Immigration & Historical Context

1. Immigration & Historical Context Esperanza Rising and The Circuit

2. Next few days . . . Today: Historical context for Esperanza Rising and The Circuit Go over Test No. 1 grades/answers. Wednesday: Discuss Esperanza Rising. Assign Paper No. 1. Next Monday: Discuss The Circuit. Continue to discuss Paper No. 1.

3. Similar topics/different genres • Both Esperanza Rising and The Circuit are about similar topics: immigration, the lives of migrant farm workers, and the American Dream. • They are, though, different genres: ER is historical fiction and The Circuit is a memoir. • We’ll be reading three memoirs and will discuss the functions and effects of this genre. By comparing two books about the same topic, we can look more closely at differences between genres.

4. Current Stats on Immigrants 11 percent of U.S. population is foreign born Of these, • 51 percent from Latin America • 25.5 percent from Asia • 15.3 percent from Europe • 8.2 percent from other regions

5. Current Stats on Immigrants • 30% Naturalized Citizens • 30% Legal immigrants • 27% Undocumented immigrants • 5% Non-immigrants (visiting) • 8% Refugees Source: www.ncsl.org

6. Attitudes about immigrants • The U.S. has always had conflicted attitudes and policies about immigration. • There are many misconceptions about immigrants, their role in our society, and the effect immigration has on the U.S. economy and culture.

7. Some untrue myths . . . • Immigrants don’t pay taxes • Immigrants come here to get welfare • Immigrants take jobs away from “real” Americans • Immigrants don’t want to learn English • Most immigrants cross the border illegally • Information:http://www.immigrationforum.org/documents/TheJourney/MythsandFacts.pdf

8. Why? and How? • A bit of research shows many of these myths to be untrue or to have greater complexity. • Larger Questions: • Why do we readily believe the worst about our immigrant populations? • How do we combat ignorance?

9. Mixed Messages • The history of immigration in the U.S. is complicated and filled with contradictions. • There have been, over time, fluctuations between: “Come on over--we need workers” and “Go home!--you’re no longer wanted here.” • For example,

10. Welcome! • “The expansion of cattle ranches in Texas and New Mexico and the increase of fruit bearing production in California in the years between 1850 and 1880 required a major amount of manual labor, a problem the ranchers resolved by importing foreign manual labor.” www.farmworkers.org

11. Go home! • “First, it was the Chinese workers -- more than 200 thousand were legally contracted for the cultivation of Californian fields, but racism and xenophobia obligated legislators to approve the “Chinese Exclusion Act.” Japanese workers substituted for the Chinese in the same appalling working conditions as them, but the Japanese were thrown out in 1903 and replaced by Filipino workers.” www.farmworkers.org

12. Welcome! • “With the construction of the railroad between Mexico and the U.S. between 1880 and 1890, great quantities of Mexican workers got jobs as railway workers. It was said that by that time 60 percent of the crews working the western railways were Mexicans.” www.farmworkers.org

13. Go Home! • Immigration intensified after the 1910 Mexican Revolution and continued through WWI and into the 1920s. • The Border Patrol was founded in 1924, and this began the distinction between “legal” and “illegal” immigrants--those with work permits and those without.

14. Esperanza Rising • Esperanza Rising covers several important events and trends in U.S. and Mexican history. • The novel also raises important questions about immigration, the American Dream, racism in the U.S. and in Mexico, socio-economic class, and the labor movement.

15. The Mexican Revolution • 1910-1920 • “Violent political and social upheaval that occurred in Mexico in the early 20th century. The revolution began in November 1910 as an effort to overthrow the 30-year dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz. It grew into a widespread rebellion that would eventually change the structure of Mexico’s economy, government, and society.” (Encarta)

16. Racism in Mexico • “The Díaz regime continued to allow non-natives to take property from the communal land holdings of Mexico’s indigenous populations, a process that had been accelerating since the 1850s. As more land passed into the control of a small minority, the vast majority of the rural people—primarily indigenous people—saw their real wages and standard of living decline.” (Encarta).

17. Racism in Mexico • How does Ryan illustrate this in the novel? • Which characters are indigenous to Mexico? Which are foreign-born? • What metaphors does Ryan use to illustrate differences and tensions among these characters?

18. Setting • The Novel begins in Aquascalientes, Mexico in 1930. • Aquascalientes is a state in the middle of Mexico. • The State originated under colonial Spanish influence and has a Spanish name. • Rural w/ farmland

19. Setting • The land (as in Roll of Thunder) is a major feature. • Why does Ryan choose to name each chapter after a fruit or vegetable? How does she work these into the narrative? What do they come to symbolize?

20. Mexican Culture • Quinceaneras: • A young lady makes her debut but before the church and society at the age of 15 in a rite of passage known as the quinceañera , celebrating the girl's transition from childhood to adulthood. Hispanics on the border have continued the custom of making a girl's 15th birthday one of the most important and memorable events of her life. • Where is this ritual mentioned in the novel?

21. Mexican Culture • Spanish speaking • Focus on family and patriarchal structures • More than 90 percent Roman Catholic • Practice of Catholicism through symbols and symbolic acts: images, candles, music, shrines, making the sign of the cross, veneration of Mary, and prayer on behalf of the dead and the living.

22. Our Lady of Guadalupe • In 1531 a "Lady from Heaven" appeared at Tepeyac, a hill northwest of what is now Mexico City. • She identified herself as the ever virgin Holy Mary. She made a request for a church to be built on the site, and submitted her wish to the local Bishop. When the Bishop hesitated, and requested a sign, the Mother of God obeyed without delay or question to the Church's local Bishop, and sent a native messenger to the top of the hill in mid-December to gather an assortment of roses for the Bishop. • (www.sancta.org)

23. Religious and National Symbol • The Lady of Guadalupe, associated with roses, is both a religious symbol and a national symbol for Mexico.

24. Shrine in Camp • It is common in Latino culture to build shrines to the Virgin Mary or other Saints, which represent a personal relationship with one’s religion. • Also, the shrine to Guadalupe that is built in the migrant camp is a way to hold onto their Mexican culture, as well as their beliefs.

25. Migrants in 1930s • “In this photograph, a family gathers outside their "home" in California, a typical shack in a camp of Mexican and Mexican American migrant farm workers during the 1930s' Great Depression. The walls and roofs of the shack are patched together from different materials. Migrant farm workers of all races lived in temporary camps like this as they moved from farm to farm to follow the seasonal work.” (museumca.org)

26. Migration from Mexico • “In the early 1900s, the Mexican Revolution and the series of Mexican civil wars that followed pushed many Mexicans to flee to the United States. Many U.S. farm owners recruited Mexicans and Mexican Americans because they believed that these desperate workers would tolerate living conditions that workers of other races would not.” (Museumca.org)

27. Migration from Mexico • “Mexican and Mexican American workers often earned more in the United States than they could in Mexico's civil war economy, although California farmers paid Mexican and Mexican American workers significantly less than white American workers. By the 1920s, at least three quarters of California's 200,000 farm workers were Mexican or Mexican American.” • (Museumca.org).

29. Deportation: • “As the Great Depression took a toll on California's economy during the 1930s, Mexicans and Mexican Americans became targets for discrimination and removal. White government officials claimed that Mexican immigrants made up the majority of the California unemployed. White trade unions claimed that Mexican immigrants were taking jobs that should go to white men. In reality, a new supply of white refugees desperate for jobs was flooding California from the Midwest, making up the majority of the unemployed.” (museumca.org)

30. Striking farm workers • At the same time that wages were dropping due to the new white refugee labor, established Mexican and Mexican American farm workers had become a threat by banding together, often with other non-whites, and organizing strikes to protest lowered wages and worsening living conditions. (photo of UFW organizing meeting: library.thinkquest.org)

31. Dust storms