Unnatural Cause Summary

America has been a melting pot of cultures for many centuries, with the number of immigrants continually rising every year. Most of these immigrants come into the country with nothing at all except for the clothes on their backs and a few English words. But they also bring with them something special – their cultures and traditions from their homeland. In the Immigrant Advantage, readers can see that these specific traditions that they bring with them give them an advantage because they tend to have better mental and physical health than their native born American counterparts (5).

The collection “Coming to America” is comprised of journal entries, biographies, and autobiographies that discuss the social and political transformations that arose from immigration. “Of Plymouth Plantation”, “Balboa”, and “‘Blaxicans’ and Other Reinvented Americans” illustrate how immigrants shape America’s direction. The changes that occurred when settlers migrated seriously impacted the nation they were travelling to. The first of these changes pertains to culture. Immigrants brought their religions and languages to their host country, and that caused a great deal of acculturation, usually to the new religion or language. Government is another principle that was implemented into the “inner workings” of the new country. Lastly, the newcomers

In the movie Unnatural Causes: In Sickness and in Wealth, it compared the lives of four individuals, Taylor, Young, Anderson, and Turner, in different locations, race, and socioeconomic background. The scale of difference between this group of people is that it goes from financially stable and healthy individuals to individuals with lower income and poorer health. This wealth-health gradient reflects that those who have easier access to healthier lifestyles (i.e. running outside without the concern of safety) are more likely to have a higher life expectancy than those who are in living environments that are not as developed and lack healthier options of nutrition. The difference of the average life expectancy scaled down from Jim Taylor whose neighborhood had an average life expectancy of 80 years, Young’s 75.3 years,

First, they must pass a health-screening process beforehand. In Canada, health screening was implemented to ensure that no immigrant becomes a burden on health or social services or “is a danger to public health or safety” (Government of Canada, 2002:np). Canada has no list of diseases that will automatically disqualify would-be immigrants, but infectious conditions such as HIV-AIDS can decrease their chances of acceptance (Zencovich, Kennedy, MacPherson, & Gushulak 2006). Screening does not guarantee that the host country will receive immigrants that are healthier than its own citizens, but it does ensure that people with serious health problems are not allowed to immigrate; consequently, the cohort of immigrants coming to North America tends to be healthy.

As the daughter of an immigrant, I have witnessed the various barriers faced by immigrants, and this experience has motivated me toward my career objective. According to the Pew Research Center Hispanic Trends Project, there were about 11.3 million immigrants living illegally in the United States in 2013 (Passel et al., 2014). These immigrants come from all parts of the world for several different reasons. Whether to provide better resources for their family back home or to live a better life, these immigrants usually work in environments that can be harmful and dangerous to their health.

Christopher Columbus landed on the shores of America back 500 years ago in the year 1492. Were he and his crew the first illegal immigrants in America? The land was occupied by another group of people that didn’t grant these explorers the right to have whatever they please without acquiring some kind of legal status. The topic of legal status might have been irrelevant back in those days but it surely is an issue that is widely talked about in today’s America. The issue of illegal immigrants has been a hot topic especially when it comes to discussing whether these people should be allowed to have health care provided by a government that doesn’t recognize their

Many Mexican Americans have been able to accomplish their own versions of the American dream by attending a 4-year college, owning businesses, and taking on political and public service careers. However, Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants continue to face the hardships that their ancestors went through in the 20th century. The ethnic Mexican experience in the United States has been a difficult one for Mexican immigrants and Mexican Americans of the first generation. Two key factors that continue to shape the lives of Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants are labor laws and the citizenship process. Focusing on the research, statistics, and information provided by Mai Ngai “The Architecture of Race in American Immigration”, Natalia Molina’s, “In a Race All Their Own": The Quest to Make Mexicans Ineligible for U.S. Citizenship”, and George J. Sanchez, “Becoming Mexican American” will provide the cause and effect of labor laws and citizenship laws that made an impact on the lives of Mexicans during the 20th century.

Immigrating to America is a process in which many people all across the world entrust as their one way ticket to a better life. Whether they do so legally or illegally, coming to the United States ensures better opportunities, economically, politically, and so on, to people who would have otherwise been worse off in their countries of origin. Even so, the common understanding of being “better off” can be considered a misconstrued concept when it comes to living in the states. Many families that choose to immigrate to the U.S. fail to realize the cultural hardships that newcomers tend to face once on American soil. Anything from racial discrimination or bias at work, in neighborhoods, at school, etc., can all be challenges that people encounter when making a move to the U.S. Such challenges are described by Richard Rodriquez in his autobiography Hunger of Memory. In this passage, he explains how cultural differences between Mexican and American ways of life have shaped him into the person that he is today. He also chooses to highlights the problems that he faces growing up in a predominately white neighborhood, while attending a predominantly white institution. Much of his writing consists of the cultural differences and pressures he feels to assimilate to Western culture and how this process, in turn, changes him into the person that some may find to be unethical, but nonetheless, someone he is proud of.

Immigration has a great impact on first generation immigrants. Studies show that acculturation and assimilation have wide-ranging effects on the groups involved, but mostly on the immigrants' lives. There are positive and negative attributes. Attributes that are due to the issues associated with integrating cultures, and broadly related to the greater issue of immigration. The issues and discrimination towards first generation immigrants cause them to have limitations throughout their lifetime, in the country that they have moved to. Furthermore, the Hispanic and Latino community have lived through this problem for so long. They are always the group to be affected by it because they lose a sense

The migration of foreigners to the United States has been one of the most powerful forces shaping American history this was especially true between 1860 and 1920. (American A Narrative History, Pg. 827). When immigrants traveled to the new land it was an arduous journey. Arriving in large cities often without their families or understanding the language was difficult.

The article Health Disparity and Structural Violence: How Fear Undermines Health Among Immigrants at Risk for Diabetes was extremely informative. The article identified “three dimensions of fear including (a) Cost; (b) Language,

Contrary to what many people believe, America’s health status is not quite “up-to-par,” to say the least. Over forty-seven million people in the United States lack health insurance; that is more than 15% of our nation’s population! At first this disturbing truth seems impossible to believe, being as America is one of the most technologically advanced and economically developed countries in the world. “We spend trillions of dollars per year on medical care. That’s nearly half of all the health dollars spent in the world. But we’ve seen our statistics. We live shorter, often sicker lives than almost every other industrialized nation. “We rank 30th in [global] life expectancy” (Adelman 2008). Knowing this brings rise to the question: why are

The video Unnatural Causes: In Sickness and in Health highlights the various disparities that impact population health outcomes among different groups. The frequency of violence and crime is one such feature that impacts health. Areas affected with an increased prevalence of violence and crime, will likely have residents that feel unsafe outside their homes. If patrons are not safe in their homes or neighborhoods, they are less likely to active within their community. This particularly affects children. If they are unable to play outside safely, there are more likely to live sedentary lives as they grow into adulthood. This impacts population health because a sedentary lifestyle increases the risk for developing certain cancers and other poor

Seth Holmes contributes greatly to the conversation of American immigration in his ethnography “Fresh Fruit Broken Bodies”. His detailed account of the experiences he had, people he met, and things he observed gives us great insight into the hierarchies in migrant society, the struggles immigrants face in terms of their health and health care, and how these inequalities become naturalized in society. Reading from his ethnography would make a great addition to the Anthropology 104 curriculum because of the various topics talked about and his different methods of research.

Canada has always been recognized as a multicultural country with a diversity of ethnic groups. According to the 2006 census (Statistics Canada, 2006), there was a total of 1,109,980 new immigrants arriving Canada from various countries between 2001 and 2006. The Multiculturalism Act (1988) is adopted to encourage ethnic groups to preserve their own languages and cultural heritages while integrating into the Canadian culture (Minster of Justice, 1984). Despite that, constant barriers remain in immigrants’ experiences of acculturation. Newcomers who failed to acculturate into the host country may experience social exclusion, which could result in a reduction in their health statuses. Although recent immigrants are often healthier than the general Canadian population, their health status tend to converge to the Canadian-born population with increased length of residence; for instance, statistics revealed worsening immigrant health in chronic conditions like diabetes and tuberculosis (Statistics Canada, 2002). This is referred as the “healthy immigrant effect”. Immigrants’ initial healthy status is explained by self-selection reasons, and screenings that are regulated by the Immigration Act (Statistics Canada, 2002). However, it is more crucial to understand the reasons for their deterioration in health over time. In this paper, we will explore a framework that explains the pathway between social exclusion, an important social determinant of health, and the deterioration in the