blog # 4

While reading in Kuma’s chapter 5, Cultural Assimilations and its Delusions, on page five it was written that there were restrictions placed on immigrants through the Nationals Origin Act in 1924. This act was supposed to help in “preserving the American character of the United States as a Anglo-Saxon, protestant community”. It’s pretty obvious that in our country today, Anglo-Saxon and protestant does not accurately describe the citizens of this country. Many different races and religions are found here and in certain places in the country, Anglo-Saxon and protestant are not the majority characters found. I do however; think back to when this Act was brought about, during the 20’s. Maybe before the influx of immigrants from 1880-1960, the vast majority of the people living in America as well as the immigrants were more of the Anglo-Saxon and protestant type. This latest wave of immigrants brought over different types of Europeans and many Japanese. I understand that Americans may have felt threatened by the new races and religions arriving and that’s why the National Origins Act was enforced. But, this concept of racism and discrimination in America has really never made sense to me. I mean, I’m sure we all agree that racism doesn’t make any sense and isn’t right, but I think the fact that immigrants to a country feel they have the right to discriminate against other immigrants is something that has always bothered me. On page six, when beginning to discuss the “real” melting pot, the “original Americans” were those who were white, spoke English, and were Anglo-Saxon and protestant. I can’t help but disagree that these people are not “original Americans”. The British may have been the first immigrants to make permanent settlements in America, but the Native Americans were actually the original Americans. They were not white, did not speak English, and were not Anglo-Saxon or protestant. Native Americans lived on this land long before the British decided to come over and claim this land as their own. I find it kind of ironic how settlers in America gained dependence from England during the revolutionary war on land that really wasn’t theirs to claim in the first place. I don’t see how it was appropriate for the National Origins Act to discriminate against those were not like an “original American” when the real Native Americans were nothing like that. Anglo-Saxon’s changed what an original American should look like and what religion they should practice and then discriminated against other immigrants who didn’t share those characteristics. In a country made up of immigrants, I don’t believe that anyone ever has any right to discriminate against other immigrants who are coming to this country for probably the same reasons, hopes and beliefs as the persons who are discriminating against them. What surprises me even more is the fact that these views can still be found today, in some aspects. On page seven, the English-Only movement, which opposes bilingual education, is mentioned. As a bilingual education major I understand the importance of providing this type of education to students who do not speak English as their native language. If people think that this will help assimilate immigrants, by only allowing them to speak English, they are mistaken. By just throwing an immigrant student into a completely mainstream, English speaking classroom, this will allow the student two options: to sink or swim. Many immigrant students that are faced with these prejudices are not given the opportunity to succeed in this country and therefore are viewed negatively from the public. What the public doesn’t realize is that these students are being set up for failure and really are not given a chance when they are thrown into an English-only environment and not offered any bilingual educational help.