Original Article Transplanting the organizing seed: Seasoned activists ’ political habitus and the transnational social fi eld Karen Tejada University of Hartford, West Hartford, CT Abstract This article examines the political habitus of “seasoned activists,” a group of individuals that capitalize on their long-standing activism and organizing experience gained in El Salvador to build community-based organizations in the Washington, DC metro area. Through in-depth and semi-structured interviews with 25 seasoned activists, I find that although they have transitioned to locally based community work, they have maintained an activist and committed political habitus, defined as the dispositions, thoughts, and actions that influence the political choices of an actor and come to underlie the political ethos that a change-agent uses. Nevertheless, the role of the Salva- doran government in expatriate communities and a changing DC context produce con- tentious conditions for seasoned activists to practice their organizing work. These findings add to the growing literature on Salvadoran transnational practices, both reaf- firming some of the tensions embedded in the social field and elucidating how transna- tional actors challenge the very processes that subjugate them. Latino Studies (2015) 13, 339–357. doi:10.1057/lst.2015.32 Keywords: Salvadorans; political habitus; seasoned activists; Washington, DC; transna- tional social field A Case Study of Salvadorans in Washington, DC Immigrants escaping political persecution in their homeland have political experi- ences that can expand the transnational framework, 1 or what Glick-Schiller et al (1992) define as the process by which migrants create, sustain and expand ties 1 There is still disagreement over the transnational framework. For debates see Waldinger (2006), Wimmer and Glick-Schiller (2002). © 2015 Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 1476-3435 Latino Studies Vol. 13, 3, 339–357 www.palgrave-journals.com/lst/