Summary Of Mexican New York: Transnational Lives Of New Immigrants

In the descriptive narrative “Se habla Español”, Tanya Barrientos illustrates the difficulties she faces as she struggles to fit in her own culture. Barrientos begins the story by letting the reader know a little more about her background. Barrientos was born in Guatemala, a Spanish speaking country, but her family moved to America when she was three years old. With the use of vivid language, she explains that at the time American people accepted immigrants only if they were willing to forget their culture and embrace American culture. However, times changed and Barrientos had no ties to her culture other than her brown skin and immigrant parents. Throughout the narrative, the author expresses remorse for not appreciating and embracing her

First, one must consider the probing of behaviors such as stereotyping, prejudice, discrimination, and racism as underlying forces of culture contact and the danger it brings (Robbins, Chatterjee, & Canda, 2012). Second, the seriousness of cultural change is to be acknowledge in the lives of Hispanics individuals and families as it affects its function which encompasses beliefs, values, behaviors and more (Archuleta, 2012). Finally, a description of Charo’s culture mirrors a Hispanic heterosexual female, a survivor of domestic violence whose roots stems from Mexico (Plummer, Makris, & Brocksen, 2014). She speaks her native language only, does not have a visa to work,

A newly found myth that has arisen about immigrants are they threaten our culture and movements that have granted minority groups rights they have fought for (pg. 80). In particular the women’s movement, speaking to Mexicans who are known for their strong culture, women commonly defer to men and play the role of the 1960 women in America. This threatens women’s rights that were fought for during the 1960s and 70s, having Mexican women around who are passive to men only hinders their movement in the feminist eyes. However, most Mexican women are very strong and yes, they may defer to the man at times, but within the Mexican community the women are the most respected and actually run the family and the household. Lastly, and probably the most significant which results in a lot of pushback from elites is the myth that immigrants will politically become too involved (pg. 81). Though how is this something we frown down

Lala is able to do this partially due to her state of liminality that pushes her to question her belong-ness between her Mexican and United States position. Recalling Stoller (2009) that argues that those individuals (or ethnographers) in liminal positions have the facility to neutrally critique the binaries that surround them. In Lala’s situation since she does not possess a concrete sense of belonging to either Mexico or the United States can neutrally elaborate a critique of the source of her Mexican family pride. First, her paternal great-grandfather fled Spain to Mexico; next, her grandfather escaped the danger of the Mexican revolution to the U.S.; later, her father ventured to the U.S. where he fought on the war. Lala’s father afraid for punishment due to his poor academic performance immigrated to the U.S., but unlike the predominant migration narrative he was not escaping extreme poverty or violence; hence once in the U.S. encounter various jobs and even the need for him to fight with the U.S. army. In these three generations of migrations various push and pull factors are observed headlining the diversity of the reason of why people migrate. The first migration is of colonization when Spaniards feel the great pull to come to the Americans and appropriate its wealth and prosper. The second wave of migration draws attention to push factors like war that motivate people to leave their home. Alternately, the last

This Alejandro Portes and Rivas are two authors who investigated how young immigrants adapt to a life in the United States. These authors began noting of two distinct migrants: the Asian and the Hispanic. The reason that this article is reliable is both authors are a professor of Sociology at Princeton University with a Ph.D. in Sociology. The article will help me by having authors with a Ph.D. in Sociology describing the life of both Asian and Hispanic adapting the lifestyle in the United

Robert Smith’s Mexican New York explores the transnational nature of Mexican migration through an extended cast study of migrants and their children from Ticuani, in Puebla, Mexico. This book covers the many ways that migration influences social, political, and economic pattern in both New York and Mexico. Smith begins by describing how Ticuani has been transformed by migration, changing the town into a sort of holding place for the very young and the very old. Next, he discusses how Mexican migrants fit into the racial, ethnic, and economic hierarchies in New York. I found the discussion of Mexican/Puerto Rican relationships particularly interesting because I was reminded of the simultaneous distancing, community, and competition evident in

This analysis will focus on femininities and masculinities of gendered ideals and their alternative outcomes of the short story “Woman Hollering Creek” by Sandra Cisneros. In this short story we have the protagonist by the name of Cleófilas whose father has agreed to let Juan Pedro Martínez Sánchez take his daughter for a bride. Cleófilas is a traditional Méxican women and her husband was from “the other side”, Texas. Juan Pedro Martínez Sánchez later becomes her abusive, unfaithful husband. “Woman Hollering Creek” recreates the representation of La Llorona except in this story the mother does not drown her children and she does not cry in search for her dead children. Instead it highlights alternative possibilities for women when she encounters Felice, and Graciela who act as new role models for Cleófilas, and help her escape the hardships of her marriage.

There are many different stories coming from the diversity of immigrants. Mendoza and Shankar states that “We define the new literature of immigration as that literature emerging out of communities formed or re-formed by post-1965 immigrants” (xviii). Editors explain that the new literature of immigration is written by the first generation of immigrants or their children who lives in the communities of immigrants. Within the writings of the new literature of immigration, they explain the issues of identity, cultural, and generational conflicts. Many immigrants experiences the mindset of being an American instead of becoming an American. The new literature is a direct representation of unheard stories from

he City of New York, often called New York City or simply New York, is the most populous city in the United States.[9] Located at the southern tip of the state of New York, the city is the center of the New York metropolitan area, one of the most populous urban agglomerations in the world.[10][11] With a U.S. Census Bureau-estimated 2015 population of 8,550,405[1] distributed over a land area of just 305 square miles (790 km2),[12] New York is also the most densely populated major city in the United States.[13] A global power city,[14] New York City exerts a significant impact upon commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and entertainment, its fast pace[15] defining the term New York minute.[16] Home to the

One of Lynn Stephen’s main argument is to adopt the term transborder to describe transnational migrants. She believes the term more accurately depicts the experiences of, in particular, Oaxacan migrants who have simultaneous ties in different spaces. She explains, “I want to suggest, however, that we have to look beyond the national in order to understand the complete nature of what people are moving or “transing” between” (Stephen, 2007, p. 23). She elaborates that Oaxacan migrants cross ethnic, cultural, colonial, and state borders within Mexico and the U.S. along with the national border. With this definition, when discussing the transnational collective identity, taking into consideration the many borders the Oaxacan migrants cross, there is a visibility of the discrimination and racialization they face within the

The problem of cultural adaptation is extremely complicated. In diverse situations immigrants are forced to question their original belief system due to the pressure of their new environment. Elias Miguel Munoz’s and Omar S. Castaneda’s essays in Muy Macho capture’s two interesting aspects of the internal war happening within the common immigrant. Both essays analyze the effect of the American society on the macho image. However Munoz deals with a second-generation crisis; whereas Castaneda’s essay is interested in the first generation immigrant’s feelings. In other words, while Munoz confronts the macho father, whom he feels disconnected from; Castaneda tackles his own cultural identity. Yet they seem to arrive at different conclusions:

For my research, I propose a literature analysis of feelings of guilt, anxiety and sense of separation from social inclusion and the family of undocumented Mexican women in contemporary period. In my research I plan to address the following questions: What propels guilt, anxiety and sense of separation in undocumented Mexican women, specially undocumented female Mexican students? How does intersectionalities and the Critical Race Theory play a role to address this issues? How does immigration pattern change their experience? What role do intersectionalities play on perpetuating this feelings? And, most importantly how are the feelings of guilt, anxiety and sense of separation address in Reyna Grande’s The Distance Between Us: A Memoir and similar literately works? In this research, I propose to bring conscious of the presence of these feelings and their great impact on a personal, social and academic performance of undocumented Mexican woman.

This book can also be viewed as a migrant novel and by looking through the eyes of a first-generation migrant,

My mother and I are two interdependent organisms; we need each other to survive yet we are completely different in mind and soul. Often times it seems that our polarization is what balances us and keeps our mother-daughter relationship healthy and fun. Regardless of our differences, though, we still share three characteristics that determine how we think, speak, view and act; my mother and I are both immigrants, we are both Mexican and we are both women. In this case study I will attempt to demonstrate how various experiences shared by my mother and I, through theories such as Coordinated Management of Meaning, Genderlect Theory, Face Negotiation Theory, can be perceived either the same or utterly unalike due to our standpoint as immigrant Mexican women.

Transborder communities differentiate from any other because migrants not only cross cultural, colonial, and racial borders; but they also construct a sense of belonging through activities such as organizing groups that share a common knowledge. “Mujeres Luchadoras Progresistas (MLP) formed in the mid-1990s in association with PCUN.” (p.233). This organization started as a project to produce income, but eventually the MLP provided woman with skills like “public speaking leadership, accounting, and public education. (p.233). Majority of the woman being described in this chapter shares one common factor. Their husbands are or were far away in the fields and in danger of deportation. A woman called Antonia said “My husband came here to Oregon in 1985. They always had to hide from the migra as well. They used to hide in the bins where they stored the vegetables in the fields. There were a lot of