Insights Into My Own Feelings

In “Puerto Rican Obituary” by Pedro Pietri, the author takes his readers on a journey of the oppressive life of a Puerto Rican immigrant. He describes a vicious cycle of stagnancy in which immigrants work endlessly without reward. Hopeful every day that the American dream they once imagined would come to fruition, but instead they are continually faced with trials and turmoil on every hand. Instead of uniting as a body to work towards greatness, the immigrants grow envious of each other, focusing on what they lack instead of the blessings that they currently attain. Contrary to the ideals of early immigrants, Pietri portrays Puerto Rico to be the homeland. The ideals of early immigrants have drastically changed throughout the development of America. Petri paints a completely different picture of America throughout his poem. Early immigrants describe an America that is welcoming, with endless opportunities, and a safe haven. Despite earlier depictions of the immigrant experience, these ideals are challenged because they weren’t integrated into society, were inadequately rewarded for hard work, and were disadvantaged due to their socioeconomic status.

As a person who came from another country to the USA. learning how to read and write wasn’t easy. At the beginning, I found it so hard to read and write I would sit for a long time trying to read one page and most of the time I didn’t understand what was it about. writing one complete sentence was very difficult I had to learn read and write for that reason I feel that I have a lot of similarity with Jimmy Santiago who also had a hard time reading and writing and he had to teach himself how to read and write. I have a lot of similarity with Jimmy Santiago Baca. Jimmy Santiago was born in poor Mexican Family.His dad was addicted to alcohol and his Mom left him when he was a kid because of the financial problem they were facing and married a rich man. Regardless the struggles that Jimmy Santiago Baca faced he was able to cope with them by teaching himself how to write poems. Jimmy found a place for him in the community and he felt that by writing poems he was able to connect with people. He found a place to stand. A place that he was always searching for and he mentioned that in his book,“ A Place to Stand The Making of a poet.” by saying,“I was searching for something to make me feel more a part of the world, I couldn’t share with anyone the pain that still drove my exploration to find a place to stand comfortably in my skin.”, also, he was able to get rid of his anger that he was born with wrong skin color. reading, writing, and becoming a poet helped Jimmy Santiago get

Job owners take advantage not having a voice to denounce any type of problem. For example, a mother can “have a job” and try to work extra hours, but the job owners will make them overwork, and these mothers aren’t aware that this isn’t right,and when they find out,they can’t denounce it because these job owners threaten them,with saying that they will lose their job. Most of these immigrants don’t know how to speak English, and for this reason they can’t defend themselves. The government should consider helping these immigrants, for example, they could help these mothers be able to take classes or go to school to learn English, in which it can improve our economy because of the many jobs that will be created.There’s many groups of people where they support these mothers because the government doesn’t try to make a

Even more frequently, his use of “undocumented” immigrants rather than “illegal” immigrants. Simply by calling himself and others “undocumented,” it provides a positive impression for the reader. This is a stark contrast to news and society, both of which refer to them as “illegal” immigrants. Referring to

Pat Mora is an award-winning writer that bases most her poems on tough cultural challenges and life as a Mexican American. She was born in a Spanish speaking home in El Paso, Texas. Mora is proud to be a Hispanic writer and demonstrates how being culturally different in America is not easy. She explains this through her experiences and the experience other’s. In her poems “Elena”, “Sonrisas”, and “Fences”, Mora gives you a glimpse of what life as a Mexican American is; their hardships, trials, strength that make them who they are.

Some argue that immigrants will take our jobs after the allowance of legalization and attendance of postsecondary education. It is a true fact that those who become legal in the labor market will demand better treatment, respect, increased wages, and employee benefits. Those, who already have a degree, and clean houses for living due to their status, will apply for jobs equal to their education. Although the fact that they will take our job is true to some degree, it is a rhetoric marketed exaggerator, installed to create fear, and lead to an opposition to immigration reform. The legalization will affect most companies that benefit from a mistreatment of undocumented immigrants and will affect businesses that profit from underpaying their hired laborers, documented or undocumented. According to Aviva Chomsky, “Governments have made sure that there are people without rights to fulfill business’s need for cheap workers and high profits” (126). Businesses tend to oppose restriction on immigration today because inequality maintains a population of poor people who lack access to resources, and who may have little alternative but to accept jobs under the worst of conditions (15). “The answer to the low-wage problem is not to restrict the rights of people at the bottom even more (through deportations, criminalization, etc.) but to challenge the accord between business and government that promote the low-wage, high-profit model” (27). Immigrants have always flooded America, to work as a cheap labor, work under strenuous conditions, send remittance to their home countries, and return home. The fact that people believed immigrants come to steal the American wealth is altered by the globalization of the economy, and it hurts to have a vulnerable nation labor force to compete with other countries. According to Chomsky, “As of 2005, Social Security was receiving about $7 billion a year through false social security numbers provided by illegal immigrant workers” (38). This fact is based on a low-income/low immigrant wage. Therefore, allowing immigrants to access higher education and better-paid jobs will result in higher income taxes, higher real estate and consumer’s taxes, community involvement and volunteering. If the

Similarly, the poem by Jose B. Gonzalez, Autobrownography of a New England Latino, illustrates the difficulties that Gonzalez lived due to being a brown Latino. He experiences segregation and racism, but fights to become an educated man despite his color and social class. Gonzalez, like

Poetry is a form of art and literature that allows a reader to feel what the author wants them to. Pat Mora is a Mexican-American woman that wrote the two poems “Sonrisas” and “La Migra”. “Sonrisas” is about the two types women that are seen in two different rooms, while “La Migra” is about a typical exchange between the Border Patrol and a Mexican maid attempting to crossing the border from Mexico into the United States. Both of these poems show the reader what it is like to be Mexican-American and describes the experiences each speaker in the poem is having.

The poem is filled not with resentment but with optimism, the cheerfulness of that “great, silly grin" (21) that he believes will take him to a future where they will be as American as anyone else. But he also understands that people like him, mainly Mexicans who come to the United States to strive for something better in life.

Throughout Jimmy Santiago Baca’s poem, “So Mexicans Are Taking Jobs from Americans”, the speaker addresses controversial issues in our society. Mexicans are made out to be bad guys in our society because they seem to be “stealing” jobs from Americans. Jimmy Santiago Baca’s poem, “So Mexicans Are Taking Jobs from Americans”, seems to be about mexicans stealing jobs away from Americans, but is really a critique of the socioeconomic hierarchy that has been created in our society. The speaker throughout the poem is very critical and harsh towards Americans and the idea they are accusing Mexicans of taking their jobs. Through the title and first few stanzas the speaker creates this idea the poem is about Mexicans taking jobs from Americans, but completely changes focus to the bigger picture. The poem begins by saying, “O Yes? do they come on horses / with rifles, and say, / Ese, gringo, gimmee your job?” (1-3). Through the speakers

Immigrants from Mexico aren’t stealing highly coveted good paying jobs from United States workers. Many are working in the fields or in low skilled jobs that most white America’s don’t work. In Working in The Shadows Thompson goes to work in the lettuce picking fields in Arizona and manages to be one of the few white Americans that continues to pick lettuce for more than a few days. He references how many only have a high school education and can’t get into higher education for one reason or another. These immigrants or descendants of immigrants work hard and long days that can span from 8am to 10pm harvesting. With these long days with little breaks it’s hard to do much especially criminal activity. One worker even told Thompson he moved there to get away from drug

Adding on, the threat has created the feeling that immigrants are taking away jobs available in the country meant for citizens especially, illegal immigrants. The “real” citizens who possess the right to attain jobs first before anyone else, are not getting the opportunity to exercise their rights. According to Green (2009) forty percent of native born African Americans are of the view that immigrants are stealing jobs from them. Even a higher number think that new immigrants are repressing salaries for all American citizen (Community Service Society (2007). The evidence above depicts that the African Americans seem to have a point. In the past, jobs such as butchering and lawn mowing were associated with the black community, but now the non-Americans are known for these. This change can lead to bitterness on the part of the black community as what belongs to them has been taken away. It is worth mentioning that most of these immigrants have genuine reasons for migrating to the United States.

While “I Hear America Singing” champions the work of the people, the words of “I, Too, Sing America” are lined with a deep sense of pride in individual identity. Whitman’s poem includes a number of vocalists with varying professions, such as a carpenter, a hatter, and even a young wife. The words of the piece show that these laborers complete each day’s tasks with pride and singing. Their jubilee is even described as continuing into the night with “strong melodious songs” after the work was done (Whitman 11). They rejoice in their work because their positions represent much more than jobs, but have, in fact, become the people’s resounding contributions to the great machine that is the United States. It is what they are able to offer their country to keep it moving ever forward. Similarly, the narrator in Hughes’s work takes pride in his identity, but in a much different way. It is uncertain whether he is living in a period of widespread slavery or afterwards, but his words clearly convey an environment of inequality. He is, for instance, ordered to “eat in the kitchen” when company comes (Hughes 3). However, the narrator boasts both in what he is and what he will be; he has faith that in the future, he will not be huddled away from the others, but sitting at the table, a citizen. He will be his own man, and the

Did you know what 13 percentages of the immigrants live in the United States? It is approximately 41.3 million immigrants over the total population of 316.1 million, which is a lot (migrationpolicy.org by By Jie Zong and Jeanne Batalova). These are the people who move from different countries to receive a better life. On the other hand, these are the people who struggled the most because they were treated as an outsider. So for this reason Beau Sia complained in the poem, “Conquered, Colonized, Colonialized” “Too late to run now! You gave us visas to do what you thought was beneath you.” The author wants to tell us that the only reason the immigrants got visas to come to this country because they want to make the immigrants their slaves and over rule them. So throughout the poem, “Conquered, Colonized, Colonialized,” Beau Sia is arguing that immigrants are discriminated because they are first generation, but the author believes they will catch-up to the first world and slowly everyone will be equal.