Refugee And Immigrant Children Character Analysis

An individual’s fears and need to survive can become a major factor in the buildup of their identities. ‘The Happiest Refugee’ memoir written by Anh Do and the illustrated novel ‘The Boat’ by Nam Le explores how the individual characters’ existence is based upon the strengths and weaknesses that they have acquired from their fears. Do uses the bold ambience Tam Do has to demonstrate how his early life in Vietnam has impacted him in contrast to Lee’s protagonist, Mai who begins to understand how her memories and bonds with her family will helps her endure her journey on the refugee boat.

Throughout the world, there is an estimate of about 65.3 million refugees that have either been forced out of their homes or chose to willingly escape the violence or corruption they faced in their homeland. Of those millions of people, only a small percentage are given the status of refugee as many nations have strict requirements and only allow a specific amount each year. This leads to an increase in the amount of illegal immigration as many are desperate to risk their lives to for a better one then they had back home. Even as refugees are given asylum, many often face difficulties such as discrimination due to the racial stereotypes that exist as a result of negative depictions in the news and media. Although nations have generally become more open to receiving and providing aid for a significant amount of refugees seeking asylum, people’s ideology of race and the misrepresentation of the media towards immigrants prevent an even larger amount of refugees from being accepted into society.

As an Immigrant child, I had a conclusion that all immigrant parents come to America for a better education for their kids. They wanted to give them the opportunity to have a better life that they never had. In American the first thing that I notice was that the airport, weather, and the school are all very different.

‘The Happiest Refugee’ discusses various concepts including the effects of war, the trauma that refugees experience, their desire to contribute to society and our negative attitudes towards them. After the war, South Vietnamese soldiers and their families were captured by the North Vietnamese Communists and held in labour camps. Some of these prisoners were eventually released (after 1976), however, they had no right to education, employment or government supplied food rations. If Ahn had not left this oppressive environment, he would have grown up in extreme poverty and would be a very different person due to the trauma that

“It was the last time I would see them for 14 years.” Uong, who is a Vietnamese refugee, fled his home at the age of 10—being separated from his family for 14 years (Uong). Being a refugee is rough as it requires one to leave his home country and to start a new life in a completely different world. According to Yen Le Espiritu, a "refugee" is described as a person who harbors "a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion" (Espiritu 209). There are many variations of refugee groups as countless minority groups have left their homeland due to reasons such as persecution. Cambodian Refugees and Vietnamese Refugees are both minority groups in the United States today whom have fled their homeland to escape communism and persecution. These groups have suffered many conflicts and overcome many obstacles in order to rid themselves of persecution and in order to gain the freedom that all humans should possess. Although Cambodian Refugees and Vietnamese Refugees are two different groups, they possess both similarities and differences. Cambodian Refugees and Vietnamese Refugees share differences when it pertains to the topic of war, when it pertains to the topic of hardships faced while fleeing one’s homeland and to the topic of adjusting to life in America—while also sharing similarities when it pertains to adjusting to life in America.

My parents both came to this country at a very young age. My father was 16 when he first moved to the U.S. and my mother years later moved when she was 19. I am a child of immigrants and it was hard growing up. I consider myself a Mexican American or Chicana. I grew up in the suburbs of Los Angeles and later moved to Las Vegas. As I asked my father what he had to deal when he first moved he said “people would discriminate me just because I couldn’t speak well English and because of my brown skin”. “I was only 16 and wanted to live the American dream, but it was more like hell in America”. A lot of people are discriminated every day just because they aren’t Caucasian/white Americans, but they’re still American they live here and have a living here.

In both of these articles they talk about refugees. Some families had adjusted a new life after all the bad things that happened to them. When the refugees were being sent away, they felt queasy about where they were going. All the refugees thought they were going to get a document and be U.S. citizens. But they weren't, they were being sent to internment camps. And had to live there.

Children in immigrant families are often considered at increased risk of maltreatment due to the stress and pressure experienced by the family resulting from immigration and acculturation. Within the child welfare system, the number of Latino children has steadily risen over the past several years, with national data indicating that the percentage of Latino children confirmed as victims of maltreatment has risen from 10.0% in 1995 to 14.2% in 2000 to 17.4% in 2005 (Dettlaff et al. 2009). This data represents only one part of the various research studies conducted in order to better understand immigrant families entry and presence in the child welfare system. In Earner’s (2007) research study, a focus group was facilitated with immigrant families who were already part of the child welfare system. From this focus group a few key themes arose, there was a deep concern for the public service workers lack of awareness on issues that immigrant families face and the needs that they encounter (Earner, 2007). There was also concern about the service and referrals they were receiving since many of them were dependent upon eligibility which they did not meet due to their immigration status (Earner, 2007)

Ha and the refugees that are immigrating to the U.S. where they are all hoping to flee from the war back home in Vietnam, the refugees do not know that they will encounter many challenges such as discrimination and bullying along the way to the american dream.Ha is being bullied at school and she claims that, “They pulled my arm hair, they threw rocks at me, they promised to stomp on my chest.”Lai, (151).Furthermore this explains how Ha is being bullied because she is different from the other children in the U.S. the author uses the example that they threw rocks at me to explain what they did to her. Furthermore the pilgrims had to go through a lot, “They had fled to America because of religious persecution in their homeland”Gevert (2). This

Immigrant children did not live an easy life in the nineteenth century. Most children were never educated. Italian children immigrants were rarely put through schooling. However, Eastern European Jewish immigrants looked at public schooling as their best way to help their children enhance their potential in life. Chicago, Detroit, and New York City had large populations of Jewish and Italian immigrants. The conditions of the children in all three cities were similar yet different with cities in which they lived in. Jewish and Italian immigrant children had to overcome many obstacles during their adjustment to American life in the nineteenth century.

For the podcast, I interviewed Lina Abdulnoor, with the intention of exploring the intricacies of refugeehood by analyzing Lina’s refugee experience. Lina lived in Iraq with her family until they began receiving death threats due to their religious beliefs. Convinced that they needed to flee the country to survive, they left Iraq as refugees. After leaving Iraq, they settled in Jordan, where they waited two years until the U.N. to approve their request to move to the U.S. in 2012. Lina and her family initially settled in Virginia, where she experienced culture shock as she adapted to American culture and the English language. However, Lina did not feel accepted in Virginia; her experiences in the state led her to think that Americans treated her according to negative stereotypes of Iraqis. After living in Virginia for several months, Lina and her family chose to resettle in San Diego, California, which harbored a larger Iraqi population than Virginia did. Supported by San Diego’s Iraqi community and various refugee organizations, Lina flourished, and she currently studies at UCSD while holding a stable job.

According to the migrationpolicy.org in 2010 the reports show low-income immigrant children were significantly less likely to make a doctors appointment weather having private or public health care insurance. Of the low-income immigrant children only forty-seven percent, forty-four percent with private coverage and sixty-two percent of public overage over their native-born children that sixty-nine percent, sixty-nine percent with private coverage, and seventy-one and a half percent with public coverage (Ku and Jewers). With the raise in obesity it is very important that they are able to go to the doctors the check their health. Having programs and doctors appointments set up can help them to learn where they need help weather its in their diets or in their exercise. I think having a program at schools can provide a better opportunity for both the children and the parents to have check ups especially when families are raises the rates of obesity.

Before I moved to America I lived in a Thailand refugee camp called Mae La. Growing up in Mae La camp there was not a lot of diversity since most people who live there were Karen people. All my neighbor were Karen, therefore I was not close to people of different background or people with different ethnicity. I could not open up to them easily since I only speak Karen language. I was more comfortable with the Karen people too since I know mostly Karen people and my school was full of Karen kids. I went to a mission school in Mae la and the school in Mae La refugee camp was not well made like the one in US, it was made of bamboo and there was no floor. Mae La also have a poor education system so many Karen student including myself did not get a full advance education like the one in America. Since I was still a kid when I lived in Mae La camp, I did not know about the struggle of living in refugee camp.

As I looked over to snowy meadow I wondered if we would ever convince Strong horn we can't leave this place, as I stood up to walk over to the nearby flowing stream. This was the only body of water our flock had access to, as I watched the crystal clear water flow down the diagonal slope I saw my reflection in this water there I was a young Ram still being a trained killing machine to keep our flock together Bruce Defender of the Strong horn flock I thought to myself. There were also two other flocks the Bighorns and the Broken horns these clans were divided up by our family name.

Children are often caught in the middle when the state decides whether a child’s right to live in an intact family conflicts with its interest in maintaining immigration control. Along with this issue, there is an argument regarding allowing children born in a country to have automatic birthright citizenship, even when their parents may be undocumented.