“Transnationalism Personified: Young Returning Trinidadians ‘in Their Own Words’” by: Robert B. Potter, Dennis Conway, and Godfrey St. Bernard

This article talked about Trinidadian migrants who return to Trinidad after living abroad for several years. It talks about how these migrants connect to Trinidad as a country and their views n returning to Trinidad. We can understand through this article how transnationalism affects the country of origin of a person. The article talks about several areas that make the migrants keep their connection to their homeland. The first area is Transnational family and life-course issues. An example of this could be the connecteion that is maintained when a parent with a child overseas gets help in child rearing from family back in their home country. The second area is connection between transnational communities. If it is cheap to go back and forth between two countries they are more likely to have a transnational relationship. The Third area is keeping in touch with their homeland and the people there. If a family visits their country often, they have a lot of information about their home country that can allow them to decide whether they want to have something like a retirement home back in their country, in this case in Trinidad. The fourth area is Transnational mobility. Traveling back and forth leaves a door of possibly staying in their home country. For many of the people mentioned in this article, Trinidad was their “home” and they wanted to eventually return to their home. The fifth area is Transnational identity. In this area we can talk about the many migrants who felt connected to their home land as well as their residing country. This could be dealt with through dual citizenship. They have the legal ability to stay in either countries. The sixth area is Transnational economic and commercial interests. In this area, the article talks about how owning a property abroad can influence the decision to return home. The last area was Strategic flexibility. In this area we can talk about the flexibility of the migrants to move around. They were open to migrant opportunities int he future.

It was interestng to read this article because when I thought about my life as a migrant it made sense that these were the areas migrants looked at to decide whether they want to return to their home land, remain in the migrant country or possibly have a dual citizenship for both countries. Thinking about it I realized that these were options open to me as well and it made me understand my reason for choosing one country or the other. I can connect to both the United States as well as India just as the people in this article to connect to Trinidad.