After watching the films, I noticed a few similarities between the films. One example from the films is between “el Norte” and “Under the same moon”, both films show the struggle of immigrants go through when wanting a better life for themselves or their families. During the Norte film, the producers explained how an immigrant tries to cross the borders themselves, yet once they fail, they are left with the options of hiring a coyote to help them get across. I also saw that connections in the film “Under the same Moon”. In that film, the producers wanted to show their viewers that any age group would have the difficulty of going across the border. It also shows how children are much easier to be crossed , since they are much smaller , but also
Ruth Gomberg-Muñoz’s, Labor and Legality is a book written on the Mexican immigrant network in the U.S. She centers it on the Lions, a group of Mexican men from Leon, Mexico that all share their lives and help explain the many networks and strategies that are used in order to excel and gain happiness. There have been many different sorts of misconceptions about immigrants, and in recent years about undocumented immigrants from Mexico. The U.S. has made a sort of war on illegal immigrants and has made it a seemingly high priority in the media and in politics. Therefore, many Americans have been mislead and ill-informed about the history of immigrants/undocumented immigrants. Gomberg-Muñoz’s Labor and Legality helps set us straight. She unveils undocumented immigrants for the people that they are instead of the criminals that the media leads many to believe. Although she doesn’t have a wide range of participants for her study, I believe that she addresses many of the misconceptions and just plain ignorance that American people have of people that are undocumented; why stereotypes are supported by the people themselves, why politicians include stronger illegal immigration laws, and everything in between. Many of her topics reveal a sort of colonialism that the U.S. practices on Mexico; the exploitation of undocumented peoples to the benefit of the U.S. through economics, hypocritical laws and campaigns, and the racist and prejudice consequences.
El Norte is a film focuses on a brother and sister that are basically forced to migrate to the United States because their village was being destroyed by the Guatemalan army. The film shows all the hardships that Rosa and Enrique had to surpass in order to get to Los Angeles were they still remained to struggle. Since the film shows the two’s individual stories, the audience becomes attached to these two characters which promotes emotions. The film is meant to bring the audience to the realization that immigrants are suffering, it make them connect to the story personally. A lot of the moments within the film are depressing,
The second documentary was called “Wetback”. It was about the Latin or South Americans and the difficult journey to sneak into America. This documentary was also tied in with symbolic interactionist perspective. The first term that refers to the documentary “Wetback” is stereotype. This is basically when someone assumes you are like others of the same race, gender, age and other descriptive labels others can give you. In this film, the two main characters where Nayo and Milton. They are two men from Nicaragua that had decided to take the dangerous journey to the United States. They were making this trip to try and find a better life for themselves and their families. They were stereotyped during the journey when they were caught by some Mexican police members that ended up taking all their money and sending them on their way back home. They were two easy targets because they were traveling on a bus with other people attempting to migrate into the United States illegally. Further along in the film, there were other times where many immigrants from South America were labelled as criminals. This is because many people in border areas or towns believe that they are only coming here to steal our jobs and overrun America. For example, in Arizona there is a group of men called the Civil Homeland Defense. These are citizens that take time out of their days to patrol areas around the border to try and stop as many “Mexicans” from coming into America. The sheriff in this town thank
During the Mexican-American War the border moved, but the people didn’t. History has shown us that no matter how thick the border might be Latino Americans have a strong connection to their culture and roots; instead of assimilating, Mexicans live between two worlds. The film, Ballad of Gregorio Cortez gave us a perspective of two cultures; “Two cultures- the Anglo and the Mexican- lived side by side in state of tension and fear” . Cortez is running for his life as he heads north, while the Anglo believe that because of his Mexican ethnicity, he would travel south to Mexico. Throughout the film there were cultural tensions and misunderstandings; language plays an important part of someone’s identity, and for many Latino Americans Spanish is their first language. The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez also shows us that language plays an important role, and can cause confusion between two different groups. For example, Anglos refer to a male
The movie “El Norte “is the one of the most successful and influential movies to represent the immigrants state. Director Gregory Nava’s gives the story of Guatemalan siblings Rosa and Enrique’s journey in a melodramatic way. The movie is divided to three main parts, Guatemala, Mexico and United States. The story of Rosa and Enrique’s shows us community, the power of language and culture in different countries.
David G Gutiérrez’s Walls and Mirrors: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the Politics of Ethnicity discuss the deep and complex understudied relationship between Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants. This relationship was a natural consequence of the mass illegal immigration from Mexico to the United States that had constantly been increasing the population of “ethnic Mexicans” and along with it brought tensions between those who were Americans of Mexican descent and had been living here for generations and those who had freshly arrived to the United States and as such did whatever they had to do to make a living.
According to talkproverty.org 21.4% of Hispanics in America are living in poverty. A book call The House on Mango Street and a movie call “Stand and Deliver,” represent the struggle of being a Hispanic in America. The House on Mango Street is similar to the movie, Stand and Deliver because the characters were judged based on where they lives, the characters have low self esteem, and the females were expected to take care of family. The House on Mango Street is also different from the movie, “Stand and Deliver,” because of the encouragement the characters received by adults, the relationships the characters build, and the different viewpoint the characters have on where they will be in the future. In my opinion, The House on Mango Street interests me more than “Stand and Deliver,” because the book leaves you wondering what is going to happen next, allows you to imagine the characters, and it has different storylines.
“The House on Mango Street” and “Bless Me,Ultima” are similar, but they have their differences. Whereas, “Bless Me, Ultima” is about a young boy growing up with his future chosen for him by his parents and him dealing with religion, “The House on Mango Street” is about a young girl growing up in an environment that she is not proud of, by any means. As the two main characters grow up, they find that their perspectives in life vary along the way. I find that Antonio Marez from “Bless Me, Ultima” and Esperanza Cordero, from “The House on Mango Street,” can relate to many aspects of my life.
The film expresses the loss of social relations and traditions of Enrique and Rosa’s Indian culture in Los Angeles. The movie portrays Enrique and Rosa as good and the Mexicans or Chicanos as evil. Is this good versus evil portal accurate? The Coyotes, the Chicanos, and Enrique and Rosa are all making decisions due to economic factors and their social status. Yes, Enrique and Rosa come from a strong Indian culture but they are breaking the law by illegally coming to America. The Coyotes seem to have no loyalty but they have limited options to make money and have no understanding of the importance of family and community. The director, Nava, introduces each episode in short segments that may limit the viewer’s opportunity to reflect upon the social reality of Guatemala, Tijuana, and the economic opportunity of an illegal immigrant in the United States. Can Enrique and Rosa obtain the same economic freedom as American citizens? Throughout the film there is an idea of the North as being the promise land. In the first and second episode of the film the north seems of nothing but happiness. In
I find it interesting that while Rodriguez and Anzaldua came from comparable backgrounds they feel very differently about similar issues. Rodriguez believes that education should not be bilingual for children who come from Spanish speaking homes. Anzaldua on the other hand thinks that people should not be squashing the culture of these people, and should do what they can to help them preserve it. I think that in that sense one could compare Anzaldua and Rodriguez to the idea of American culture, as each are one extreme of how we view it. On the one hand we have Anzaldua, the idea that America is a melting pot, combining all of the different cultures of the different people living here to come up
El Norte was released in 1983 and set in the middle of Guatemalan civil war. It was directed by Gregory Nava and produced by Anna Thomas. The major theme of this movie is the struggle of young siblings to find a better life in another country as immigrants. The movie is divided into three parts: when the two siblings, Enrique and Rosa flee from their homeland because of a raged war, their attempts to cross Mexico illegally, and arrived in the United States of America, where most people think it’s a “promised land”. The main point of this movie is not the end, but the journey itself. Immigration is one of the most heated and controversial issues until now. By watching this movie, we can see the different perspective from the immigrants.
Immigration has been a problem since 1880, and it is still a big conflict for the world right now. Immigration can be thought of in two different ways, a positive way and a negative way. I am comparing The Red Umbrella and “Band-Aid for 800 Children” they both have a subject on immigration. These two texts are very similar and different at the same time because one of them is a story and the other is from a article. There are multiple ways the articles are similar, one might be fiction and the other non-fiction
Dinaw Mengestu, Richard Rodriguez and Manuel Munoz are three authors that have been through and gone through a lot of pain to finaly get accepted in their societies. They are all either immigrants or children of immigrants that had trouble fitting in America’s society at the time. They struggled with language and their identities, beucase they were not original from the states and it was difficult for others to accept them for who they are. They all treated their problems differently an some tried to forget their old identeties and live as regulalr Americans others accepted themselves for being who they are, but they all found a way to deal with their issues.
La Linea is a novel about crossing borders. The protagonists literally cross the borders of Guatemala and the US. Crossing the Guatemalan border has no importance, because this border does not carry meaning for them. Only the American border is a symbol of hope, a better future, and reunion with their parents. However, during their strenuous trip through the desert, they do not even notice when they cross the border. “I always thought I’d know exactly the moment I crossed the border. [...] How could I not have felt something?” (96) Miguel is shocked because he confused the physical border with the symbolic border. The novel ends before the reader could see how Miguel and Elena deal with the cultural border they crossed. We only know that they came to the US without knowing anything about the culture. Elena returns to Mexico, probably because she was not happy in her new environment. The siblings also
From watching Sin Nombre I have learned that not everybody makes it in the United States. I learned what families had to do to enter, and some families did not make it over. How hard it is for people to immigrate. To immigrate it comes with a sacrifice and that sacrifice could be leaving behind someone you really care about. The movie Sin Nombre made me feel empty inside, like a boy without air. For every event that happen, I had ten times the hearts in my body after the movie. During the movie my expressing/feelings were “I wanted to give a piece of my heart to each character.