The Domestic Side of a Foreign Existence

Abstract

Because increasing numbers of Americans who go abroad are taking their families with them, the fate of American missions overseas is becoming more dependent on adaptations in the domestic sphere. In order to find out the nature of these adaptations, an investigation of the domestic arrangements of Americans in a small community in Spain was undertaken. Because these expatriots did not have the support of the kind of prefabricated enclave which is to be found, e.g., at a large overseas military base, they were required to come to terms with the hosts and the host situation. Among these Americans' responses to this foreign setting was an increased family cohesiveness and an ethnocentrism which was, perhaps, expressed most unguardedly by American adolescents. Though American wives and children took on new roles, they did so for the most part grudgingly and with difficulty. Despite exposure to foreign people and ways, domestic life among these expatriots was easily recognizable as American; and contrary to the hopes of those advocating people-to-people contact, they tended not to be very sympathetic to the hosts and their ways.