Since the beginning of the century, immigration has become a very sensitive topic to American society. While Americans of European descent are concerned with the risk of terroristic attack and the threat to their culture and employment, other people who reside in the country struggle with xenophobia and uncertainty. Perhaps, if more Americans knew about the history of immigration to this country and the related social changes, they would change their approach to this topic. In America, the phenomenon of immigration has always been strongly affected by socially constructed concepts of race and ethnicity that are mere logical fallacies.
Ironically, this country has not always been seen as the land of oppression and xenophobia. On the contrary, people of the Old World believed that this would be the place of real equality and liberty. Hector St. John de Crèvecœur was a French immigrant who was excited about living in America. In his Letters from an American Farmer, he stated this land was a shelter for all Europeans who suffered from poverty and oppression (Crèvecœur 2).
Use your promo and get a custom paper on
"What We Should Not Forget about Immigration".
Nevertheless, as centuries were passing by, the situation changed. Descendants of impoverished Europeans and members of oppressed religious minorities settled down. In America, they became the dominant majority, and their culture and customs became considered as the only acceptable norm. Since then, they looked down upon newcomers and perceived them as the threat to their lifestyle. Interestingly, this process continues even now. Americans whose immigrant grandparents were severely oppressed now often criticize immigrants who come to the U.S. today. Without a doubt, this pattern will recreate itself in future, and descendants of people who are coming to America now are likely to look down upon immigrants who will come to the country during the following decades.
Europeans were coming to America willingly because they expected to find a better life. However, a major group was brought to the country against its will. Thousands of Africans were kidnapped or sold into slavery and transported to the New World. As slaves, they entirely depended on their masters’ will, and the government granted them no civil rights. It was believed that they were inferior to Europeans because of their dark skin, and their distinct appearance encouraged whites to think that they were different in other aspects as well. This led to the creation of the concept of race, which served as an explanation of whites’ dominance over people of non-European descent.
To add more weight to this concept, the field of scientific racism emerged. Some individuals tried to come up with scientific evidence of the biological difference between races. One of the most well-known works on scientific racism was The Passing of the Great Race by Madison Grant who claimed that the Nordic race was superior to all other races. Although nobody takes scientific racism seriously nowadays, it has contributed to racism in America. As a result, whites are prejudiced against immigrants who do not look European.
Apart from skin color, Americans have always been concerned with the issue of ethnicity. Since the first immigrants were of Anglo-Saxon descent, their cultural norms and religion became the standard. Naturally, newcomers from other cultural backgrounds were perceived as inferior by the Anglo-Saxon majority. To reflect this xenophobic sentiment, the vague concept of ethnicity was introduced.
Often, race and ethnicity got intervened, For example, people of Italian, Irish, and Polish nationalities once were considered non-White (Wilson 26). However, their Americanized children and grandchildren now are seen as perfectly white. In 1921, the Emergency Quota Act was passed. It introduced the system of quotas for immigrants based on the number of American residents originated from the same country. Since Anglo-Saxons and Scandinavians were the majority, more people from Britain, Germany, and Scandinavian countries could come to the U.S., and the rest had fewer chances to be admitted.
The situation changed when the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 was signed into law. It altered the system of admitting immigrants and put more emphasis on their professional skills and family relations with American residents. Nevertheless, it did not put all debates on immigration to an end. During the economic recession in the 1980s, politicians decided to blame illegal immigrants for that. As a result, the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 criminalized hiring immigrants without checking their legal status. Unsurprisingly, it did not make any good and resulted in unexpected negative social, economic, and law enforcement outcomes. It is clear that the U.S. needs new immigration reform, although it is unclear whether it will be pro- or anti-immigrant due to the severe political polarization.
Overall, immigration has always been very important to America. Although once it was seen as free from prejudice and bias, each generation of newcomers has been oppressed by the dominant social group. To justify this prejudice, it was claimed that people of races other than white or not from Western Europe were inferior to the Anglo-Saxon majority. Although the discipline of scientific racism is dead today, it has contributed to the racist approach to immigrants. Since the concepts of race and ethnicity are merely social constructs, they were altered and even merged to reflect xenophobia of American society. Although the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 made the system of quotas for immigrants somewhat more just, the Act of 1986 has proven to be harmful to the U.S. Hopefully, new immigration reform would resolve the issue and prove that the American Dream is not dead yet.
- Crèvecœur, Hector St. John. Letters from an American Farmer. The University of Tennessee,
- Wilson, Jennifer. Nationalists Take on the Shifting Grounds of Polish Racial Identity. World Policy Journal, vol. 35, no. 1, 2018, pp. 26-29. Duke University Press
