Chapter 9

Chinese

Chapter 9 reminded me a lot of an ethic studies class I took in fall 2010. We talked about Asian American immigrants and their push pull factors. Chapter 9 talks about Chinese Exclusion Act of suspended Chinese immigrants from coming into the U.S.  Before the exclusion act about 300,000 Chinese immigrants entered the U.S.  Just to come over here, Chinese immigrants who didn’t have enough money would borrow money and then have to pay 2x more repayment then the original payment. “Chinese were borrowing seventy dollars and obligating themselves to pay back two hundred dollars.” (241) According to the book their ticket was $50 and $20 for their expenses.  San Francisco was the “port” of entry for them.  Parts of San Francisco became Chinatowns.  The Chinatowns are where most of the immigrants lived, worked and socialized. Chinese immigrants born in U.S. were automatically a citizen.

Japanese

-Early years of Japanese Immigrants were mainly men

-worked as agricultural laborers

-Gentleman’s Agreement: according to wikipedia.org "an informal agreement between two or more parties. The essence of a gentlemen's agreement is that it relies upon the honor of the parties for its fulfillment, rather than being in any way enforceable. It is, therefore, distinct from a legal agreement or contract, which can be enforced if necessary."

·         Provided family unification, passports were only issued to people who has already been to America and to “parents, wives, and children of laborers resident there.” (255)

- After Gentleman’s agreement, about 20,000 adult Japanese women. Some were married, but other’s came as picture brides. This reminded me of the movie we saw called “Picture Bride” In that movie, the girl comes over as a bride as well. The only thing she has a picture of her husband.  She migrates over and her husband is a 40 yr old man. She gets mad, because she is a girl who’s probably no more than 16 thinking that the husband would be young too. This was what was happening. The men migrated first and were lonely so they would pay for a picture bride to come over. It’s a great movie that points out what it would like for lives of immigrants who worked in the fields. They worked pretty much all day and lived in tiny shacks and they had terrible wages in my opinion. I’m not sure in the movie if she migrated to Hawaii but it was definitely a similar situation.

-Other Japanese American were in wholesale, retail trade or personal services.

French Canadians

-“only ethnic group whose migration was chiefly accomplished by rail.”(258)

-French speaking population was in Quebec

- From what I understand mostly mill workers

            After doing the readings for each chapter, I keep seeing one thing they all have in common. I think I’ve mentioned this before too. Every ethnic group has suffered. But I think no matter what there will always be suffering.

Chapter 8

Basics of Chapter 8

Around 26 European ethnic groups emigrated to the U.S. from the area north of Greece and east of Germany. 
žBetween 1812-1924, more than 3 million immigrants arrived. Most members of these groups arrived in the last of the 19th century. 

ž“They settled predominantly in the cities of the north-eastern & north-central states, cities known today as the “rust belt” for the demolished or obsolete and rusting factories that once made the region the greatest manufacturing center in the world.” (pg.213) 

Poles

“The creation of a new Poland by the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, no Polish state existed. Interwar Poland lasted just twenty yrs. A new one was created by the victorious allies after WW2.” (pg. 215)

-Poles who came to America lived in one of 3 main European empires- German, the Austro-Hungarian, & the Russian. Other Poles came from France.

-Ethnic Poles who came to America shared 2 characteristics: spoke Polish as mother tongue, they were roman Catholics.

-Poles followed their clergy.

-Poles that settled in American cities were driven by economic motives.

-Poles were influenced to come to America by other Poles such as Priests, relatives & friends.

  Eastern European Jews 
-250,ooo Jews in U.S. in 1880.   
-Migrated b/c they wanted to improve their standard living. 
-Migration was difficult for Eastern European Jews; they came from poor backgrounds.
-Had Religion & determination to stay in U.S.
-“The generation of eastern Europe Jews lived in a Jewish world in which Yiddish was the medium of communication….” (pg. 227)
-Biggest tragedy- Triangle Shirt Waist Fire of 1911. Other types of work was with retail trade. 

 Hungarians
 ž-Most representative of emigration from the other groups. 
ž-Magyar migration was short.
ž-Over 450,000 Hungarians came. 
ž-Most were under the age 30, 88% were literate
-Worked dangerous jobs with long hrs. at low wages.

Questions for exam

1. What were 1 of the characteristics that Poles shared?

spoke Polish as mother tongue, they were roman Catholics.

2.What was the main reason for Eastern European Jews migrating?

 they wanted to improved their living conditions.   

3. What were the primary language that the Eastern European Jews spoke?

Yiddish