Immigration Case Study
Four hours a week, discussing the issues of immigration, combined with a mountain of reading on the topic will eventually have an effect on a person's every day outlook. I discovered as much during my last semester at University. The absence of thought was more than made up for in the ensuing semester, as the ideas we discussed in class oozed into my daydreams, my personal time, and my personal associations. And if all that hadn?t happened, I never would have met Rosa.
I came down the stairs in the hotel reservation center where I work and slid down the worn, but very clean tiles towards the employee?s break room. As had become a habit in the past few weeks, I was thinking over the most recent reading from SOC 331. This one was by Jo Ann Koltyk?New Pioneers in the Heartland, Hmong Life in Wisconsin. It told the story of several Hmong refugees who were carving out a new life for themselves in Wisconsin. It was filled with statistics and numbers, but what always came back to me when I least expected it was the people, and the faces that I dreamed up for them. Sometimes I would try to see out from inside those faces and watch how folks reacted to me, wondering if they wanted me to leave and go back ?home.? But, of course, being a white boy from Utah, I was one of the least qualified for that little piece of introspection.
Rosa was mopping the otherwise empty break room. I didn?t know her name at that point. In fact I had never given her more than a friendly smile before side-stepping her custodian cart, and heading back to the time clock. I had heard her speaking in Spanish to the few other janitors, all of whom worked the late shift like me on the weekends. I worked poor hours because I was relatively new in my department. They worked them, I assumed because no one wanted to see floors being mopped during the day.
As I stepped into the room this time, I looked at the woman who was cleaning the tiles for me and discovered that I was impressed.
The Latehomecommer by Kao Kalia Yang is a beautifully crafted memoir. Yang’s distinct prose style is captivating combined with her powerful narrative about the Hmong immigrant experience in America creates an unforgettable and insightful piece. She masterfully captures not only her story as an immigrant, but that of her whole family and to some extent the entire culture. Yang’s use of voice, particularly her use of a distinctly different more child-like voice when depicting her younger self, is a large contributing factor to what makes this memoir so unique and engaging. In The Latehomecomer, Yang captures the voice of herself as a child in a way that is so effective that it inspired me to go back through my memoir and attempt to do the same.
In The Latehomecomer, by Kao Kalia Yang shares her story and the story of her family’s search for a home and identity. Her family’s story voices the story of the Hmong people and their plight. From every stage of their journey, from the mountainous jungles of Southeast Asia to the freezing winter of Minnesota, Yang and the Hmong were compelled to redefine their identity, willingly or unwillingly. While growing up, Yang’s parents would often ask her, “’What are you?’ and the right answer was always, ‘I am Hmong.’” (Yang, 1) For “Hmong” to be the right answer, then what does it mean to be “Hmong”? From the personal story shared by Yang, and the universal story of the Hmong people, the Hmong identity cannot be contained in
In the first Chapter of the book ‘A Different Mirror’ by (Takaki, 1993) the author embarks on a descriptive narrative that tries to elaborate the concept of a multiracial America. The chapter begins with the author taking a taxi ride in which he is subjected to racial discrimination. The taxi driver questions the author’s origin owing to the fact that his English is perfect and eloquent. This incident prompts a discussion that transpires throughout the chapter as the author tries to explain to his audience that America is a multiracial country with different ethnic groups that moved from their homelands to settle in the United States. The chapter discusses the settlement of various racial groups such as; English immigrants, African Americans, Asian Americans, Chicanos and the Irish.
On Angel Island, the United States of America took it upon themselves to record and examine all of the people emigrating from their homelands. Most of the people immigrating to America through Angel Island were Asian in origin. Upon arrival to Angel Island, a medical inspection was one of the first examinations that the immigrants were put through to determine whether they were fit to enter the United States. The medical examiners inspected every immigrant for signs of disease or being unfit and detained them for further examination. If immigrants were found to have something that was able to be easily taken care of, they were treated. If, upon further inspection, an immigrant was found to have a chronic illness, they were then marked as unfit and denied entry into the United States.
American minorities made up a significant amount of America’s population in the 1920s and 1930s, estimated to be around 11.9 million people, according to . However, even with all those people, there still was harsh segregation going on. Caucasians made African-Americans work for them as slaves, farmers, babysitters, and many other things in that line. Then when World War II came, “World War II required the reunification and mobilization of Americans as never before” (Module2). They needed to cooperate on many things, even if they didn’t want to. These minorities mainly refer to African, Asian, and Mexican-Americans. They all suffered much pain as they were treated as if they weren’t even human beings. They were separated, looked down upon, and wasn’t given much respect because they had a different culture or their skin color was different. However, the lives of American minorities changed forever as World War 2 impacted them significantly with segregation problems, socially, and in their working lives, both at that time and for generations after.
1. Initially Reyna Grande and her siblings Carlos and Mago were left behind while their parents immigrated to the United States to work. During that time Grande faced many struggles among the most prevalent were her feelings of abandonment, the neglect she and her siblings faced at the hands of their paternal grandmother, and the ostracization due to their circumstance. Reyna and her siblings were left behind when she was a baby by her father, as a result Reyna had no concrete recollection of him during hi absence. Two years after her father left her mother left to help him in America when Reyna was four years old. Until that point Reyna’s mother had been the only parental figure she had known. The abandonment didn’t stop at the physical absence
Share the story of The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures.
“I am a first generation immigrant and a woman, but I don't really write about that because I feel like I'm a human being. There are universal human experiences.” (“Evelyn Rodriguez”). As a first generation woman myself, I can relate to the notion that I am more than my background. While there are universal experiences people go through, my cultural experience is something that sets me apart from others. I believe that it is essential for me to find the balance between assimilating into American culture while keeping my cultural identity.
Mr. Schwarzenegger uses the power of persuasion and his knowledge on immigration to make his essay more effective rather than ineffective. At the beginning of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s essay, An Immigrant Writes, he mentions a statement from President Reagan about immigration. Afterwards he states “He believes, as I do, that we can have an immigration policy that both strengthens our boarders and welcomes immigrants.”(Schwarzenegger 26) Using this example is part of the reason why his essay is so effective.
Fadiman, A. 1997. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux.
My life in early 19th century was very dreadful and scary. I was from a poor family where father goes to work in factories for 12-18 hours a day. I was from Germany. Jews was the most segregated religion in Germany. We did not have full right to do a certain things such as go to certain college to get education, shoe our religion freely to other and enjoy our festival. My father used to get a low wages in work and we have to live with the things we have we have no right to argue back for wages or anything. At that time pneumonia,tuberculosis and influenza were very common dieses. If anybody get sick in family we did not have much money to cure or buy medicine. There was a struggle going on with farmer because industrialist have started making the crops and grains in cheap mony and sell which make the life of farmer hard to live. We also have a little land where we use to farm and live since there is not profit in selling grains than my father start working in factories. My mother used to stay home and prepare food for us. Christian people were persecuting many of my relative and jews...
A topic crucial to the world today is illegal immigration. Illegal immigration is when people live in a country without permission from the government, nor have any legal documentation. As more and more illegal immigrants enter the United States, it either upsets some people, or others feel like they should just grant them ability to pursue life, liberty, and happiness because that is what the Constitution says. Some people feel that illegal immigrants should be protected by the same rights and laws as American citizens. On the other hand, many people believe that this is a horrible mistake. They feel that the rights of citizenship should be earned and not extended to people who haven broken the law just by being in the United States.
When a native author Greg Sams said that the reservations are just “red ghettos”, the author David disagree with that. He thinks there must be something else beyond that point. After his grandfather died, he somehow changed his mind. Because he could not think anything e...
Anna joined the Office of Policy and Strategy in April, 2012 as the team lead for the Immigration Fraud Research and Evaluation Team in the Research & Evaluation Division. She has since successfully led contracted researchers to complete evaluation studies on four unreleased Benefit Fraud Assessment Studies conducted by FDNS in 2005 to 2008. In addition, she led a second team of contracted researchers to complete a qualitative study, titled ‘Qualitative Study on Marriage-based Benefits Fraud’ to collect foundational information fraud detection and investigation of marriage-based benefit types. The team interviewed 144 officers and their respective supervisors from six field offices and two service centers. She is currently leading the
from many Vancouver residents who are unable to purchase homes. In this situation, immigration is having a powerful effect on the real estate market. In Vancouver, larger immigrant populations are moving enormous quantities of money to Canada and allowing them to buy homes at faster speeds. They are driving out traditional buyers. Moreover, Vancouver is expecting approximately one million immigrants over the next two decades. This may put a strain on the already crowded housing market in other ways which have not been determined yet.