By Jeff Libman, with photographs by Steve Kagan
Foreword By Phil Ponce
Category: Social Science, Chicago, Photography
Publisher: Flying Kite, Inc.
Format: Hardcover, 240 pages, 100 duotone photographs
Pub Date: August 2004
Price: $35.00
ISBN: 0974142905

See the website for this book.

AN IMMIGRANT CLASS documents the human experience of immigration through 20 first-person stories and photographs of recent immigrants to Chicago from around the world. Each reveals the unique elements of his/her life before immigration, the circumstances that motivated the move, the experience of immigrating, and the impressions of life and identity that continue to unfold and change in the United States. Through the voices and images of those who have made this journey, An Immigrant Class shares the hopes, fears, tragedies and triumphs that make up the complexity of the immigrant experience. Some share their expectations and encounters with success, freedom and opportunity. Others tell of their disappointments, frustrations, and regrets, but all have come, like many before and many after them, to make a new home in the United States.

JEFF LIBMAN teaches English as a Second Language at Truman College in Chicago. Prior to that, he was the executive director of the Tibetan Resettlement Project-Chicago. Jeff has worked in the production of documentary programming for national public television. In addition, he is a singer-songwriter.

STEVE KAGAN is a freelance photographer whose work has been widely published in such publications as Time, Newsweek, and The New York Times Sunday Magazine. Steve is a regular contributor to The Chicago Tribune Sunday Magazine, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.

PHIL PONCE is the anchor and managing editor for news, news analysis and public affairs for Chicago Tonight, a nightly magazine of news and culture at WTTW11, public television Chicago. He was a national correspondent for The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer at PBS in the 1990s. Prior to that, he worked as a reporter in Chicago for WBBM-TV Channel 2 and columnist for The Chicago Tribune.