Understanding Latino-Majority Suburbs: How Immigrant Generation Shapes the Meaning of Suburban Place

As U.S. suburbs diversify, Latino-majority suburban neighborhoods have become increasingly common, yet little is known about how Latino families come to live in these communities or how they understand and experience them. This study examines how Latino families narrate their settlement and everyday life in Arroyo, a Latino-majority suburb of Houston, Texas, and how these meanings vary by immigrant generation. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 55 Latino parents of middle-school-age children, I find that family ties, schools, and neighborhood racial composition featured in parents’ accounts of coming to and remaining in the suburb but were interpreted through distinct neighborhood frames. First-generation immigrant parents framed Arroyo as a familial and co-ethnic foothold that provided relational support and enabled institutional agency. In contrast, U.S.-born and 1.5-generation Latino parents emphasized educational opportunity and racial protection, drawing on their prior experiences in U.S. neighborhoods and schools. By identifying generationally distinct neighborhood frames, this study shows how the same suburban place can carry different meanings across immigrant generations, advancing research on immigrant settlement, ethnic suburbs, and parents’ residential decision-making.