Transcript CHAPTER 5

Hispanic Americans:
Colonization, Immigration, and
Ethnic Enclaves
Chapter Seven
Lesson 11
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Introduction
•
Before Jamestown was founded, the ancestors of some Hispanic groups were
already in North America.
•
Hispanic Americans are more than 16% of the total population.
•
Estimates are that by 2050, nearly 1 out of every 3 Americans will be Hispanic.
•
Hispanics are partly an ethnic group and partly a racial group.
•
As is the case with all American minority groups, labels and group names are
important. A recent survey shows that only about 25% of Hispanic Americans
use “Hispanic” or “Latino” to describe themselves. Most (51%) identify
themselves by their family’s country of origin and 21% think of themselves as
“American.”
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Foreign-Born by Country of Origin
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Mexican Americans
•
•
•
Mexicans were conquered and colonized in the 19th century and
used as a cheap labor in many areas of the dominant group
economy in the Southwest.
By the dawn of the 20th century, Mexican Americans resembled
Native Americans in some ways, southern African Americans in
other ways.
The most crucial difference was the proximity of the sovereign
nation of Mexico, which facilitated constant population movement
across the border continually rejuvenating Mexican culture and the
Spanish language even as they were attacked and disparaged by
Anglo-American society.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Mexican Americans
•
•
•
The overwhelming majority of Mexican Americans are Catholic.
Mexican Americans place more value on family relations and
obligations.
These cultural differences have served as the basis for excluding
Mexican Americans from the larger society, however, they also have
provided a basis for group cohesion and unity that has sustained
common action and protest activity.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Mexican Americans
•
Since the early 1900s (and especially since the 1960s) the Mexican
American experience has been largely shaped by fluctuating
immigration that can be explained by conditions in Mexico, the
varying demand for labor in the low-paying, unskilled sector of the
U.S. economy, and by changing federal immigration policy.
 Uneven foreign economic development and the 1910 Mexican





Revolution
WWI and European and Asian immigration restrictions
Depression and repatriation
WWII, the Bracero Program, and “Operation Wetback”
1965 Immigration Act and family preferences
Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1984
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Legal Immigration from Mexico
1905-2011
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Mexican Americans
•
•
•
•
Throughout much of the 20th century, Mexican Americans have been limited
to the less desirable, low-wage jobs, and split labor markets have been
common.
The workforce has often been further split by gender, with Mexican
American women assigned to the worst jobs and receiving the lowest
wages in both urban and rural areas.
Mexican Americans were excluded from political, educational, and legal
institutions of the larger society by law and by custom.
Discrimination in the criminal justice system and civil rights violations have
been continual grievances of Mexican Americans throughout the century.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Mexican Americans
•
•
•
Organized local resistance and protest stretch back to the original
contact period in the 19th century.
Regional and national organizations made their appearance early in
the 20th century and were integrationist and assimilationist in
nature—LULAC.
Mid-20th century labor organizing and WWII brought about new
organizations that changed the focus from assimilation per se, and
worked to address a broad array of community problems and to
increase political power—Community Service Organization and the
American GI Forum.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Mexican Americans
•
•
•
The 1960s Chicano movement was guided by Chicanismo.
The movement questioned the value of assimilation and increased
awareness of the continuing exploitation of Mexican Americans,
illustrated through adoption of Chicano as the group name.
The movement produced important organizations and leaders:




Reies Lopez Tijerina and Alianza de Mercedes (1963)
Rodolfo Gonzalez and Crusade for Justice (1965)
Jose Angel Gutierrez and La Raza Unida (1973)
Cesar Chavez and United Farm Workers
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Mexican Americans
•
•
•
•
Jessie Lopez and Dolores Huerta were central figures in the movement to
organize farm workers and worked closely with Cesar Chávez.
However, Chicanas encountered sexism and gender discrimination within
the movement.
Chicanas helped to organize poor communities and worked for welfare
reform.
Continuing issues include domestic violence, child care, the criminal
victimization of women, and the racial and gender oppression that limits
women of all minority groups (Amott & Matthaei, 1991, pp. 82–86; see also
Mirandé & Enriquez, 1979, pp. 202–243).
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Mexican Americans
•
•
•
•
Unlike immigrants from Europe, Mexican Americans tended to work and live
in rural areas distant from and marginal to the urban centers of
industrialization and opportunities for education, skill development, and
upward mobility.
As Chicanos urbanized, they continued to serve as a colonized, exploited
labor force concentrated at the lower end of the stratification system.
The flow of immigration kept Mexican culture and the Spanish language
alive.
Although some Mexican Americans have acculturated and integrated, a
large segment of the group continues to fill the same economic role as their
ancestors.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Puerto Ricans
•
•
•
Puerto Rico became a territory of the United States after the defeat
of Spain in the Spanish-American War of 1898.
As the century wore on, U.S. firms began to invest in and develop
the sugarcane industry that decreased opportunities for economic
survival in the rural areas and forcing many peasants to move into
the cities (Portes, 1990, p. 163).
Movement to the mainland began gradually and increased slowly
until the 1940s, when the number of Puerto Ricans on the mainland
increased more than fourfold, to 300,000, and during the 1950s, it
nearly tripled, to 887,000 (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, 1976, p.
19).
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Puerto Ricans
•
•
•
Puerto Ricans became citizens of the United States in 1917, which
facilitated their movement.
Unemployment was a major problem on the island.
Puerto Ricans were “pulled” to the mainland by the same labor
shortages that attracted Mexican immigrants during and after World
War II.
 Puerto Ricans moved to the Northeast
 Took jobs in the low-wage, unskilled sector of the job market
 Concentrated in urban labor markets (Portes, 1990, p. 164)
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Puerto Ricans
•
•
•
Puerto Ricans are overwhelmingly Catholic, but the
religious practices and rituals on the mainland are quite
different from those on the island.
Even though skin color prejudice still exists in Puerto
Rico, it was never as categorical as on the mainland.
In the racially dichotomized U.S. culture, many Puerto
Ricans feel they have no clear place.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Cuban Americans
•
•
•
•
The conditions for a mass immigration were created in the late 1950s when
a Marxist revolution brought Fidel Castro to power in Cuba.
The first Cuban immigrants to the United States tended to come from the
more elite classes and included affluent and powerful people.
The U.S. government welcomed the new arrivals as political refugees
fleeing from communist tyranny.
Many profoundly Americanized Cuban exiles viewed southern Florida as an
ideal spot from which to launch a counterrevolution to oust Castro. (Portes,
1990, p. 165).
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Cuban Americans
•
•
•
Today, Cuban Americans remain one of the most spatially concentrated
minority groups in the United States (67% in Florida; 52% in Miami; U.S.
Bureau of the Census, 2000s), which has created a great deal of civil
disorder over the years.
Cuban Americans rank higher than other Latino groups on a number of
dimensions, a reflection of the educational and economic resources they
brought with them from Cuba and the favorable reception they enjoyed from
the United States (Portes, 1990, p. 169).
The differences run deeper and are more complex than a simple accounting
of initial resources would suggest as Cubans adapted to U.S. society in a
fundamentally different way than the other two Latino groups.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Cuban Americans
•
•
•
Cuban Americans are an enclave minority.
An ethnic enclave is a social, economic, and cultural
subsociety controlled by the group itself, located in a specific
geographical area or neighborhood inhabited solely or largely
by members of the group.
The enclave encompasses sufficient economic enterprises
and social institutions to permit the group to function as a selfcontained entity, largely independent of the surrounding
community.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Cuban Americans
•
•
•
•
The fact that the enclave economy is controlled by the group itself is
crucial.
The ethnic enclave provides a platform from which Cuban
Americans can pursue economic success independent of their
degree of acculturation or English language ability.
The fact that success came faster to Cubans that were less
acculturated reverses the prediction of many theories of
assimilation.
A final qualification, success has been selective and inequality
continues to be a problem for Cuban Americans.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Cuban Americans
•
•
•
Cuban Americans are neither the first nor the only group to
develop an ethnic enclave, and their success has generated
prejudice and resentment from the dominant group and from
other minority groups.
Higher-status Cuban Americans have been stereotyped as
“too successful,” “too clannish,” and “too ambitious.”
This stereotype of Cubans is an exaggeration and a
misperception that obscures the fact that poverty and
unemployment are major problems for many members of this
group.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Contemporary Hispanic-White
Relations
•
•
•
•
•
The American tradition of prejudice against Latinos was born in the 19th century
conflicts that created minority group status for Mexican Americans.
The level of Latino prejudice has declined, but prejudice and racism against
Latinos tend to increase during times of high immigration and competition for
jobs and other resources.
Research shows that Hispanic groups’ rates of acculturation increase with
length of residence and are higher for the native born (Espinosa & Massey,
1997; Godstein & Suro, 2000; Valentine & Mosley, 2000).
Racial factors have complicated and slowed the process of assimilation for
many Latinos.
Cultural differences reflect recent immigration.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Contemporary Hispanic-White
Relations
•
•
•
Regional concentrations of Latinos in 2000 reflect the
legacies of their varied patterns of entry and settlement.
Within each of these regions, Latino groups are highly
urbanized.
Hispanics are generally less residentially segregated
than African Americans, still their level of segregation
actually increased between 1980 and 2000.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Contemporary Hispanic-White
Relations
•
•
•
Levels of education for Hispanic Americans have risen in recent
years but still lag behind national standards.
Lower levels of education are the cumulative results of decades of
systematic discrimination and exclusion further reduced, in the case
of Mexican Americans, by the high percentage of recent immigrants
who bring very modest educational backgrounds.
Given the role that educational credentials have come to play in the
job market, these figures support the idea that assimilation will be
segmented and suggest that opportunities for upward mobility will
continue to be limited.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Educational Attainment 2010
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Contemporary Hispanic-White
Relations
•
•
•
The political resources available to Hispanic Americans have
increased over the years, but the group is still proportionally
underrepresented.
The number of Hispanics of voting age has more than doubled in
recent decades, yet the Hispanic community has not had an impact
on the political structure proportionate to its size.
With their rapid growth rate, it is clear that the Hispanic voters will
have a much greater impact on politics in the future, especially as
second- and third-generation children reach voting age (Del Pinal &
Singer, 1997, p. 42).
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Contemporary Hispanic-White
Relations
•
•
•
•
•
The economic situation of Hispanic Americans is mixed.
The unemployment rates for Hispanic Americans run about twice the rate for nonHispanic whites, and the poverty rates for the group as a whole are comparable to
those of African Americans (Camarillo & Bonilla, 2001, pp. 110-111).
As was the case with African Americans and Native Americans, Latinos are
overrepresented in the lowest income categories.
Cuban Americans have the lowest poverty rates and are comparable to national
norms.
Mexican American and Puerto Rican families have the higher rates of poverty,
especially for female-headed households, and these rates are comparable to the
figures for African Americans and American Indians.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Contemporary Hispanic-White
Relations
•
•
•
•
The socioeconomic profiles of Mexican Americans and Puerto Ricans reflect
their concentration in the low-wage sector of the economy, the long tradition of
discrimination and exclusion, and the lower amounts of human capital
(education, job training) controlled by these groups.
Cuban Americans, buoyed by a more privileged social class background and
their enclave economy, rank higher on virtually all measures of wealth and
prosperity.
These figures point to a split labor market differentiated by gender, within the
dual market differentiated by race and ethnicity.
Female-headed Latino families are affected by a triple economic handicap: They
have only one wage earner, whose potential income is limited by discrimination
against both women and Latinos.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Contemporary Hispanic-White
Relations
•
•
•
As was the case with African Americans and Native Americans,
these economic differences are even wider when we consider
wealth (savings, property, stocks and bonds, etc.) as opposed to
income.
The majority of Hispanic households (57%) are in the “low wealth”
category and only about 26% are in “upper-middle” and “high”
wealth categories.
While some immigrant groups arrive with abundant resources and
high levels of human and financial capital, Hispanic immigrants
typically arrive with little education, few skills, and, often, no more
wealth than the clothes they wear.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Assimilation and Hispanic Americans
•
•
As test cases for what we have called the traditional view of
American assimilation, Latinos fare poorly as there is no single
experience or pattern of adjustment to the larger society.
Their experiences also illustrate some of the fundamental forces that
shape the experiences of minority groups: the split labor market and
the U.S. appetite for cheap labor, the impact of industrialization, the
dangers of a permanent urban underclass, the relationships
between competition and levels of prejudice and rejection, and the
persistence of race as a primary dividing line between people and
groups.
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.
Latinos are Coming!
Healey. Diversity and Society: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender 4e
© 2014 SAGE Publications, Inc.