Cultural Anthropology : A Microcosm For The World We Live

What is anthropology? This is a question that can be answered in numerous ways, but we are going to define it as simple as possible. If we break the word down into its two components it means the study of human beings. “Anthropo” means human beings or human kind and “logy” or “logia” is Greek for the study or knowledge of something. When we put it all together, it is the study of human beings which can be very broad. Anthropology can be broken down into four subfields: physical anthropology, archaeology, linguistic anthropology, and cultural anthropology.

Over the past thousand years or so, many immigrants have had countless complications and obstacles while finding their home here in the United States. Migrants tended to have a stigma or stereotype associated with their race, class, or culture. In no way did the United States make it “easy” or “free” whenever the mass of people came to the country. The experiences between the immigration groups of the Chinese, Irish, and Germans over the years show that they have overcome prejudice through their work.

Immigrants are hard workers; however, the Americans are viewing the immigrants as lazy and as a burden to The United States when in actuality, research shows that, some immigrants come to The United States legally although they may not have papers to work legally when they first arrive. For many immigrants the process to get legal documentation to work is a long, tedious, and expensive process. Even though this issue is very common, many immigrants are positive and productive contributors in society. On the other hand, there are immigrants who are roaming around the streets, and looking for places to sleep on the roads. As an immigrant in any country, these things can happen to anyone, due to the fact that some immigrants do not know anyone as they migrate to a foreign land. Many immigrants are struggling and are facing many problems that come along their way as they try to become stable and achieve their goals in The United States. In an article written by Octavio Blanco titled “Immigrant workers are most likely to have these jobs,” he states, “That is especially the case in America’s beauty business, where immigrants made up 63% of those that provide services as manicurists and Pedicurists, makeup artists, shampooers and skin care specialists. Slightly more than half of these workers (51%) were

"Immigrants' Lament: Have Degree, No Job." Immigration and Multiculturalism: Essential Primary Sources. Ed. K. Lee Lerner, Brenda Wilmoth Lerner, and Adrienne Wilmoth Lerner. Detroit: Gale, 2006. 353-355. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 11 Apr. 2014

To say that immigrants in America have experienced discrimination would be an understatement. Ever since the country formed, they have been seen as inferior, such as African-Americans that were unwillingly brought to the 13 colonies in the 17th century with the intention to be used as slaves. However, post-1965, immigrants, mainly from Central and South America, came here by choice. Many came with their families, fleeing from their native land’s poverty; these immigrants were in search of new opportunities, and more importantly, a new life. They faced abuse and Cesar Chavez fought to help bring equality to minorities.

The immigrants’ workforce started as a cost saving solution to increase America’s economic success. The impact was positive which then led to Americans trying to set standards of perfection and principles to be following. Workers, farmers, and

Holmes’ purpose in conducting his fieldwork with the migrant workers (specifically the Triqui of Mexico) of California and Washington fruit agriculture was to gain understanding from a perspective many do not consider and that has not been assessed in this way before. Similarly, the goal of this book was to pass that understanding to the common reader, the average American, those who are affected directly and those who are believe they are unaffected by the migrants of American agriculture—and to distinguish that they are not unaffected. Doing so creates the potential for change, even if by only a small factor like

In the United States, the cliché of a nation of immigrants is often invoked. Indeed, very few Americans can trace their ancestry to what is now the United States, and the origins of its immigrants have changed many times in American history. Despite the identity of an immigrant nation, changes in the origins of immigrants have often been met with resistance. What began with white, western European settlers fleeing religious persecution morphed into a multicultural nation as immigrants from countries across the globe came to the U.S. in increasing numbers. Like the colonial immigrants before them, these new immigrants sailed to the Americas to gain freedom, flee poverty and

Immigration makes up of the United States. The life of an immigrant faces many struggles. Coming to the United States is a very difficult time for immigrant, especially when English is not their first language. In Oscar Handlin’s essay, Uprooted and Trapped: The One-Way Route to Modernity and Mark Wyman’s Coming and Going: Round Trip to America, both these essays describes the life of immigrants living in America and how they are able to make a decent amount of money to support their families. Handlin’s essay Uprooted and Trapped: The One - Way Route to Modernity explains how unskilled immigrants came to adapt to the American life working in factories to make a living. In the essay, Coming and Going: Round Trip to America, this essay describes the reality of many immigrants migrating to the United States in the midst of the Industrial Revolution. Many were living and adjusting to being transnational families. Both these essays show how the influx of immigration and industrialization contributed to the making of the United States. With the support from documents 3 and 7, Thomas O’ Donnell, Immigrant Thomas O’Donnell Laments the Worker’s Plight, 1883 and A Slovenian Boy Remembers Tales of the Golden Country, 1909, these documents will explain the life of an immigrant worker in the United States. Although, the United States was portrayed as the country for a better life and a new beginning, in reality, the United

In this documentary about Mexican’s workers experience in Ontario, Canada, Min Sook Lee addresses the issue of the Foreign Temporary Worker program. Specifically, El Contrado demonstrates how Mexicans come to Canada in order to work during several months under bad working conditions. Those workers have to leave their family constantly in order to help them financially. They work 8 months a year, which means that they are home in Mexico only for 4 months (El Contrado). Maximo left his family behind; unfortunately, he cannot even for four months in order to see his son as he is illegal in Canada. As those Mexican workers, Maximo experienced bad working conditions. Here he briefly talks about working conditions and explains how he wanted to get

With the recent presidential change the U.S. immigration policies and effectiveness are being spotlighted. One of the rather tough issues is how to handle current illegal immigrants and how to put an end to illegal immigration (Schaefer, 2015). Immigrants that come to the United States are looking for the American dream or just for a better life for themselves or their families. Although, the stigma society insinuates is that of all immigrants bring terrorism, drug problems, and employment with them (Schaefer, 2015). Since the problems have been linked to immigrants, Americans have developed a prejudice towards people of Hispanic and Asian descent. Due to this prejudice towards immigrants both illegal and legal immigrants struggle to find employment (Schaefer, 2015).

When most people think about immigration to the United States, they think of the U.S. as being the “land of opportunity,” where they will be able to make all of their dreams come true. For some people, immigration made their lives richer and more fulfilled. This however, was not always the case. A place that is supposed to be a “Golden Land” (Marcus 116) did not always welcome people with open arms. Even after people became legal citizens of the United States, often times the natural born Americans did not treat the immigrants as equals but rather as outsiders who were beneath them in some way. In some situations, people’s lives were made worse by coming to the “land of opportunity.” Often times people were living no better than they

As Americans pushed westward, the demand for laborers on the frontier grew. Asian immigrants began to arrive in North America the mid 1800’s with the hopes of creating better lives for themselves (Jannson, 2014, pg 128). Asian laborers became ideal for employers because they could be paid lower wages, had no political power as they were not considered citizens, and were easily stopped from holding labor strikes (Jannson, 2014, pg 129). With the increased favorability towards Asian laborers, white workers were faced with the fear of losing their jobs or a decrease in their compensation, (Jannson, 2014, pg 129). This period of “fear” ultimately led to the nation instating stricter immigration policies (Jannson,

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.,

Anthropology is the social sciences discipline that looks to understand humanity. In this discipline there are subdivisions such as cultural anthropology and primatology, and the beauty of anthropology is that you can more than you think, link some of your life event to some anthropological context.