the patriarchal system in Togo, men have more power than women in the families. This leads the influence of the fathers on the children to be greater than that of the mothers. A study could be done to understand the experiences of female whose fathers did not participate in education. Arthur’s (2000) study provides some general information about African immigrants’ experiences in the United States; however, it does not address the immigration and educational experience of women from different countries in Africa. Another study on the immigration and education experiences of women from different countries in Africa could highlight issues and nuances that exist in their experiences based on their country of origin in Africa. In conclusion, the findings of this study suggest that the experiences of Togolese immigrant women are the result of the interconnection of their identities in the United States. Togolese immigrant women have identified that there is benefit despite the trouble from studying and living in the United States. These benefits are related to the better paying jobs they had after receiving post-secondary degrees in the country. This suggests that they appreciate the host culture and indicate that they are gradually adapting to their host culture. The challenges they have faced, the benefits they had through their education, as well as the bargaining skills they adopted for their survival in their host culture, led to their new

identities. These new identities have certain benefits, while also creating new challenges. I suggest that the identity change is also the result of their exposure to the host culture. The level of bargaining can become uncomfortable for Togolese immigrant women when they live in the United States for a long time. When the new values they learn in the country intersect with Togolese values they brought with them, a new way of confirming their identity may arise to disrupt the bargaining relationship. For example, Arthur’ (2000) study found that: While immigrant women often defer to their husbands in decision-making affecting the household, this is only because husbands have usually been living in the United States much longer than their wives….And, although the majority of the women are involved in relationships that are structured according to patriarchal beliefs, they have redefined the boundaries of the patriarchal relationships. In redefining the boundaries of their patriarchal subordination, immigrant women rely on the experiences the law provides for women in areas such as property rights, inheritance, and obligations to children. These conditions may not be welcomed by men who do not want to relinquish the privilege conferred to them in the patriarchal system, which for example, does not make them responsible for caring for the children. (p. 119) I add that, while bargaining with patriarchy, women should be careful not to compromise their happiness. They should be able to make choices on their own instead of waiting for their partner to tell them what to do, because this situation helps reinforce patriarchal values.

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Appendix A Human Subjects Research: ER Application # Exempt Certification Application

HS Research Protocol: All research projects, involving human subjects, regardless of funding (admin use only) source must submit an application to the compliance office prior to the initiation of the research. EM from PI Some research requires IRB review and approval and some research is exempt from complete review, EM from FA

however, at Miami, the Compliance Office is the only authority that certifies the Exempt Status (ES). If your research meets the requirements (Sections D, below), you may use this application. If it does not, submit an application for IRB review. Completed ES applications must be emailed as attachments to [email protected]. If you have questions, contact the

Office for the Advancement of Research and Scholarship: (513) 529-3600.

A. Personnel Information (Information):

Primary Investigator Status: Faculty Staff Graduate* Undergraduate*

PRIMARY CONTACT (Corresponding Researcher): * FACULTY ADVISOR (required for student PI’s):

Name: Name:

UniqueID (ex: smithja): UniqueID (ex: smithja):

Department: Department:

Phone: (513) 529 - Phone: (513) 529 -

Email address: [email protected] Email address: [email protected]

CITI Online Training (date): Date CITI Online Training (date): Date

MU Application training (date): Date MU Appl. training (date): Date

Note: All investigators and personnel that will be in contact with subjects or data that can be linked to subjects must complete initial online human subjects research training and then refresher training every 3 years. Check to be sure all training is up-to-date before submitting your application: Training Completion Dates

Other project personnel who will interact with subjects or data (CO-PI’s, research assistants, etc.)

List Names and UniqueID’s (add lines as necessary)

Names

B. APPLICATION INFORMATION (Info):

Application Title: Enter Title for the Activity

Your Research Project Title: Optional (for your records to link the protocol to a research project or grant).

Projected beginning date: mmm dd Expected ending date: mmm dd Human Subjects Research yy (e.g. Jan 01 09) yy Dates: (and after Compliance Office approval)

Funding Source if Federal or If externally funded, enter OARS eSPA ID State: eSPA ID number:

C. SUBJECT OF RESEARCH (Info):

Is the data being collected primarily about a program or other entity (i.e. not about living

Yes No humans) and collecting minimal demographic or personal information about the

respondents ( e.g. age-class, gender, ethnicity, etc)?

D. EXEMPTION CATEGORIES (Info)

Please indicate the Exemption Category below (1-6) that applies to your research. Check each box for which the statement following it is true, including the boxes in the second column. The descriptions are not all-inclusive, see the guidance for further explanation. Note: research involving prisoners can never be exempted from IRB review. If your research involves taste or food quality, contact the compliance office for further information.

Instructions:

Select the most relevant exemption category below. You only need to select one. Provide an adequate description of your research in Section E to justify the application of this exemption to your research. 1. Research will be conducted in established or commonly accepted educational settings (e.g. schools, (Info) training centers) involving normal educational practices, such as research on instructional strategies or research on the effectiveness of or the comparison among instructional techniques, curricula, or classroom manage- -ment methods. The activities in which the students engage will be practices that would occur in the absence of any research. 2. Research will involve the use of: i) educational tests (e.g. cognitive, diagnostic, aptitude, (Info) achievement), ii) survey procedures, iii) interview procedures (which includes focus groups), OR iv) observation of public behavior uninfluenced by the research. Check the appropriate boxes below This category can apply if :

information obtained will be recorded in such a manner that subjects could not be identified (directly or through information that could identify the subjects) OR any disclosure of the subjects responses outside the research could not reasonably place the subjects at risk of criminal or civil liability or be damaging to the subjects’ financial standing, employability, or reputation. (Information on limitations) this research will not include subjects less than 18 years of age. This category (2) can be applied when subjects are <18 only when: the research involves the observation of public behavior and the researcher will not participate in the observed activity (no surveys or interviews and a teacher cannot videotape her students while teaching and qualify for exemption category 2). 3. This research will involve the use of educational tests (cognitive, diagnostic, aptitude, etc), survey (Info) procedures, interviews, or observation of public behavior and is not exempt under (2) above, but the subjects will be elected or appointed public officials or candidates for public office, OR

federal statutes require without exception that confidentiality of collected information must be

maintained beyond the end of the research (e.g. course grades).

4. This research involves the study of existing data or specimens and: (Info) The data is publicly available; OR

Miami researchers have never or will never have access to data with subject identifying information (original collected data may have identifiers but it must be edited before MU researchers have access and the data must arrive on campus without identifiers to qualify). 5. This research will be funded or conducted at the request of, and approved by the head of a federal (Info) agency for the purpose of studying: A public benefit or service program, or;

Procedures for obtaining benefits or services under a program, or;

Changes in payment or alternatives to a public benefit or service program.

E. Research Description (Complete all sections. If you believe a section does not apply to your research, you must explain and justify this; Refer to the guidance document for help). (Information) i) Purpose, Population and Methods: Use the space below to briefly describe the purpose, nature of the research, e methods to be used, and describe the subject population (demographics and approximate number of subjects). (Information)

Description

ii) Consent Process: Use the space below to briefly describe the consent process that will be implemented. It is most expedient to compose a draft of your consent form and attach it to your message or copy-paste it here. (Information)

Consent Process

iii) Materials and Other Information: Use the space below to list survey or interview questions or attach the survey/interview questions (MS-Word or PDF) in one file along with this document (2nd file) to the email message when submitting your application. Include some response in the space below, e.g. see attached file or indicate that this research does not involve interviews or surveys. (Information)

Materials

F. INVESTIGATOR’S ASSURANCE STATEMENT I have read Miami University's policy concerning research involving human subjects and by signing below: 1. I agree to accept responsibility for the ethical conduct of research conducted in this project;

2. I agree to obtain approval from the Compliance Office prior to modifying any of the procedures that might affect an exempt determination; 3. I attest that the information submitted in this application is true to the best of my knowledge. Students: send your application to your faculty advisor. Faculty: submission by attachment using your MU email address to [email protected] serves as your signature and pledge to abide by the conditions stated above. This cover page document should be sent in it’s current format (Word Doc), no original signatures are required

Primary Investigator Signature (Submitting by MU email serves as your signature) ______Date: mmm dd yy

Faculty Advisor Signature (Submitting by MU email serves as your signature) ______Date: mmm dd yy

Notes: (for administrative use only ):

Appendix B

Dear Participant: My name is Tela Bayamna. I am contacting you because I would like to conduct a study on your experiences in the United States. The study is part of the Doctoral Degree requirement at Miami University Oxford Ohio. For this research I have chosen to interview Togolese immigrant women who after high school are pursuing or have pursued post secondary education within the past year in the United States and Togolese immigrant women who after high school did not pursue post secondary education. I am specifically interested in understanding how you negotiate gender expectations about education and family. I will ask you open ended questions to collect your narratives about your experiences in the United States and take notes of our conversation. If at any time, you indicate discomfort during the conversation, you need to only notify me and I will cease to interview you. If you do not consent (below), I will not record your narrative. To aid in accurately collecting information, I will ask that you allow me to audio record the interview. I will record our conversation and the recorder will always be in full view so that you know I am recording. I record things only to be sure that I get the conversation right and I will destroy the tapes afterword; only me, my advisor and my dissertation committee will listen to the recording. The recordings will be transcribed and later destroyed and not used publicly in any way. A copy of the research questions will be faxed, mailed or given to you so that you can consider and prepare your responses to the questions prior to the interviews. During the interview, you can decline to answer any question for any reason. The interviews will last an hour and they consist of open ended questions. Multiple interviews are planned with you in order to provide in depth data collection and opportunities for follow up. The collection of your narratives will be done at locations convenient to you. I may also do the interview via Skype because of time constraints and conflicts of availability and the recorder will also be in full view so that you know I am recording. I will take notes during the interview and transcribe your responses. I will use a pseudonym to hide your identity. The draft copies of the transcripts will be sent to you for validation, editing and returned to me. The transcription of your narrative will be done by me. Your participation in this study is voluntary and you may withdraw at any time or decline to answer any question that makes you uncomfortable. You will not be asked to do anything that exposes you to risks beyond those of

everyday life. No major risks are anticipated for you in this study. You may also terminate the interviews at any time and subsequently, reschedule or drop from the study without explanation. You can refuse to answer any question or talk about any topic. Only my faculty advisor, my research committee and I will have access to identifiable raw data. During presentations or written reports, you will not be identified unless you indicate so below. If you have question about this research, please contact me Tela Bayamna at (513) 328-7669; [email protected] or my faculty advisor, Dr. Lisa Weems at [email protected]. If you have questions or concerns about the rights of the research participants, please contact the Office for Advancement of Research and Scholarship at (513) 529-3600 or email: [email protected]. Please complete the section below, separate the section, and return it to me. Please retain the top portion for your future reference. Thank you for considering participating in this study. We are very grateful for your help and hope that this will be interesting for you.

Cut at the line, keep the top section and return the bottom section. I agree to participate in the dissertation study. I understand that I may be contacted for an interview and that I may decline to participate in any way or ask that the researcher discontinue collecting information on me.

By checking this box, you agree to allow the researcher to identify you in presented materials. If this box is not checked, a pseudonym will be used.

Participant’s signature ______Date: ______

Appendix C Dear Participant: My name is Tela Bayamna. I am contacting you because I would like to conduct a pilot study to understand your experiences in the United States. The research is part of the Doctoral Degree requirement at Miami University Oxford Ohio. This pilot study can help me work out some of the procedural burden and collect preliminary data as well as decide if I need to make alternatives before the full study. For this pilot study I have chosen to interview one Togolese immigrant woman who after high school have pursued or is pursuing post secondary education within the past year in the United States and one Togolese immigrant woman who after high school did not pursue post secondary education. I am specifically interested in understanding how you negotiate gender expectations about education and family in the United States. I will ask you open ended questions to collect your narratives about your experiences in the United States and take notes of our conversation. If at any time, you indicate discomfort during the conversation, you need to only notify me and I will cease to interview you. If you do not consent (below), I will not record your narrative. To aid in accurately collecting information, I will ask that you allow me to audio record the interview. I will record our conversation and the recorder will always be in full view so that you know I am recording. I record things only to be sure that I get the conversation right and I will destroy the tapes afterword; only me, my advisor and my dissertation committee will listen to the recording. The recordings will be transcribed and later destroyed and not used publicly in any way. A copy of the research questions will be faxed, mailed or given to you so that you can consider and prepare your responses to the questions prior to the interviews. During the interview, you can decline to answer any question for any reason. The interviews will last an hour and they consist of open ended questions. Multiple interviews are planned with you in order to provide in depth data collection and opportunities for follow up. The collection of your narratives will be done at locations convenient to you. I may also do the interview via Skype because of time constraints and conflicts of availability and the recorder will also be in full view so that you know I am recording. I will take notes during the interview and transcribe your responses. I will use a pseudonym to hide your identity. The draft copies of the transcripts will be sent to you for validation, editing and returned to me. The transcription of your narrative will be done by me. Your participation in this pilot study is voluntary and you may withdraw at any time or decline to answer any question that

makes you uncomfortable. You will not be asked to do anything that exposes you to risks beyond those of everyday life. No major risks are anticipated for you in this study. You may also terminate the interviews at any time and subsequently, reschedule or drop from the study without explanation. You can refuse to answer any question or talk about any topic. Only my faculty advisor, my research committee and I will have access to identifiable raw data. During presentations or written reports, you will not be identified unless you indicate so below. If you have questions about this pilot study, please contact me Tela Bayamna at (513) 328-7669; [email protected] or my faculty advisor, Dr. Lisa Weems at [email protected]. If you have questions or concerns about the rights of the research participants, please contact the Office for the Advancement of Research and Scholarship at (513) 529-3600 or email: [email protected]. Please complete the section below, separate the section, and return it to me. Please retain the top portion for your future reference. Thank you for considering participating in this pilot study. We are very grateful for your help and hope that this will be interesting for you.

Cut at the line, keep the top section and return the bottom section. I agree to participate in the dissertation pilot study. I understand that I may be contacted for an interview and that I may decline to participate in any way or ask that the researcher discontinue collecting information on me.

By checking this box, you agree to allow the researcher to identify you in presented materials. If this box is not checked, a pseudonym will be used.

Participant’s signature ______Date: ______

Appendix D

Interview questions

Face sheet questions

1. What brought you to the United States?

2. How long have you been in the United States?

3. What is your highest degree of education?

4. What was your highest degree of education before you came to the United States? Background questions

1. Since you have been in the United States, what have been some of your major struggles?

2. Tell me about your experiences as a Togolese woman before you moved to this country?

3. A. What role has education played in your life in Togo? B. What role has education played in your life in the United States? Education questions

1. If Togolese women or African women ask you if they should pursue post-secondary education in the United States, what would you say?

2. Have you seen any changes in yourself while pursuing or since you pursued secondary education in the United States? Family questions

1. What is your daily routine in your family?

2. What are some of the ways that you balance the expectations in the family as the female or the mother? Gender identity questions

1. How are other people viewing you?

2. What kind of things do you talk about with your friends?

3. How do you internally feel about yourself?

4. Give five words that describe you!

5. If you read a story what would you read about? Gender expectations questions

1. In what ways does gender role expectation affect/affected you and your schooling?

2. What are your perspectives in relation to attitudes about gender expectations and post- secondary education?

3. What gender role expectations appear to be most commonly mentioned by women in the community?

4. To your knowledge, how are women who pursue post-secondary education identified in Togo? How are they identified in the United States?

5. What attitudes are there about women in the family?

6. Is there anything I did not ask that you think is important for me to understand about your experiences in the United States? Any follow up questions came from the questions above.

100

Appendix E

1-Jul-16

To: Tela Bayamna and Lisa Weems ([email protected]; [email protected])

Educational Leadership RE: Post-secondary educational experiences of Togolese immigrant women and educational attainment. Project reference number is: 02187e (please refer to this ID number in all correspondence to compliance administration) The project noted above and as described in your application for registering Human Subjects (HS) research has been screened to determine if it is regulated research or meets the criteria of one of the categories of research that can be exempt from approval of an Institutional Review Board (per 45 CFR 46). The determination for your research is indicated below. The research described in the application is regulated human subjects research, however, the description meets the criteria of at least one exempt category included in 45 CFR 46 and associated guidance. The Applicable Exempt Category(ies) is/are: 2 Research may proceed upon receipt of this certification and compliance with any conditions described in the accompanying email message. When research is deemed exempt from IRB review, it is the responsibility of the researcher listed above to ensure that all future persons not listed on the filed application who i) will aid in collecting data or, ii) will have access to data with subject identifying information, meet the training requirements (CITI Online Training). If you are considering any changes in this research that may alter the level of risk or wish to include a vulnerable population (e.g. subjects <18 years of age) that was not previously specified in the application, you must consult the Research Compliance Office before implementing these changes. Exemption certification is not transferrable; this certificate only applies to the researcher specified above. All research exempted from IRB review is subject to post-certification monitoring and audit by the compliance office. ------Neal H. Sullivan, PhD Director of Research Compliance Office for the Advancement of Research and Scholarship 102E Roudebush Hall Miami University Oxford, OH 45056 [email protected] (513) 529-2488

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Appendix F Picture of Togo

Source: http://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/map/togo-political-map.htm

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Appendix G French song about a broken relationship Ca va pas changer le monde par Joe Dassin Meaning: It is not going to change the world by Joe Dassin C’est drole, tu es partie

et pourtant tu es encore ici. Puisque tout me parle de toi

Un parfum de femme. L’echo de ta voix

Ton adieu Je n’y croix pas du tout C’est un aurevoir

Presqu’un rendez- vous

Ca va pas changer le monde Il a trop tourne sans nous Il pleuvra toujours sur Londres Ca va rien change du tout

Qu’est ce que ca peut bien lui faire Une porte qui s’est refermee on s’est aime n’en parlons plus Et la vie continue

Ca va pas changer le monde que tu changes de maison Il va continuer le monde Et il aura bien raison

Les poussieres d’une etoile c’est ca qui fait briller la voie lactee On s’est aime n’en parlons plus et la vie continue

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Ca va pas changer le monde Ca va pas le deranger Il est comme avant le monde C’est toi seul qui a change

Moi je suis reste le meme Celui qui croyait que tu l’aimais C’etait pas vrai n’en parlons plus et la vie continue.

Meaning of the song

It's funny, you're gone

and yet you're still here Since everything tells me about you.

A woman's perfume The echo of your voice

Your farewell I do not believe it at all It is a goodbye

Almost an appointment

It's not going to change the world It has turned too much without us It will always rain on London It is not going to change anything

What can it do to the world? A door that closed we loved each other no longer talk about it and life goes on

It’s not going to change the world that you go to a different house It will continue the world And it will be right

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The dust of a star is what makes the labyrinth way shine we loved each other no longer talk about it and life goes on

It's not going to change the world It's not going to bother the world It is like before the world You're the only one who has changed

I am the same He who believed that you loved him It was not true let's not talk about it anymore And life goes on

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