As I took a deep breath in, smoke entered my lungs and I could barely hear my mother saying, “Go. Go to America, get a job and send us money and one day” she coughs and when she can function, she continues, “ one day, we will join you.” he grabbed my trembling hands in her own soft, warm ones as I asked her, “ What about the kids, it’s not safe here for them?” She motioned for me to bend lower to her and she whispered gently into my ear, “They will be fine, I will protect them. The best thing you can do for them now is go… we will come, 我承诺”.
Chapter six examines the anti-Chinese sentiment with the emerging class antagonism and turmoil between white capitalists and workers. The unwelcomed arrival of Chinese immigrants brought along their own social organizations such as the huiguan, fongs, and tongs. These types of social organizations secured areas of employment and housing for Chinese immigrants in California. This social structure that was unknown to Anglos led them to also categorize Chinese on the same level as Indians by depicting them as lustful heathens whom were out to taint innocent white women. These images were also perpetuated onto Chinese women, thus, also sexualizing them as all prostitutes. The political status of Chinese immigrants were also heavily impacted as they could not serve as witnesses for one another and required a white man to vouch for their innocence or naturalization. The rising structure of capitalism brought more anti-Chinese sentiment from the white working class basis as they feared that the Chinese would monopolize their privilege of white free labor. The class nature of the anti-Chinese sentiment also generated hostility from white farmers as they also assumed that Chinese immigrants were out to take over their agricultural sector. These racialized class relations during the era of urban manufacturing reflected the racial segregation of labor that fostered white supremacy in California. The status of Chinese women also became affected as many were forced into prostitution to serve their patriarchal family. In order to protect the white working class, racial laws were created and directly targeted towards Chinese immigrants to protect their whiteness. Chapter seven explains the new threat of the arrival of Japanese immigrants in California. During the beginning of the anti-Chinese sentiment and white working-class racism, Japanese immigrants were also under the romanticized belief of
The common reason for Chinese immigration issues in the 1800 's and current Mexican immigration issues are wealth. To be honest, as a Chinese, China is not that developed in the 1800 's, so as today 's Mexican. People always want to get a better life, it 's the reason for immigration. America is the right place for Chinese in 1800 's and current Mexican. "In the 1850 's, Chinese workers migrated to the United States, first to work in the gold mines, but also to take agricultural jobs, and factory work, especially in the garment industry."1 It 's not difficult to see that the job for Chinese is at low level. Chinese in America in the 1800 's were in a very low rank. Chinese workers had to start from the worker like building railroads. That was a tough time for immigrants. Many Chinese died during that time. No Pain No Gain, they chose to have a possible to get a better life. "A number of them became entrepreneurs in their own right."2 Some of immigrants successfully survived and got
The Chinese immigration Act, now known as the Chinese exclusion act. This was mostly being taken place in California and states of the west of the Rocky Mountains. Chinese immigrants came to the U.S for the california gold rush, this event provided many jobs, hope for a good future, and hope to give a good life to their families.Nativists
Currently, the population of people with Chinese descent in America reaches to 1.2%, which accounts to an estimated 3.8 million people. This all started with the Gold Rush, which let two completely opposite cultures that had never interacted before encounter their differences. The religious and cultural exchanges between the American and Chinese societies occurred with many difficulties of acceptance and tolerance, resulting in the diverse American society of present day. After differences between the two cultures were overcome, the Gold Rush opened the doors of exploration for many generations of not only Chinese immigrants, but all Asian ethnicities to follow. Many immigrants would later follow in their footsteps to find what America has to offer them. Interviews Chinese immigration helped pave the road for Asian immigration in America. As quoted from Justice Harry A. Blackmun, "One last word: Diversity yields strength. To oppose it is to ignore and violate the American testament and its precious dream." The Gold Rush, an event which lasted only a decade yet so crucial to American history in more ways than one, had an everlasting impact on the society that Americans live in today. Although their ethnic and cultural background may be different from other immigrants in the U.S., the Chinese immigrants helped shape and construct
One of this week’s readings focused on Ch. 5, “Caged Birds,” in Professor Lytle Hernandez’s book City of Inmates: Conquest, Rebellion, and the Rise of Human Caging in Los Angeles, 1771-1965, and this chapter was particularly interesting because it further explained the development of immigration control in the United States. As a continuation from the last chapter, there was a huge emphasis in the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and the Geary Act of 1892. This essentially prohibited Chinese laborers from immigrating to the United States, as well as eventually requiring these people to comply with regulations. “Caged Birds” encapsulates the events afterwards, as the book heads well into the early-1900’s. The disenfranchisement of immigrants develops towards further exclusivity because “[by] 1917, Congress had banned all Asian immigration to the Unites States and also categorically prohibited all prostitutes, convicts, anarchists, epileptics, ‘lunatics,’ ‘idiots,’ contract laborers, and those ‘liable to become public charges’ from entering the United States” (Hernandez 132). This is significant because it is a reinforcement of the exclusive lifestyle of the patriarchal
Most immigrants who came to the U.S had high expectations that they would find wealth but once they arrived they realized their expectations weren’t what they expected. Although, they were disappointed in not finding wealth the conditions in which the U.S was in by the late 1800s were still a lot better than the places they all had left behind to come. The majority of the immigration population anticipation was to find profitable jobs and opportunities. When the large numbers of immigration were migrating to the U.S, it was during the “Gilded Age”, which was the prime time for the country’s expansion of industrialization. This rapid expansion of new industries led to the need of workers which motivated people from other countries to come to
During the late 1800s and early 1900s, the United States gained many new citizens – immigrants from other countries in search of the American Dream. However, the immigrants’ path to the American Dream was hindered by the prejudice they faced from native-born Americans. This prejudice, also known as nativism, depended on stereotypes that portrayed the immigrants as subservient and justified discriminatory actions. The “otherness” of the immigrants was further confirmed with Social Darwinism, a twisted extension of survival of the fittest that asserted failure as natural selection. Since many immigrants had a difficult time finding success due to cultural barriers and the already prevalent nativism, Social Darwinism allowed prejudice towards
In the nineteenth century, rates of immigration across the world increased. Within thirty years, over eleven million immigrants came to the United States. There were new types of people migrating than what the United States were used to seeing as well. Which made people from different backgrounds and of different race work and live in tight spaces together; causing them to be unified. Not only did they immigrate to the United States, there were cities all over the world attracting all sorts of individuals. In this essay, I will discuss the variety of people who migrated, why so many people leaned towards immigration, and why the majority of immigrants populated the cities instead of rural areas like their homelands.
Americans had rarely accepted outsiders as equals, and that was the case with immigrants coming to the U.S in the 1840s to the 1920s. A time in America where immigrants were not considered inferior to native white Americans did not exist. The hatred of anything non-American, especially with the coming of World War I in 1914, would only cause more Americans to despise immigrants. Part of this was rooted simply in racism, which existed towards groups other than African Americans, but much of it was simply that Americans considered themselves the chosen people while everyone else was below them. Thus, despite immigrants being accepted into America, those immigrants were still treated far worse than white citizens between the 1840s and 1920s, for the prejudice against them was obvious even in the laws created.
The relocation and internment of the Japanese in America is often seen as one of our nation's greatest mistakes. For many, the quest is to now understand why we committed such an atrocious act. The most common explanations include racist attitudes, military ‘necessity’, and economic reasons. Japanese relocation was a disgracefully racist act that the Government of the U.S committed, an act that was virtually unnecessary and unjustified.
The mid-19th century saw an unprecedented wave of immigrants coming into the country. At its peak, Ellis Island, the main processing station for immigrants, handled an astounding 5,000 people every day. Because of the language and culture barriers faced by each group of people, they often settled amongst themselves. Very quickly, country-specific neighborhoods began popping up throughout New York and the surrounding area. This helped to alleviate the stresses with moving to a new country; however, most immigrants came to the United States penniless and lived in low-income housing as their jobs rarely supported themselves let alone their families. Most of these jobs were labor-intensive, and oftentimes, very dangerous. “These urban immigrants
Throughout its history the United States has seen a great ebb and flow in the amount of immigrants entering the country. For a country that was founded by immigrants many of its policies in the 19th and 20th centuries sought to exclude and limit the amount of immigrants coming from many continents, including Asia and Africa. Chinese Immigrants increasingly started showing up in Northern California at the start of the gold rush in 1849 and would establish a large enclave known as China Town in San Francisco. Immigrants from China were particularly targeted with the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, that made illegal, the influx of Chinese laborers that had been migrating to the US just a few years prior.
Citation: Lee, Erika. "Enforcing The Borders: Chinese Exclusion Along The U.S. Borders With Canada And Mexico, 1882-1924." Journal Of American History 89.1 (2002): 54. Advanced Placement Source. Web. 8 Mar. 2016. Retrieved
Immigrants from the mid 19th century and early 20th century consisted of mainly Southern and Eastern Europe, Asia, and elsewhere. Immigrants motivations, experiences, and impacts shaped what an immigrant had to go through being a different person from another country. Although Americans dislike foreigners who came to the United States, immigrants had a role in political, economic, cultural, and social aspects of immigrants because of their motivations, experiences, and impacts in America. New Immigrants did not have it easy and went through obstacles natives, political figures, bosses and others had thrown at them.