Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Ida B. Wells Barnett and the Fight for Fairness and Equality for Undocumented Immigrants

As the words of our founding fathers, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is the American dream that many pursue, whether immigrated to the United States or born here. Within Demetria Martinez’s book, Mother Tongue, a novel, the character named Jose Luis flees from El Salvador to the United States in order to escape it’s brutal civil war. His choice to flee El Salvador and enter the United States under a false name places him in a difficult situation, both in his moral abandonment of his home country El Salvador, and for crossing the United States border illegally. The position of Jose Luis can be dissected into the need for borders, the asylum process into the U.S., the reason why politicians reject immigration, and the potential

Their stance may not have been as boisterous then as it is now, but they have always played an important role within the formation of todays’ society. The final attribute, studied within this chapter, supports this notion with the rise of female workers within America. Some of the most famous women social employees were: Jane Addams, Charlotte Gilman, Anna Cooper, Ida Wells-Barnett, Marianne Weber, and Beatrice Webb. Each of these women were still looked upon as inferior to men despite their contributions to society as a whole. These women believed sociology was developed from scholarly investigations that helped to attribute to the ideology of improving ones’ life through education and learning means. The women believed that this change would bring about both a sense of belong for women within cultural societies as well as modeling the community into a world in which everyone can coincide together. Their work would not be accounted for under the sociological realm of study… but it would be attributed to the greater sense of communal study as it is known

The article I decided to do my research on social problems is called “Immigrant Rights Are Human Rights: The Reframing of Immigrant Entitlement and Welfare”. This article was first published in February of 2005 by Oxford Journals and was written by author Lynn H. Fujiwara. I chose this article specifically because it covered topics we learned in class this semester. Lynn’s article considers the broader implications for immigrant and welfare rights movements. In 1996 President Clinton enacted a welfare reform law that made non-citizen immigrants ineligible for “Supplemental Security Income (SSI) (assistance for the elderly, disabled, and blind) and food stamps”

This paper explores the United States, Immigration Policy from an historical, fair and factual perspective. The Immigration Act of 1990 States limited “unskilled workers to 10,000 a year. Skilled labor requirements and immediate family reunification were major goals. The Act continued to promote the nuclear family model, foreign-born in the US was 7%”. This paper will also explore the demographics and diversity, of immigrants, throughout the U.S. This paper includes an article form the website of the Washington, D.C., Immigration Policy Center, and American Immigration Council. This paper will examines significant research data from the Pew Research web site on Hispanic trends and immigration, around the United States. This paper will also cover numbers, facts and trends which shape the immigration policy. This paper will also include five different books written by authors concerning the immigration policy and public issues which most concern Americans. This paper will cover topics of history of social problems and the policies that address immigration, special interest groups advocacy groups, political party and supporters, social justice and ethical issues, policy outcomes of illegal immigrants and how other countries compare to the United States when dealing with immigration.

For thousands of years’ immigration to the United States has been considered one of the biggest problems and has been one of the topics most talked about, especially in this year, being one of the favorite topics to talk about in the presidential debates. Yet, due to speeches given by President Donald Trump little is known and talked about the problems immigrants, especially Latinos face day by day, socially and economically. By being a minority in the United States it has been very difficult for immigrant farm workers’ to get where they are now and have more opportunities than before the 1970s. Fortunately, there have been organizations and leaders that have helped immigrants through the years, one of these being Dolores Huerta.

I will start with the compare and contrast of what three theorists were concerned with when forming their theories of feminism. As all three theorists claimed that the problem of women’s rights was not the simple one of the democratic demand of women for equal prerogatives with men, their initial concerns were all essentially twofold: to show how women and society were disastrously affected due to the continued suppression of female; and to demonstrate, both in theories and practice means whereby women could fight for their rights and equalities in society. However, since they three had different focuses on progress for women, Gilman, Cooper and Collins’ principal concerns when forming their theories were also different, and I will explain the differences in the following paragraphs.

During the latter 19th and early 20th centuries racism and racial segregation were considerable problems. Mob violence, including lynchings were responsible for the deaths of thousands of black men, women and children, often for crimes they had no part in or which were not even committed. Ida B. Wells-Barnett was born into slavery by James and Elizabeth Wells during the Civil War. She attended Rust College, which was partly founded by her father in Mississippi. After Wells’ parents died of yellow fever, she attained a teaching position at a local school by lying about her age. After some time teaching she moved to Memphis with two of her sisters, where she acquired another teaching position and continued her schooling at Fisk University. While her professional life was moderately successful, her personal life was dismal, however, “it is the very qualities that problematize her personal relationships… that will impel her to undertake… a courageous crusade against lynching” (DeCosta-Willis). Being a freed black woman in the south, Wells had firsthand knowledge of the segregation and racial tension of the time. This knowledge and her experiences gave her insights about the South that were crucial in her successful crusade against lynching and segregation.

During the Progressive Era, there was a rise in advocates for various issues of the period. A prime example of a progressive advocate is Charlotte Perkins Gilman, who through her writing encouraged more social, political, and economic rights for women. Gilman specifically advocated for women to not only participate in their domestic duties but for women to also serve as active members of society; both politically and financially. To convey these points, Gilman wrote and published many books that illustrated the issues to the public and started conversations and controversies which brought more attention to women’s rights. In her works, Gilman consistently advocated for economic power for women; however, she supported women being involved and equal in every aspect of society; including having the same domestic power and rights as their husbands, women’s suffrage to match male counterparts, and the ability for women to be financially independent and self-supporting. Gilman’s writings acted as a significant part of the women’s rights movement during the Progressive Era by bringing the controversial issues to the public eye.

Freed from the constant fear of deportation, Alex moved his family to Los Angeles, where his family would better fit, given the large Hispanic population. In Los Angeles, Alex obtained a job with Pan-American Underwriting Company as a file clerk, making roughly $1000 per month. Alex worked there for twenty years, without receiving a promotion or raise, before finally being laid off without receiving any retirement benefits. My wife cries as she recounts how she helped her father to get a job as a delivery driver where she worked, after he had been laid of at Pan-American; she cries in a mix of emotions that include anger, embarrassment, shame, and deep anguish for her father’s wounded pride (Rock, 2011). Alex’s experience is like so many immigrants in the United States, where uncertain legal status combined with other factors, like language barriers serves to lock them into low-wage jobs that often lack benefits (Massey, Durand, & Malone, 2002). While living in poverty in the United States was an improvement over the situation in Guatemala, Alex’s status as illegal immigrant and poor command of the English language all but assured a life of poverty in the United States.

The United States was founded through means of immigration; immigrants from everywhere and anywhere around the world. Who are they? How did they get here? Why did they come? Many of these questions can be answered when considering how race, gender, and sexuality affect immigration. Immigration means something to different to everyone and for some it forced, while for others, it is a choice. For some it means pursuing the “American Dream,” for others it may be breaking away from political and religious persecution, but nonetheless, it is always a test. Gender roles, relations and inequalities affect who migrates and why, how the decision is made, the impacts on migrants themselves, on sending areas and on receiving areas. While focusing

Barnett, Miller-Perrin, and Perrin present a multitude of barriers facing immigrant women such as the ones discussed above. However, their main focus deviates

Jose Antonio Vargas, courageous author of the essay “Outlaw”, contributes a first-hand life story to the boiling pot that is the argument over immigration. He recalls his own story chronologically, beginning with the month and words spoken by his mother on his day of departure over twenty years ago. He justifies the reasoning behind his leaving by retelling almost every illegal immigrant’s initiative, a craving for “a better life”. Vargas takes the reader on his journey, piggybacking through his fight for citizenship. He explains the numerous obstacles he’s had to bob and weave around and the laws he’s had to duck and cover for. On paper, Jose is the perfect American citizen, loved by his teachers and bosses a clean cut right side of the tracks

Ida B. Wells-Barnett dedicated her life to social justice and equality. She devoted her tremendous energies to building the foundations of African-American progress in business, politics, and law. Wells-Barnett was a key participant in the formation of the National Association of Colored Women as well as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). She spoke eloquently in support of Marcus Garvey and the Universal Negro Improvement Association. The legacies of these organizations have been tremendous and her contribution to each was timely and indespensible. But no cause challenged the courage and integrity of Ida B. Wells-Barnett as much as her battle against mob violence and the terror of lynching at the end of

The current immigration system in the United States is broken and unjust. When we use the condition of a woman and her position in society, it allows the understanding of the impact that immigration has at the social, economic and cultural level. This process can maintain the women in situations of disadvantage and subordination in relation to the men. Because undocumented migration has turned into a political

When one thinks of immigrants, lets’ face it what one envisions is the man or woman working in California restaurant kitchens, the maids in middle class neighborhoods, baby sitters, gardeners mowing lawns. L.A mayor Antonio Villaraigoza famously put it during a speech: “Today we say to America: We’ve come here to work: We clean toilets. We clean your hotels. We build your houses. We take care of your children. We want you to help us take care of our children as well” (Malkin,M.,