My Life As An Undocumented Immigrant Summary

Vargas is really good at drawing the audience in with his emotional description, and his story telling ability. He is able to make the reader understand the struggle of being an undocumented immigrant trying to live in the United States and be happy with who he is. The audience is able to understand each decision that he makes in order to try to keep himself out of trouble, but they could always see the constant fear that he could come crashing down at any given moment if he was found out. It is hard to imagine living in that kind of situation, and Vargas portrays his experience extremely

“Outlaw: My Life In America As An Undocumented Immigrant” by Jose Antonio Vargas from the New York Times, is a narrative essay that focuses on telling a story of past events. Vargas proposes that since he grew up in America that this is considered his home. Vargas believed he would be granted citizenship if he worked harder and achieved more. His motivation of sharing his childhood journey would be the relief of him coming forward about his legal status to those who were not aware and to those who he truly cares about but could not risk sharing his story with. Vargas tone and stance attracts people who are or have already been through the same path and for those that come to America to live the “American Dream” like Vargas intended to. Vargas concludes he is trapped in duplicity and being dishonest about his legal status is destroying his character. Even though, Vargas convinces me about his difficult journey as an undocumented immigrant, his belief that coming forward with the truth of his legal status will allow him to regain his values or the trust of those who he has already lied to is unconvincing because after all those years it has become a part of his selfhood.

Jose Vargas tells the story of his life; from coming to America, finding out that he is residing here illegally, learning how to live with that, and finally to sharing with everyone that he is an undocumented immigrant. Jose has a difficult task in front of him, though. He must win his audience over to his side so that he can further his agenda of developing an easier path for undocumented immigrants to receive citizenship. There are many ways he could go about this, trying to skirt the topic of his illegal activities, but Jose is an intelligent man and knows how to influence his audience. He uses the story of his life to connect with others, and in connecting with them wins them over, even if only indeterminably so. In My Life as an

In the article, “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant” by Jose Antonia Vargas, to spark the topic of immigration and undocumented immigrants in the United States. In the article Jose show the choice he made in his life which were good. One of the good choice he made was instead of being one of undocumented who hides and just do labor work, Jose instead graduated from college and became a journalist. He worked as a reporter for The Washington Post, the Philadelphia Daily News, the San Francisco Chronicle, The Atlantic and Rolling Stone. Not once did he give up his dream of becoming a legal resident or on his dream which he did accomplish which was to become a journalist.

Michael Walzer’s essay on “What Does It Mean to Be an American?” raises many points about the American citizen. Specifically, he discusses “American” as an adjective (Walzer). “American” is often associated with American citizens; while this is true, the term can also be applied to Canadians and Mexicans (Walzer). American is such an ambiguous adjective that it is applicable to all countries and individuals that are part of the North American continent. Like Mr. Walzer states, American is not a truly defined term and America is not a country (Walzer). Walzer goes on to introduce a Horace Kallen’s opinion on American’s as anonymous and their “unique” pluralism (Walzer). There are exceptions to all things; the positive to being an American is the fact that Americans can be whatever they choose to be. I feel to be an American one must believe in the American ideals, they must believe in life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. American 's in general may be anonymous, however, upon further reflection they have left the definition of “American” open for each American to define the adjective for themselves.

A life without tribulations is a life that has not yet been lived. It is so often that people are intimidated by the simple thought of change due to the inconveniences that arise. Being stagnant, however, limits your opportunities to prosper and take challenges as an advantage. To do so, one must persevere and leave no stone unturned. The act of perseverance correlates with having hope due to the fact that one must hope that going the distance and pushing through will consequently lead to success. Throughout the selections, “Exile,” written by Julia Vargas, “The Trip,” by Laila Lalami, and “Outlaw: My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant,” written by Jose Antonio Vargas, readers come to know of the challenges that the dynamic characters go

Vargas handled it through journalism. The article “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant” is about Vargas’s life story as an unwanted American. In the article he uses ethos, pathos, and logos to share his story with the readers. He uses data’s, location, names of palaces, and other events that were happening at the time. For example, “Dream Act” and “Obama administration has deported almost 800,000 people in the last two years”, which was before 2011. He published this article with the New York Times in 2011, but it wasn’t the first time Vargas had published something. He tells the readers that he is “paying state and federal taxes” and on “April 2008, [he] was part of…[the] team that won a Pulitzer Prize” to show that he is credible in telling his struggling life story as an undocumented immigrant.

The article “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant” was written by Jose Antonio Vargas. In it, Vargas tells of the time when his mother brought him to the Phillippines’ Ninoy Aquino International Airport when he was twelve. His mother told him that she wanted to give him a better life so he boarded onto a plane with a man he had never met before and was told that he was his uncle. He arrived in Mountain View, California and moved in with his grandparents Lolo and Lola. Vargas says that he grew to love his new home and when he entered sixth grade that’s when he found his passion for language. He tells of his struggle of making a distinction between “formal English and

An American is not just a type of countryman, it’s a state of mind and lifestyle. Maybe an American is just a soldier fighting for freedom? John McCain and the people he was captured with are the perfect examples of what a true Americans are. While captured in Vietnam, his friend, Mike, received a red and white cloth.

What is an American? This question cannot be answered by one word. There are so many different characteristics, qualities, and features that can be used to describe an American. Besides features, someone is only a real American if they take advantage of all of the many privileges that are given to them. Any person that is not grateful for the privileges that are given to them to me are not real Americans but this is only my opinion. Real Americans use their privileges to benefit themselves and everyone around them. In today's society there are certain things that are expected from American citizens, for instance being a responsible citizen.

Whether in the early 1900s or the present day 21st century, immigration to America was all about searching for a better life; looking for the opportunity to be successful. In the short story “How I found America” Anzia is much more oppressed in America; she is discriminated against in her work and her environment. Vargas in “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant” is given more opportunities to better himself. Both of the immigrants have a sense of having to hide themselves in America.

What it means to be American? Everybody you ask this question to will have a completely different response. Some responses might have similarities but none will be exactly the same. In the beginning of the year my response was “To be an American means having a rich history, having opportunities to better ourselves, and having freedoms.” Unfortunately not everyone has had the same opportunities or freedoms. Native Americans, who are indigenous, dealt with having their freedoms taken away, less opportunities even though they had rich history in this land before it was taken away from them. Look at what Zitkala-Sa endured. Not only that, but African Americans have fought long and hard for freedom and equality as well. W.E.B. Du Bois stood for

Since this great country was first established many intuitive minds have tried to answer the question; "What is an American". This country is full of individuals of many backgrounds, and diversities and each person has a different opinion on this question. In my opinion, an American is someone who values freedom and equality and pursues the "American dream." Every American exercises these rights and these are great adjectives to describe our country. Each of the seven readings, and the one image I compiled help mold this broader definition into a more precise description of an American.

Jose Antonio Vargas, a Pulitzer Prize winning author, shares his life-long journey as an undocumented immigrant in his text, “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant.” As the title suggests, Vargas attempts to convey to his audience, who likely never has and never will experience anything similar to what he has, what it is like to live as an immigrant in the United States of America. Skillfully, Vargas details the perfect number of personal stories to reach the emotional side of his audience, which is anyone who is not an immigrant. Through the use of his personal accounts Vargas is able to effectively communicate that immigrants are humans too while simultaneously proving his credibility, as he has experience and a vast amount of knowledge

American citizens define American as a mix of different culture, but in many cases it’s not the literal definition of American. The American definition is relating to or a different characteristic of the United States or it’s inhabitants. We as American can not be wrong with the explaining our meaning of American.