Families navigate the experience of resettling into the United States strategically. Because of the amount of people that resided in Lowell they made themselves feel at home. They built their own community, where they can carry on any traditions they wanted. They ultimately built their own freedom. The people were free to do what they wanted, when they wanted to do it. Lowell made the Cambodians comfortable because of the community and family support networks that were offered to them, as well as the availability of ethnic stores. They occupy an abundance of businesses and jobs, here today. Families changed overtime by becoming more Americanized as they resided here. Few families still carried normal Cambodian traditions, but they had the …show more content…
Few people in Cambodia attended schools in rural areas. Khmer (Cambodian language) was a foreign text to many of these individuals. Without money school was unavailable, specifically if you could not pay for tuition, books, supplies and transportation. These schools were all located within the city. This was all the leading cause to many Cambodian refugees arriving in the U.S. unable to read or write their own language. Once resettles, some have no learned the proper skills in small groups. The professional fields, along with attending formal education in Cambodia and teaching, would sometimes result in getting private English instructions. They received many resources that made other people angry with the group. Being Cambodian gave them more rights than others. They got the lowest cost for housing, and received an abundance of aid. A newly established Office for Refugee Resettlement with branches in every state took responsibility for overseeing refugee resettlement. This occurred after the 1980 Refugee Act was passed. Resettlement officials intended to separate the refugees between Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, in order to minimalize the financial, educational, and social services drains on any single vicinity. Where the refugees would end up was determined by many factors. In the eyes of the Office for Refugee Resettlement, most importantly, was the location of existing voluntary service agencies. These Agencies that the Office for Refugee Resettlement would contract to carry out the work of finding sponsors who were able and willing to house them temporarily, or help them find housing, provide money for food, aid in finding jobs. They would also, sign them up at community service agencies and in state welfare programs. Second, ORR tried to find out whether the refugees had relatives or friends already in the country who could help them adapt to life here. Lastly Office for
While both Chaukamnoetkanok and his grandparents’ experiences were very similar, Chaukamnoetkanok points out that there are two main differences. First, the motivation for their immigration was drastically different. Chaukamnoetkanok states “Ar-kong migrated from China mainly for economic reasons. My parents’ main objective for migrating was the education of their children” (Foner 338). His parents left behind everything they had in Thailand and started a new life from the ground up in the United States for the sake of their children. His grandparents, on the other hand, could not provide their own children with a decent education
...heir families. Life was difficult for those who came. The work available was hazardous and offered low wages. Housing was typically overcrowded and not clean for safe living. People came hoping that we would experience the gold paved roads of success. But the realities were obviously different as Bell shows the struggles that immigrants have throughout the book with George and the other Slovaks who immigrate to America. Life was not so grand and was often truly difficult and everything that the immigrants hoped and dreamed about America became so different and untrue. Reaching the American dream for the immigrants became unrealistic and unachievable despite all the hope and effort they stirred to stay afloat and to make it in America.
Immigration has existed around the world for centuries, decades, and included hundreds of cultures. Tired of poverty, a lack of opportunities, unequal treatment, political corruption, and lacking any choice, many decided to emigrate from their country of birth to seek new opportunities and a new and better life in another country, to settle a future for their families, to work hard and earn a place in life. As the nation of the opportunities, land of the dreams, and because of its foundation of a better, more equal world for all, the United States of America has been a point of hope for many of those people. A lot of nationals around the world have ended their research for a place to call home in the United States of America. By analyzing primary sources and the secondary sources to back up the information, one could find out about what Chinese, Italians, Swedish, and Vietnamese immigrants have experienced in the United States in different time periods from 1865 to 1990.
I chose Cambodian Americans for my target culture because it was a place I knew very little about. My ignorance of that side of the world is laughable, to say the least. Cambodian American was a great choice because both the people and the culture are very captivating to me. While some Cambodian Americans have become very westernized, accepting most of America’s cultural norms, some hold strong to their Cambodian traditions and way of life. Through Geert Hofstede’s
For years refugees have come to America from all over the globe coming from Syria, Vietnam, Iraq, and even Australia. A refugee is different than an immigrant, in such a way that they are basically forced to leave their country in order to escape war, persecution, or a natural disaster. Unlike immigrants who have been here for a long time like the Mexicans, or the Japanese, the Vietnamese have been in the U.S for around thirty years or less. After the Vietnam War, the Vietnamese feared for their life and were forced to leave their county for liberty. The Vietnamese arrived here as refugees, not voluntary immigrants.
The United States is a country known for its variation of nationalities and ethnic races. After extensive research, and questioning I discovered that my ancestors originated from Norway and Switzerland. My family migrated to the United States in the late 1800’s from Norway due to social, economic, and religion reforms as well as, a surplus in the population. Learning of my ancestor’s migration to America has very much influenced my views on the existing immigration problems that the U.S. currently faces.
One theme that I found to be very interesting is the struggles that Asian Americans have faced in the past and the present. I never knew about the struggles that have been happening in places like China and Laos. I never realized how many families come from poverty and violence. I have only learned very little about historical events such as Vietnam. I am only now becoming more aware about the human rights problem in China. I am so used to seeing places like Tokyo, Japan in movies and television. Everything seems so clean and the city is lit up with bright lights and amazing buildings at night. Before this course, I thought that most Asians live this kind of life. I never knew that these events had even occurred and I was amazed at some of the things Asians have had to go through over the years.
...o save these refugees because many of them were still terribly ill and still suffered from starvation. Many of the refugees that had lost family members, including Chanrithy, were emotionally drained due to the horrific events that they had witnessed during the rule of the Khmer Rouge. Sadly for many of the refugees, the experience of being part of genocide alone was psychologically devastating. Chanrithy was now living without parents due to the genocide, and development as a human now became an obstacle for her due to the fact that she lost half of her family. Cambodians living today have made the post-genocide effects clear as problems regarding the topic still linger. The refugees that witnessed the horrific four-year span of killings are growing old, and hopefully with the passing away of the witnesses the effects of the disastrous event will slowly fade away.
The Chinese immigrant experience has traveled through times of hardships, under the English man. They have struggled to keep themselves alive through racism, work, and acceptance. Although many have come to Canada for their lives’ and their children’s to be successful, and safe. It could not be just given until adversity gave them the life they hoped to one day life for. In the starting time of 1858, the Chinese community had started coming to different parts of Canada considering the push and pull factors that had led them here. Because of the lack of workers in the British Columbia region, the Chinese were able to receive jobs in gold mining. Most Chinese were told to build roads, clear areas, and construct highways, but were paid little because of racism. The Chinese today are considered one of the most successful races in Canada because of the push and pull factors that they had come across, the racism that declined them and the community of the Chinese at the present time.
In this paper I will be sharing information I had gathered involving two students that were interviewed regarding education and their racial status of being an Asian-American. I will examine these subjects’ experiences as an Asian-American through the education they had experienced throughout their entire lives. I will also be relating and analyzing their experiences through the various concepts we had learned and discussed in class so far. Both of these individuals have experiences regarding their education that have similarities and differences.
What will be your first thought when you hear the word “undocumented”? Immigration issue, especially undocumented immigration issue is always framed as Latino issue. On the contrary, Asian immigrants are often left out of this discussion. As the matter of fact, Asia is now the largest sending region for immigrants. Asian Americans are the fastest-growing immigrant population in the United States today. They are expected to become the largest immigrant group in the United States (Foley 16). Asian American should not be left out from the discussion of immigration reform because Asian American has made a great contribution to the history of immigration in the U.S. Many of them are still struggling with
During the early 1850s to late 1990s, the United States experienced an enormous rush of Asian immigration from various countries such as China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam. For most of these immigrants, they traveled far and wide on dangerous journeys out at sea and away from their homeland of origin in order to escape the horrors of tyranny, discover wealth during the California gold rush, and create new opportunities of a better life for their families and future descendants. Countless bodies were lost at sea and many more of these immigrants died from starvation and disease. Although these Asian immigrants were overjoyed when they reached the main lands of the United States, their struggles were only beginning as many of them were not met with open arms of acceptance. Instead, most of these Asian immigrants were met with harsh racism, various amounts of mistreatment, and unpleasant living conditions from many Americans. In spite of all these hindrances, most Asian immigrants were able to adapt to their new environment, find occupations despite the undercut wages, and build homes for their families. (something here) . After a while, these Asian immigrants were able to learn English and understand the protocols of the United States judicial system in order to change certain laws which discriminated them. Even though some may group Asians into one large category, the fact of the matter is that there are many distinct ethnic backgrounds with different histories and methodology of persevering through hardships in order to reach the blissful freedom of the United States.
The air would always be humid and stuffy while riding the bus to school, and the slightest bump in the road would result in tossing up the kids like salad. The backseat would provide carriage for all the popular and tough kids shouting out at pedestrians on the street or flipping off a middle finger to the bus driver that would shout for them to calm down. I despised those kids in the back. They were the same people that made my life a living hell, while growing up and attending an American school.
The strong efforts at dispersion in the early resettlement period placed additional obstacles in the way of maintaining existing social relationships (Haines et al., 1981, p. 310). Shapiro et al. (1999) examined generational differences in psychosocial adaptation among Vietnamese immigrants to the U.S. and found that elderly immigrants encounter the greatest number of obstacles in mastering daily living skills such as new social customs and language acquisition. Middle-aged immigrants in the late 1990’s experienced the brunt of the trauma of the Vietnam war, and young adults felt they were caught between two cultures, and experienced chronic cultural conflict leading to mental distress (p.
Before I was five, I thought I was Chinese. However, I wondered why I couldn’t understand the Chinese patrons of Chinatown restaurants. Upon learning my true ethnicity, I pulled out a mammoth atlas we had under the bed. My father pointed to an “S”-shaped country bordering the ocean, below China. It was then that I learned my parents were refugees from Vietnam. “Boat people,” my mother, still struggling to grasp English back then, would hear kids whispering when she walked through the halls of her high school. Like many refugees, although my parents and their families weren’t wealthy when they came to America, they were willing to work hard, and like many Vietnamese parents, mine would tell me, “We want you to be success.”