Adult Learning, Generativity and "Successful" Aging in Multicultural Perspective: A Hmong American Educational Biography.
Author(s):
Hones, Donald F.
Format:
Report
Publisher:
1996.
Language:
English
Abstract:
This document examines the themes of adult learning, generativity, and successful aging against the backdrop of the biography of a Hmong refugee who immigrated to the United States in 1988 at the age of 35, began studying English as a second language (ESL), and continues to study ESL in adult education classes while six of his seven children attend public schools. First, the man's experiences as a child in a French missionary school, teenager in the Laotian army, resident of a refugee camp for 13 years, and immigrant in the United States are described. Next, the following paradoxes in his life are discussed along with the difficulties that they pose in formulating a theory of life span learning: (1) a strong culturally based desire for independence coupled with a continuing dependence on outside means for economic survival; (2) loss of country, home, and kin coupled with the gains of life in an advanced industrialized society; (3) support for public school education coupled with resistance to Americanization; and (4) generativity inherent in his efforts to pass Hmong values to his children coupled with the stagnation of his life as a forgotten Hmong soldier. Contains 17 references. (MN)