In Joel Spring’S Book, Deculturalization And The Struggle

The United States has had tension with Asian immigrants since the first wave of migration in the 1840’s, and in 1882 the United States declared a Chinese Exclusion which was to keep all Chinese from migrating into the United States. For the Chinese already in the U.S this created worry and tension. With the Chinese people no longer being welcome the freedom for the Chinese inside which was already not much was even more condensed. The little equality that they had was taken away and they were excluded, and looked down upon everywhere they went. They had trouble living and socially because of the prejudice they were facing. An example of the Chinese struggle before the exclusion act would be the Chinese Lynching that took place in 1871. In Los Angeles a mob captured men and in this case a 12 year old boy and hung them all at a Spanish hacienda because of the citizens strong discrimination against

America feared that the Cold War would inspire the Soviet communism nurture egalitarian societies, and prompt the colored people inside and outside America to remain marginal between capitalism and communism. This inspired American policy makers to undermine their practice of discriminating the colored communities. Thus, during the 1960s America witnessed radicalization of anti-racism movements. The Cold War affected the Asian Americans in different ways. First and foremost, a vociferous call by Asian Americans against racism would invite condemnation of the white Americans. Nevertheless, famed Americans of Asian origin voiced against racism. Until the year 1950, the Japanese were kept beyond the purview of new immigration reforms. Early 1950s saw the Japanese given immigration rights to join hands with Americans to fight communism, which had earlier invaded China by the late 1940s. In 1945, America allowed its citizens who fought the war in different parts of Asia to bring their wives from Philippines and China as Filipinos, Koreans and South Asians were allowed to enter America after granting naturalization rights. This in turn created significant gender imbalance, for instance, among the Chinese and Filipino immigrants.

In Chapter 4 of his book, which is aptly titled “Postwar Passions”, Daniels chooses to focus on the experiences of African-Americans in the post-WWI era, specifically focusing on race riots that occurred during the “Red Summer” of 1919. (104) There is a long-standing history of racial discord between whites and African-Americans, but the post-WWI years are a unique time. It has been more than fifty years since slavery has been abolished, but it will still take another forty plus years before discrimination on the basis of race is made illegal in America. Industrialization after the turn of the century and blatant racism in the South led to the migration of millions of African-Americans to northern

The black race has faced many hardships throughout American history. The harsh treatment is apparent through the brutal slavery era, the Civil Rights movement, or even now where sparks of racial separation emerge in urbanized areas of Baltimore, Chicago, and Detroit. Black Americans must do something to defend their right as an equal American. “I Am Not Your Negro” argues that the black race will not thrive unless society stands up against the conventional racism that still appears in modern America. “The Other Wes Moore” argues an inspiring message that proves success is a product of one’s choices instead of one’s environment or expectations.

The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B Dubois is a influential work in African American literature and is an American classic. In this book Dubois proposes that "the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line." His concepts of life behind the veil of race and the resulting "double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others," have become touchstones for thinking about race in America. In addition to these lasting concepts, Souls offers an evaluation of the progress of the races and the possibilities for future progress as the nation entered the twentieth century.

The Condemnation of Blackness by Kahlil Gibran Muhammad outlines the struggles and tribulations that African Americans had to face after the American Civil War. The book gives specific accounts as to why African Americans were deemed “The New Problem” and how that changed, highlighting discrimination of African Americans as the real problem. Muhammad also focuses of on the work done by social scientist, criminologist, libertarians, activist of both black and white races and how their work affected the African American people and their place in society as a whole. Muhammad also explains how the labeling of blacks as criminals has had an influence on our society today.

I relate each component with a historical event in Puerto Rican politics and also consider how through this historic mobilization Puerto Ricans have gained entitlement to more power, equality, representation, consciousness from other ethnic groups, and to some degree, social change. I focus on the Puerto Ricans’ migration to Connecticut, their development of ethnic awareness and power awareness, their realization of common interests, their competing ethnic projects, and the brokered representation they have endured as detailed in Jose Cruz’s book, Identity and Power: Puerto Rican Politics and the Challenge of Ethnicity. Finally, I examine an important point that Cruz only touched upon briefly, which is the idea of cultural citizenship in the Puerto Rican community. This added point helps us to fully understand the role identity politics played in Puerto Ricans’ lives.

Alexander writes, “I have a specific audience in mind—people who care deeply about racial justice but who, for any number of reasons, do not yet appreciate the magnitude of the crisis faced by communities of color… I am writing this book for people like me—the person I was ten years ago” (p. xiii). By writing to an audience of readers who are not

In the new proactive book, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, Michelle Alexander dives into the not so complicated racial issues that plague this country that we tend to ignore. In all of history, African Americans have had to constantly fight for their freedoms and the right to be considered a human being in this society. It’s very troubling looking back and seeing where we have failed people in this country. At the turn of the century, when people began to think that we had left our old ways behind, this book reminds us that we are wrong. Racism is still alive today in every way, just in different forms.

When learning information about important facts, dates, and the influential people who made up U.S. history, I do not remember learning much of anything regarding the Irish, Chinese, or Japanese. Well, except for Pearl Harbor and the U.S. retaliating against Japan by dropping atomic bombs. I definitely learned that people from around the world immigrated by boat across vast amounts of ocean for a chance to thrive in the land of freedom called America. I learned that millions of people entered through Ellis Island in the late nineteenth century, looking upon the Statue of Liberty, in hopes of finding their right to life, liberty, and happiness. I learned that the majority of these people were stricken of their identities and provided new American names that were easier to pronounce. I did not however, learn about the great discrimination and hardship that these people suffered at the hands of white Americans. The major theme presented is labor discrimination, unequal and unfair pay, long hours, and harsh working and living environments in regards to the Mexican Americans, Chinese, and Japanese. Takaki (2008) paints a vivid picture of discrimination and suffering of the people known as the “others” living and working in the multicultural “melting pot” United States, in his book A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America.

Between the World and Me has been called a book about race, but the author argues that race itself is a flawed, if anything, nothing more than a pretext for racism. Early in the book he writes, “Race, is the child of racism, not the father.” The idea of race has been so important in the history of America and in the self-identification of its people and racial designations have literally marked the difference between life and death in some instances. How does discrediting the idea of race as an immutable, unchangeable fact changes the way we look at our history? Ourselves? In a profound work that pivots from the biggest questions about American history and ideals to the most intimate concerns of a father for his son, Ta-Nehisi Coates offers a powerful new framework for understanding our nation’s history and the current crisis. Americans have built an empire on the idea of “race,” a falsehood that damages us all but falls most heavily on the bodies of black women and men—bodies exploited through slavery and segregation, and, today, threatened, locked up, and murdered out of all proportion. What is it like to inhabit a black body and find a way to live within it? And how can we all honestly reckon with this fraught history and free ourselves from its burden? Between the World and Me is Ta-Nehisi Coates’s attempt to answer these questions in a letter to his adolescent son. Coates shares with his son—and readers—the story of his awakening to the truth about his place in the

Though Asians make up the largest portion of the world’s population, Asian-Americans are one of the least represented minority groups within the United States. Out of an estimated 318 million people living in the U.S., Asians account for 5.2%, or approximately 17 million people. Compared to Hispanics at 54 million and African-Americans at 42 million, Asians and/or Asian-Americans are vastly outnumbered by the two other major minority groups and even more so by the majority, European-Americans. Even though Asians are typically considered the “model minority”, they are faced with the same issues that plague many other minority groups within the U.S. today to include stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination and ethnocentrism. There has been a history of discriminatory national policies directed at the immigration of Asians to the U.S. and in times of duress, the labeling and targeted institutional discrimination of specific ethnicities of Asian-Americans as traitors based solely on country of origin and not on the deeds and actions of said U.S. citizens (Japanese internment camps of World War II).

The Asian American immigrants are part of the ethnic and racial groups in the United States who lives in the continent of Asia. Asian have lived in the United States for a long time. Throughout the history, Asian Americans have encountered segragation and discrimination during the periods of changes in demographics, economic recession, and war. They have been discriminated by school policies and practices due to beign different. Paul Spickard (2007) has said that Asian Americans was an idea invented in the 1960s to bring together Chinese, Japanese, and Filipino Americans for political purposes. Later, other

August 28, 1963 (Eidenmuller) marked a very important day in history that had an impact not only on America, but the whole world. On this day, Martin Luther King Jr. presented his well known I Have a Dream speech that aimed to eliminate racism, inequality and discrimination. He strongly believed that one day people would put their differences aside and come together. So, what happened to that dream? Along with other equality initiative ideas, they rarely make it past the idea stages or end in the actual eradication result. It is clear to us that even after 51 years, our societies still struggle with accepting full equality. Within those 51 years we have made a mass amount of progress but, a common thought would be that after this long the issue should have been eradicated. Two essays that can be used as an example of proof that racial inequality still exists in our society are, Black Men in Public Spaces by Brent Staples and Who Shot Johnny? by Debra Dickerson. In these essays, both provide solid evidence to support their main goal with the use of different writing styles, tone, and rhetorical devices to display how African Americans are perceived and treated by society.

African Americans were discriminated against even though they were serving their country. Like we discussed in class, some African Americans were lynched in public while dressed in their military uniform. Many were severely beaten almost to death. They were treated with no respect. As I looked through my notes I found that African Americans were grouped together in combat and often were given missions that could have been considered suicidal. Although the blacks were treated poorly, it seems that the Japanese Americans got the raw end of the deal during the war.