Institutionalized inclusion a case study on support for immigrants in english learning

It focuses on how a Mandarin–English bilingual Chinese church’s practicesfostered a young couple’s English learning and social economicinclusion into the evangelical Christian Chinese co

Institutionalized Inclusion: A Case Study

on Support for Immigrants in English Learning

HUAMEI HAN

Simon Fraser University

Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada

Based on a three-year ethnography, this article illuminates howinstitutions and individuals can support immigrants’ language learningand settlement in today’s globalized, multicultural societies It focuses

on how a Mandarin–English bilingual Chinese church’s practicesfostered a young couple’s English learning and social economicinclusion into the evangelical Christian Chinese community inCanada Drawing on the conceptualization of learning as legitimateperipheral participation (Lave & Wenger, 1991), concretized by concepts

of region and stage (Goffman, 1959) and social capital (Bourdieu, 1977,1986), I illustrate the multiple effects of this couple’s increasedparticipation in their church community I then analyze howinstitutionalized, multiple forms of mediation (Vygotsky, 1978) opened

up spaces for and assisted their increased participation I argue thatallowing ethnolinguistic minority immigrants a legitimate speakingposition, at interpersonal, institutional, and ideological levels, facil-itates immigrant language learning and integration

C anada and other industrialized immigrant-receiving countries havelong been concerned with immigrants’ so-called language problems(e.g., Bonfiglio, 2002) This concern has grown ever more acute intoday’s globalized economy which requires higher levels ofcommunication and literacy skills (Gee, Hull, & Lankshear, 1996).The dominant assumptions underlying Canada’s immigrant languagetraining policies are that immigrants have the responsibility to solvetheir language problems and language classrooms are the main sites ofachieving this goal However, the reality is that for adult immigrants, themajority of their experiences and learning of the dominant languagetakes place outside of any classroom (Roberts, Davies, & Jupp, 1992) Myown ethnographic work explored language learning among skilledimmigrants in and outside of classrooms during their first years ofsettlement in Toronto, Canada My fieldwork over a three-year period

indicated that minority churches are important, effective, and yetunderresearched sites of not only socialization but also of languagelearning for immigrants and their children In fact, social scienceresearchers have noted the reemergence or rather continuation of twophenomena: Largely Caucasian, English-speaking evangelical Christiansare teaching or preparing to teach English overseas; and minoritychurches have grown rapidly in the English-speaking world (e.g.,Bramdat, 2005; Carnes & Yang, 2004; Ebaugh & Chafetz, 2000; Woods,2004) TESOL researchers have noticed and debated about the former(e.g., Edge, 2003; Pennycook & Coutans-Marin, 2003; Varghese &Johnson, 2007), but not the latter.

In this article, I explore the practices and effects of uninstructedEnglish teaching and learning at one church in Toronto that successfullyincluded Chinese immigrants Combining the concepts of legitimateperipheral participation with front/back region and social capital (Bourdieu,1986; Goffman, 1959; Lave & Wenger, 1991), I try to understand andpinpoint how and why this particular church attracted and integratedimmigrants, and specifically, the young Chinese couple I focused on,linguistically and beyond Whereas, as I have argued elsewhere,ideological exclusion is at the heart of the so-called immigrants’language problem (Han, 2007a), this article focuses on finding possibleinterventions to address this problem at the interpersonal andinstitutional levels I do so by illustrating the multiple effects of thiscouple’s increased participation at church, and analyzing how institu-tionalized structural and individual support facilitated their inclusion

LANGUAGE LEARNING AS PARTICIPATION AND

IDENTITY BUILDING

Legitimate Peripheral Participation, Access, and Identity

The theory of communities of practice (CofP) frames learning asinvolving a dual process of participation and identity construction, inwhich apprenticeship-like legitimate peripheral participation (LPP) isboth the prerequisite and the process of learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991;Wenger, 1998) Access to a wide range of information, resources,members, and participation is crucial in this framework

Applying the CofP framework to second language learning necessarilyentails a shift of focus on linguistic proficiency to issues of access andidentity Critical scholars in TESOL, notably Toohey (1998, 2000, 2005),

1 I use minority churches’’ instead of immigrant churches to highlight that these churches are ministered and administrated by and for ethnolinguistic minorities who are largely Canadians or permanent residents.

Norton (2001; Norton & Toohey, 2001), and Day (2002), have appliedthe concept of LPP and illustrated that self-ascribed and other-assignedlearner identities play a critical role in shaping access to resources andparticipation in learning English, which subsequently shapes learneridentities Indeed, second language learners are often found to live outthe self-fulfilling prophecy of becoming the kinds of persons they weresaid to be, or taking up the identities that were assigned to, or imposed

on them (Toohey, 2000, 2005) After all: ‘‘People tell others who theyare, but even more important, they tell themselves, and then try to act asthough they are who they say they are’’ (Holland, Lachicotte, Skinner, &Cain, 2003/1998, p 3)

Whereas CofP conceptualizes learning in general, language-focuseddisciplines have complemented this framework given the central role oflanguage in social life and in learning Scholars in sociolinguistics andliteracy studies have applied, criticized, debated, and developed CofP intheir respective fields (e.g., Barton & Tusting, 2005; Holmes, 1999; andthe debate between Davies, 2005 and Eckert & Werger, 2005 commented

on by Gee, 2005) Similarly, I find several concepts generated in the field

of sociology of interaction useful in describing concretely various forms

of participation and identity in a nuanced manner

Front/Back Region, and Onstage/Offstage

The first pair of concepts is ‘‘back region, where the performance of aroutine is prepared, and front region, where the performance ispresented’’ (Goffman, 1959, p 238, emphasis added) In conceptualiz-ing self-presentation in everyday life, Goffman contends that ‘‘access tothese regions is controlled in order to prevent the audience from seeingbackstage and to prevent outsiders from coming into a performance that

is not addressed to them’’ (p 238) In other words, access to back region

is granted to actors, while access to front region is granted to thelegitimate audience

Goffman sometimes used ‘‘backstage’’ to refer to ‘‘back region’’ asshown in the previous quote In analyzing activities at institutionalsettings such as a church, it is helpful to maintain the distinctionbetween region and stage and to describe onstage and offstage activities inboth the front and back regions Stage is where a prerehearsedperformance takes place regardless of whether a literal stage is present

or not; one is onstage when performing for an assembled audience andoffstage when not performing The distinctions are fluid, in that being inthe front or back region and on- or off-stage change momentarilydepending on the focus of the analysis

In institutional settings, performing onstage in the front region of aninstitution is an important form of full participation that often grantsand consolidates the performer’s full membership; consequently, access

to full participation is tightly controlled Furthermore, the smoothonstage performance in the front region largely depends on observa-tions offstage in the front region and preparation in the back region, off-and onstage Full participation matters because of the full membership

or social recognition it can yield for participating individuals withinspecific communities Recognizing different forms of capital is key tounderstanding how identity and access are critical issues in immigrantlearners’ linguistic, social, and economic well-being

Identity as Social Capital

Pierre Bourdieu uses the concept of capital to refer to the result of

‘‘accumulated labour’’ which ‘‘takes time to accumulate’’ and has ‘‘thepotential to produce profits and to reproduce itself in identical orexpanded form’’ (1986, p 241) While material capital often presentsitself in the form of economic capital and can be easily converted intomoney, Bourdieu recognizes symbolic capital which often seems econom-ically ‘‘disinterested’’, or seems to be ‘‘in opposition to strictly economicinterest’’ (Bourdieu, 1997/1977, p 177) As an important form of symboliccapital, social capital, made up of social obligations or connections and ‘‘inthe form of the prestige and renown attached to a family and a name,’’ can

be institutionalized in ranks and titles, and ‘‘is readily convertible back intoeconomic capital’’ (Bourdieu, 1997/1977, p 179)

Other-assigned and self-ascribed identities are an important form ofsymbolic capital, in that they have their origins in individuals’ materialand symbolic inheritances, are accumulated over time, and can open up

or shut down individuals’ or groups’ access to resources and tion in various activities Their access subsequently enables or preventsthe accumulation of, and conversion between, different forms of capital

participa-THE SOCIOHISTORICAL CONTEXT IN CANADA

English Training for Immigrants and Skilled Immigrants From Mainland China

Canada began offering English training to adult immigrants in 1947,which mainly focused on those in the labour force In 1991, aiming toreach as many new immigrants and refugees as soon as possible onarrival, the Canadian federal government initiated the LanguageInstruction for Newcomers to Canada (LINC) program (Citizenship

and Immigration Canada [CIC], 2003a), and allocated 80% of the totalfederal settlement funding to it (Sadiq, 2004) LINC aims to ‘‘[provide]basic language instruction to adult newcomers’’ (CIC, 2003b, emphasisadded) Since its initiation, community advocates and ESL professionalshave criticized it for being too basic to move immigrants beyond manualjobs (for more detail, see Cleghorn, 2000) In the mid-1990s Canadaincreased the quota of economic immigrants to compete for skilledimmigrants of primary working age with necessary education, skills,training and proficiency in its official languages to fill the gaps in itseconomy It may well be even more challenging for LINC to meet thisgroup’s needs.

Skilled immigrants from mainland China compose a particularlyinteresting case because they started arriving in the mid-1990s and haveranked as the largest group to Canada since 1998 (Li, 2005); moreimportantly they have a reputation for lacking English proficiency as agroup They had few personal or institutional ties in Canada uponarrival, and their backgrounds and immigration trajectories differsignificantly from members of the established Chinese communitieshere Being selected as skilled immigrants, they often are universitygraduates and generally aimed at skilled jobs; therefore they weredirectly affected by systemic barriers to entering the skilled sector in theCanadian labour market, which include non-recognition and devalua-tion of educational credentials and work experience obtained in foreigncountries, and the demand for good English (Goldberg, 2005; PolicyRoundtable Mobilizing Professions and Trades, 2004) In addition, as aracialized ethnolinguistic minority group, people of Chinese heritageare often stereotyped as socially inept and lacking communication skills,including those who were born and raised in North America (e.g.,Louie, 2004) Skilled Chinese immigrants encountered many difficulties

in settlement, and their lack of proficiency in English was believed to betheir biggest barrier to employment and social integration in Canada(George, Tsang, Man, & Da, 2000)

Having studied English in classrooms in China, skilled Chineseimmigrants have often found themselves needing to improve theirEnglish, but have felt ambivalent toward basic LINC classes They alsofaced the urgent need to build social networks and find immediateemployment Minority churches have actively recruited them andoffered them an attractive alternative to government-funded programs

Evangelical Christian Chinese Communities in Canada

Churches have a long tradition of offering free English classes toattract immigrants, in fact, before 1947, it was largely church-based

philanthropic organizations who provided English training to grants in Canada (CIC, 2003a) Protestant and Catholic churches startedoffering free English classes to Chinese workers in the mid-1880s, butChinese workers largely adopted a pragmatic attitude to English classesand resisted evangelization (Wang, 2001).2 After Canada abandoned itsimplicitly all-White immigration policies in 1967, ethnic Chinese fromHong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asian regions started to immigrate

immi-to Canada Because of the intensive western missionary work in theseregions until the 1960s, indigenous churches sent native missionaries toNorth America to minister immigrants (Yang, 1999), and Chinesechurches grew rapidly in Canada after the 1970s.3

Contemporary evangelical Christian Chinese churches have gainedmany followers in Canada among skilled immigrants from MainlandChina Three factors may have contributed to the popularity ofevangelical Christianity among this group: (a) being socialized to beatheists in socialist China by and large, they comprised a major target forevangelization; (b) as mentioned earlier, this group had great difficultiessettling in Canada, which made them search for alternative frames tounderstand their initial decision to immigrate and subsequent choices(or lack thereof) for staying in or leaving Canada; and (c) theevangelical Christian Chinese communities have made evangelicalChristianity a powerful and satisfactory frame for Chinese immigrants

to understand their everyday lives, and have mobilized institutionalstructures and interpersonal supports to integrate them (for more detail,see Han, 2007a, 2009b)

METHODOLOGY AND SUBJECTIVITY

Data collection for the larger ethnography spanned from 2002 to

2006 and involved five key participants and 22 secondary participants Inthis article, I choose to focus on one Chinese church because it stoodout as one of the most inclusive institutions Data for this article aredrawn from one couple’s activities at and related to this particularchurch between March 2004 and December 2005, with occasionalfollow-ups until December 2006 In addition to regular tape-recorded

2 Wang (2001) contends that the hostility and systemic racial discrimination in the larger society made it impossible for earlier Chinese workers to believe in the sincerity of the White preachers and their Christian teaching of love and equality; in the meantime, the few Chinese who showed interest in or converted to Christianity were pressured and harassed by other Chinese because they needed to remain as an intact group for socioeconomic survival As well, some community elites had a stake in keeping the Chinese workers segregated to protect their own economic interests and elite status.

3 Larger Chinese churches often develop services and other programs in English, mainly to cater to youths and children, and sometimes also offer English classes to adults (see Han, 2007a, for more detail).

interviews with the couple, I observed them interacting with others athome, work, and various church and community activities, and hadinformal and formal interviews with people who were influential in theirlife I used Mandarin, English, or a mixture of both for observations andinterviews, depending on the linguistic resources and preferences of theinvolved individuals I also collected relevant texts produced by thechurch and related institutions, as well as mainstream and minoritymedia, in paper and electronic forms.

In data analysis, I sketched the couple’s settlement trajectories instories, tables, and graphs, and combed through my fieldnotes and theinterview transcripts for emerging themes I then selected transcriptsand texts around significant themes, in this case, their increasedparticipation at the church, and conducted interactional sociolinguisticanalysis (Gumperz, 1999) and critical discourse analysis (Cameron,2001)

While neither this couple nor this church was necessarily tive of skilled immigrants or Chinese churches, an intensive andextensive ethnography like this has the potential for theoreticalgeneralization or inferences (Hammersley, 1998, p 11; Mason, 1996,

representa-p 153) Indeed, it may shed light on the complex interplay betweenimmigrant settlement and language learning, and the kinds of supportthat may make a difference

As an ethnographer, I see myself as a major research instrument, andbelieve it is essential to be as transparent as possible in my positions andapproaches so that readers can make their own interpretations I wasborn, raised, and educated in China, and worked as a faculty memberuntil my immigration to Canada in 1999 As a fellow immigrant, aChinese person, a woman, an atheist, and a doctoral student at the time

of this study, I was able to easily recruit and establish rapport with my keyparticipants and gain access to most aspects of their lives For four years,

I witnessed and supported my key participants in their many difficultiesand fair shares of despair, and they did the same for me

However, throughout the study, I had to challenge my ownassumptions about and prejudices toward my participants which wererooted in my privilege of having worked in academia in China and beingadmitted to a doctoral program relatively quickly in Canada and thussuffering comparatively little physical and emotional torment of beingunemployed Being educated and socialized to be an atheist, I at first didnot understand or believe that other Chinese could genuinely convert toChristianity Although I remain an atheist today, my prolongedengagement with my key participants, familiarity with immigrant lives,and my own difficulties in settlement, eventually helped me toempathize with their conversion and to understand the significance ofChristianity in their daily lives

THE COUPLE AND THE CHURCH

Grace and Timothy4 immigrated to Canada in 2001 They wereuniversity graduates in their mid- and late 20s, newly wed, and worked inaccounting and computers in China, respectively They first attendedLINC classes5 for two months, but felt that these classes repeated theinstruction they received in China They later joined a free Englishconversation group organized by retirees who were Christians, topractice speaking, through which they were recruited to a smallEnglish-speaking evangelical Christian church led by young Chinese-Canadians They explicitly told the church leaders that they intended topractice English and were not interested in conversion, but when theysubsequently experienced many physical and psychological tormentsduring settlement, they found that this church was the only institutionthat provided linguistic, social, cultural and spiritual support for them.They were baptized in 2002, a year after their arrival in Canada Theyhad come to believe that their immigration and subsequent difficultieswere part of God’s plan to lead them back to God Amidst the manystruggles in settlement, they found peace of mind by believing that Godhad plans for them (for more detail, see Han, 2007a, 2007b)

As I have documented and argued elsewhere (Han, 2007a), beingperceived as needing improvement in English and in their newfoundChristian faith, Grace and Timothy were content with the genuineinterpersonal relationships even though they had limited opportunitiesand potential to become full members in the English-speaking church.However, their close friends gradually left this church because ofdisagreements with the senior pastor over theology6 and managementstyles, and persuaded them to leave as well In March 2004, Grace andTimothy switched to the Mandarin Chinese Church (MCC) They settled

in quickly, attending its English congregation regularly and joiningsome Mandarin programs occasionally They have remained contentthere until now in 2008

MCC is situated in a suburb of the greater Toronto area that hasdeveloped a concentration of immigrants from East, Southeast, andSouth Asia Starting as a small Mandarin monolingual church in 1996, in

2004 MCC offered one Mandarin and one English Sunday WorshipService to about 300 and 70 attendees, respectively, and added one moreMandarin service in 2005 Whereas most of the past and present pastors

4 Pseudonyms are used for participating individuals and institutions throughout the article.

‘‘Grace’’ and ‘‘Timothy’’ resembled the English names given to them by their pastor’s mother at the English-speaking church where they received baptism.

5 Grace started at Level 3 and Timothy at Level 4, and the highest level class available then was Level 5.

6 Though the church was nondenominational, the senior pastor had a background in Pentecostal churches.

and lay leaders were earlier immigrants from Hong Kong, Taiwan, andSoutheast Asia and received postsecondary education in North America,MCC served mainly immigrants from Mainland China, most of whomwere skilled immigrants who had arrived since the mid-1990s MCC wasaffiliated with the Chinese Evangelical Missions Association (CEMA),which was part of a large, active, transnational evangelical ChristianChinese community Although an evangelical pragmatism, includingvaluing and using multilingual resources for evangelism (Han, 2007a,2009a), underpins the inclusive practices at MCC, as mentioned earlier,

it is the institutional and interpersonal practices that this article isfocusing on

INCREASED PARTICIPATION AND ITS MULTIPLE

EFFECTS

Activities at MCC: Front and Back Region

Within MCC, I will refer to the sanctuary or meeting hall as the frontregion of the church, and the rest of spaces as the back region, whichincluded rooms of various sizes, the kitchen, a gym, the parking lot, andsometimes extends to members’ homes MCC members must be born-again Christians and attend MCC services regularly; though all activities

at both the front and back regions were open to all members andvisitors, only those visitors who intended to seek MCC membershipswould go to the back region regularly

In the front region, the symbolically most significant events ranregularly and smoothly with rehearsed programs, including Mandarinand English Sunday worship services (herafter, Services), and MCC-,CEMA-, and community-wide events Access to performing onstage, or atand around the pulpit, in the front region was limited to the pastors, theinvited guest speakers, and the members of the Worship Team and thechoir

A variety of religious and social activities took place at the back region

of the church MCC offered multiple levels of Sunday school classes, inboth English and Mandarin, to teach adults and children the Biblesystemically Many Cell Groups, consisting of one to two dozen peopleeach, met weekly at church or individual members’ homes to study theBible together Fellowships, each consisting of several Cell Groups,gathered biweekly or monthly to worship with rehearsed programs, pray,and socialize together during weekday evenings in the large meetingrooms at church Any member could gain access to perform onstage, orspeak or perform to a group, at the back region

Like many other minority religious institutions, MCC functioned as anurban settlement service hub (Ley, 2008) In the back region, MCC ranfree ESL classes for adults and children, a childcare center, a gym, a youthart performance team, many short-term camps for children and youth, andseasonal social programs such as skiing and strawberry picking trips, eachinculcating Christian values and lessons in various forms.

LPP and Grace and Timothy’s Speedy Integration

Grace and Timothy first visited English Sunday services offstage in thefront region, and were led to English Sunday classes for adults andMandarin Cell Groups as well as recreational activities in the backregion They quickly moved from LPP to fuller participation in variousactivities at MCC, indicated by moving from offstage to onstageperformances at the front and back region

In the front region of MCC, Grace and Timothy progressed quicklyand steadily within the English congregation and at joint services First,within 2 months of attending English services at MCC, they were invited

to act as ushers, a role that is not on the literal stage but much morevisible and thus has higher status than being an ordinary member.Within 3 months, Timothy was invited to read the scriptures, an onstagerole, and later to sing hymns with the English Worship Team Within 8months, Grace was also invited to take an onstage role singing with theEnglish Worship Team, something she had never done before, even inChinese In fact, both Grace, and Timothy told me that Grace ‘‘couldn’tsing’’ and never had the opportunity to speak on stage in China Theyboth performed all these onstage duties regularly after their first trials.Within 15 months, they sang with their English Worship Team at theMCC-wide Summer Gospel Concert in front of several hundred people,and Timothy also sang a solo

Similarly, they progressed rapidly from LPP to full participation in theback region For example, Grace was invited to lead a Bible Studysegment, an onstage role, after attending a weekly Mandarin Cell Groupthree times When the regular chair of the English Adult Fellowshipwent out of town, Timothy was invited to chair a program, anotheronstage role, even though he and Grace had attended this monthlyfellowship offstage for only six times Their increased participationseemed to bring about multiple effects

Identity Effects as the Main Effect

Moving from LPP to fuller participation seemed to have had aprofound influence on their sense of self in relation to others at MCC, or

their identities Acting as ushers in the English congregation for the firsttime was a very exciting experience that they could not wait to sharewhen I interviewed them the week after, as shown in the followingexcerpt:7

we didn’t have a lot of interaction with them before so we were not familiarwith them/ I didn’t know many of them/ and then tomorrow he [Timothy]will stand at the front to read the scriptures/

in Turn 4 further showed that she could hardly contain her pride.Timothy was proud too, as indicated in his confirmation in Turn 3.For Grace and Timothy, being ushers and one of the scripture readerswas highly significant for them socially and emotionally To them, beingasked to perform these duties indicated that the leaders at MCCrecognized them as potentially ‘‘good Christians’’ who are faithful andwilling to serve—the larger evangelical Christian Chinese communityencouraged everybody to contribute to evangelism through prayers,offering, or service Performing these duties provided opportunities forother church members to validate them, which also enabled them to seethemselves as contributing members in the MCC community Theexcitement Grace and Timothy displayed during our interview indicates

7 [ ], transcribing notes or explanation; italics, utterances in original languages, English or Mandarin phonetics; bold face, emphasis; 5utterances5, overlapping utterances; /, pause with a nonfalling ending; \, pause with a falling ending.

that they had appropriated, or self-ascribed to, their other-assigned goodChristian identity.

Toward the end of the same interview, it became even clearer thatGrace and Timothy had actively taken on their new identity They told

me that they met an older couple who had their employees run their 12chain optical stores while they were volunteering full-time at MCC.Inspired, Grace and Timothy found a new goal in life and made a newplan: Timothy would focus on his door-to-door sales job selling Internetservices, in English, until he had saved enough money to start his ownbusiness, and he would develop it to a size that he could hire others torun it Timothy articulated their new goal as follows:

T: 我的目的是这样/ 我不用为钱发愁/ 我可以整天在教会里做服侍/ 我不

用愁我的 living 了/ 也不需要靠教众的捐献/

my goal is this/ I do not have to worry about money/ and I can serve atchurch full-time/ without worrying about my living/ or having to rely onchurch members’ donations/ (Transcripts, 2004-06-26)

This new goal indicates that they had grown into their other-assignedgood Christian identity I argue that it does not matter when or even ifthey eventually realize the goal of serving God full-time as volunteers.What matters was that they told themselves, their church members, and

me their aspirations and plans, which meant that they were activelyappropriating the discourse of becoming and being good Christians,and trying to act as though they were who they said they were (Holland

et al., 2003/1998)

Grace and Timothy’s increased participation at MCC opened up theiraccess to both newcomers and old-timers, and placed them on asmoother path to further build their reputation as good Christians Thishad significant impact on their socioeconomic life

Side Effects: Social and Economic

Social and economic effects seemed to be a natural side-product ofGrace and Timothy’s increased participation in various church activities.Their visible participation at MCC implicitly presented them as goodChristians and thus trustworthy This helped them in different ways.First, it helped Timothy as a direct salesperson:

G:我们来这个 church 才两个月/ 他们有些都是老去的/ 都去了一两年的/ 现

在 我们去英文堂他们都认识我们/ 去中文堂嘛 也认识很多人/ 而且现在就是

说 Timothy 做生意嘛/ 他也要选人嘛/ 他招人也不是谁做都要嘛/ 他也要选人/ 在教堂里选的人个保个的做得/

We have attended this church for only two months/ many people have beengoing there for a year or two/ now they all know us when we go to the EnglishCongregation/ we also know a lot of people when we go to the ChineseCongregation/ plus, now that Timothy is doing business he also/ also needs

to select people/ he doesn’t just hire whoever wants to do it/ he selectspeople/ the people he selected from church/ each every one of them did[very well]/

T:对/ 个保个的/

Yes/ every one of them [did very well]/ (Transcripts, 2004-06-26)

Timothy’s reputation as well as the harsh realities many Chineseimmigrants faced helped him to recruit direct-sales partners Aschallenging as it is, a direct-sales job offered immediate earningpotential and thus was attractive to skilled Chinese immigrants whowere unemployed or stuck in dead-end manual jobs Timothy’sreputation as a salesman grew when he brought church members tosales and increased the orders they signed as a team as well as his ownrecord, which helped him to evangelize other sales team members Hisreputation grew as that of a good Christian who helped others as well asactively evangelized when he brought church members to sales and salesteam members to church Later, seven of Timothy’s sales team membersand their families showed up at the Thanksgiving English Fellowship atMCC that Timothy was chairing; Timothy bragged to me that all his teammembers, except one, had ‘‘accepted God.’’

Grace and Timothy’s growing reputation and increased participation

at church helped them to establish close relations with other churchmembers, which brought about other economic effects For instance,their church members advised and helped them in finding a realtor andbuying a house When Grace had conflicts with her employer in her firstfull-time accounting clerk job, she consulted senior church membersbefore quitting They subsequently supported her to become a direct-sales representative and helped her to reach the monthly sales target forpromotion

Having a good reputation within a social network can lead to directeconomic gains As Bourdieu (1986) explains, the value of socialconnections and reputations lies in their origin in and convertibility intoeconomic capital Social capital accumulated in church communities isfound to play an important role in economic success, particularly forminority immigrants (Gonzalez III & Maison, 2004; Smidt, 2003)

Another Side Effect: Linguistic Effects

In addition to the socioeconomic benefits, Grace and Timothy’sincreased participation at church brought about linguistic effects even