Analysis Of Maria Andreu's This Illegal: American Life

Tanya Barrientos explained her struggle with her identity growing up in her writing “Se Habla Español”. Barrientos describes herself as being “Guatemalan by birth but pure gringa by circumstance” (83). These circumstances began when her family relocated to the United States when she was three years old. Once the family moved to the states, her parents only spoke Spanish between themselves. The children learned to how read, write and speak the English language to fit into society at that time in 1963. (83) Barrientos explained how society shifted and “the nation changed its views on ethnic identity” (85) after she graduated college and it came as a backlash to her because she had isolated herself from the stereotype she constructed in her head. She was insulted to be called Mexican and to her speaking the Spanish language translated into being poor. She had felt superior to Latino waitresses and their maid when she told them that she didn’t speak Spanish. After the shift in society Barrientos wondered where she fit it since the Spanish language was the glue that held the new Latino American community together. Barrientos then set out on a difficult awkward journey to learn the language that others would assume she would already know. She wanted to nurture the seed of pride to be called Mexican that her father planted when her father sent her on a summer trip to Mexico City. Once Barrientos had learned more Spanish and could handle the present, past and future tenses she still

In the article “15 Years on the Bottom Rung” written by Anthony DePalma compares the story of a Greek and a Mexican immigrant, seeking better opportunities here in the United States. However, one succeeds and one doesn’t. One commonality is that they both resided in New York. Mr. Zannikos is the Greek immigrant who arrived in the United States in 1953 with 100 dollars to his name. Mr. Zannikos 19, left with no intent to go back to Greece. Once Mr. Zannikos arrived in New York he immediately started working and learning English. While working in a coffee shop the shop was raided by the cops and he was deported. Mr.zannikos snuck back in the United States and married a Puerto Rican from the Bronx, because of this he was able to gain citizenship giving him the opportunity to own his own restaurant “3 Guys”. 3 Guys became very successful in the South Bronx. In contrast, Mr. Peralta is a Mexican immigrant who came to the United States in 1990, whose father sent him because he was the first born and never able to have that opportunity for himself. Mr. Peralta 19, was out of a job for weeks waiting for job openings when he first arrived in New York. Once Mr. Peralta found a job opening he made enough money to pay back his father back, so he went back to Mexico to take care of his family and winds up getting married to Matilda while there. Mr. Peralta returns to New York with his new wife illegally. Living in poverty Mr. Peralta could only accept cheap labor jobs because he was not a documented citizen and didn’t know much English. DePalma explains in his writing why Mr. Peralta was not able to triumph in New York because of ethnicity, marriage, and language.

Nowadays many students from my country Brazil consider the opportunity of studying abroad in another country. I am a student athlete from Brazil and I am living my dream of attaining college in the United States. The idea of living in a foreign country, where you will encounter different places, make new friends, and live a different way of life, sounds exciting and fun at the beginning, but those expectations are not always met. The story “Always living in Spanish” is about a Chilean girl who loves her country. However, due to the violent environment, Marjorie and her family decide to go to America, hoping to live a safer life. Many foreign students, such as Marjorie in “Always Living in Spanish”, experience difficulty integrating in another society because they have difficulty expressing themselves in that society´s language. This issue also evolves problems in adapting to another culture and living a normal daily life.

Cristina Henriquez’, The Book of Unknown Americans, folows the story of a family of immigants adjusting to their new life in the United States of America. The Rivera family finds themselves living within a comunity of other immigrants from all over South America also hoping to find a better life in a new country. This book explores the hardships and injustices each character faces while in their home country as well as withina foreign one, the United States. Themes of community, identity, globalization, and migration are prevalent throughout the book, but one that stood out most was belonging. In each chacters viewpoint, Henriquez explores their feelings of the yearning they have to belong in a community so different than the one that they are used to.

In the film “Mi Familia,” we follow the story of the Mexican-American Sánchez family who settled in East Los Angeles, California after immigrating to the United States. Gregory Nava and Anna Thomas introduce the story of this family in several contexts that are developed along generations. These generations hold significant historical periods that form the identity of each individual member of the family. We start off by exploring the immigrant experience as the family patriarch heads north to Los Angeles, later we see how national events like the great depression directly impact Maria as she gets deported, although she was a US citizen. The events that follow further oppress this family and begins separate identity formations. These

In Norma Cantu’s Canicula: Snapshots of a girlhood el la Frontera, she addresses the topic of identity which is examined through the photographs of her past. In her story, it’s about how she grew up between two different countries of the U.S and Mexico. The narrator is searching for who she is within the two countries, which makes it hard for her to find herself as one culture can criticize the other. In one of the stories, “Mexican Citizen” the narrator is now faced to identify her identity as she now gets her U.S immigration papers. In these papers we see that the color of her skin listed is “Blanco”, on the other hand, her Mexico documents state that she’s “Moreno”. This shows two different identities that based just on her color of her skin. The narrator is able to cross the border occasionally without her parents that she then realizes the conflict of between the two cultures when she decides to live with Mamagrande in Monterrey. She interacts with her cousins, but they don’t seem to get along with her very well since she doesn’t know their way of things “I sing to them silly nursery rhymes and tell them these are great songs: Humpty Dumpty, Jack and Jill, Little Miss Muffet, Old McDonald. They listen fascinated, awed, but then they laugh when I don’t know their games” (Cantu 23). We see that even though she can speak Spanish, the narrator still has trouble living in Mexico and she then faces problems trying to find her identity when she experiences the conflicts

The term immigrant is defined as “a person who comes to a country to take up permanent residence” (“Immigrant”). In her autobiography, Barefoot Heart, Elva Trevino Hart speaks of her immigrant ways and how she fought to become the Mexican-American writer she is today. She speaks about the working of land, the migrant camps, plus the existence she had to deal with in both the Mexican and American worlds. Hart tells the story of her family and the trials they went through along with her physical detachment and sense of alienation at home and in the American (Anglo) society. The loneliness and deprivation was the desire that drove Hart to defy the odds and acquire the unattainable sense of belonging into American

“Legal Alien” by Pat Mora is a poem that describes the life of a Mexican American girl, she was born in America but her parents are Mexican. In the poem Mora mentioned that she is “Bi-lingual, Bi-cultural, able to slip from How is life to Me estan volviendo loca” (Mora 370). She is caught between two cultures. She feels that she does not belong to any society, people from America see her in different ways “viewed by Anglos as perhaps exotic, perhaps inferior, definitely different” (Mora 370), but also Mexicans have a different opinion “ viewed by Mexicans as alien, (their eyes says “you may speak Spanish but you are not like me”)” (Mora 370). In this poem exists the cultural border, she does not fit either in America or Mexico “An American to Mexicans a Mexican to America” (Mora 370). She is confused about her culture, and has a cultural border problem.

I started this essay off with a quote one of the characters mention in the book because it basically gives us the main idea the author is trying to get readers to understand throughout the book. By looking at the title of this novel, “The Book of Unknown Americans” and by looking at the author’s name- Cristina Henriquez, we can already get an idea of what this novel is going to be about. When someone first takes a look at the title and author of this book they would assume that it is going to be about immigrants who moved to the United States and struggled to fit in. After reading this novel, I now understand how difficult it was for these Latino immigrants to leave everything they have in hope for better lives here in the United States. Each person has their own meaning of what it means to be an American and their own reason of what most immigrants come here for. The Rivera family came here in hope for better resources to help treat Maribel because they didn 't have the resources they needed back in their country.

The book ‘Labor and Legality: An Ethnography of a Mexican Immigrant Network’ by Ruth Gomberg-Munoz explains the hardships that surround the Mexican immigrant network. Over the years the ‘undocumented’ workers coming to America from Mexico has increased which has gained the attention of the American government and the media, as it is ‘illegal behavior’. Gomberg-Munoz attempts to create an understanding of the lives of these workers by telling individual’s personal stories. The author reports the workers undocumented lives rather than reviewing their status as this is already covered in society. The author’s main topic revolves around the principle that undocumented workers strive to improve their quality of life by finding employment in the United States (Gomberg-Munoz 9). Gomberg Munoz also presents the daily struggles the works face daily, and how these struggles “deprives them of meaningful choice and agency” which effects their opportunity and futures (Gomberg-Munoz 9). This ethnography shows their social identities through work, the reasons why their position is illegal and how they live their everyday lives under the circumstances.

The article “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant” was written by Jose Antonio Vargas. In it, Vargas tells of the time when his mother brought him to the Phillippines’ Ninoy Aquino International Airport when he was twelve. His mother told him that she wanted to give him a better life so he boarded onto a plane with a man he had never met before and was told that he was his uncle. He arrived in Mountain View, California and moved in with his grandparents Lolo and Lola. Vargas says that he grew to love his new home and when he entered sixth grade that’s when he found his passion for language. He tells of his struggle of making a distinction between “formal English and

The Movie “The Immigrant,” directed by James Gray in 2013, is a historical piece, mostly because it was not made in 1921 when the events it portrays actually happened. I would also have to attribute the movie to be a drama as well as a romance, as the movie is about an evil man hooking the main character, Ewa who is played by Marion Cotillard, into becoming a prostitute. The movie has certain aspects of romance as well as fear. There are many times where you feel love will be sparked and Ewa will live happily ever after. However, these moments are fleeting and go away very quickly, only to pop up again a few minutes later. In the two hour duration of the movie, I felt hopeful, as well as sad. While not learning any historical information, I was entranced in the lives of the characters. I feel as though they did a fantastic job of portraying the time period, through the cloths, speech, and even the way the buildings were built.

Xiomara still feels “wrong saying American is a you vs me thing. But at the same time, it’s a coping mechanism…a “its fine” you didn’t do this.” She is referring to her refusal to acknowledge her own Americanness. There are complicated feelings that arise as a result of being DACA. She initially did not want to apply for DACA, in light of the fact that she felt it wouldn’t help her cause, the college going process. She also felt trepidation at the thought of the

In the article "Dreaming with My Mother" people can learn that Angy and her mother came to America as undocumented immigrants. Few people coming to America are illegal immigrants. There are two different categories of people: people who come to America thinking that they will have a better life, and a few people who break the law and commit crimes. Angy Rivera tells the story of how she and her mother faced life as undocumented immigrants. When Angy came to America, she knew America was the land of opportunity.

Throughout Argentina and as well many other Central American countries during that of the late 1970’s, many were going through severe political upheaval. This political catastrophe coupled with various human rights violations pushed many people to the edge and out of their homeland. Economically drained and scared for their lives Argentines sought freedom and asylum within the United States. For many this was the start of something new in a foreign country with people that speak a foreign language. Courage and bravery those are two words that in my eyes describe an immigrant that has been forced to endure so much that they leave everything they had ever known.The Dirty War of Argentina caused families to be ripped apart and people to vanish as if they had never existed. This horrendous stretch in Argentine history showcased various human rights violations, corrupt leaders, United States backed coup, death and a need for reform in a country that was broken and dismayed.