2.6 Race and Immigration

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Del curso dictado por University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Race and Cultural Diversity in American Life and History

14 calificaciones

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Race and Cultural Diversity in American Life and History

14 calificaciones

Learners will deepen their understanding and appreciation of ways in which race, ethnicity and cultural diversity have shaped American institutions, ideology, law, and social relationships from the colonial era to the present. Race and ethnicity are ideological and cultural categories that include all groups and individuals. Hence, this course is designed in significant part to take a broad look at the ideology of race and cultural diversity in America’s past and present. The primary focus is on the historical and social relationships among European Americans, Native Americans, African Americans, Latino/as, and Asian/Pacific Americans. Issues of race and ethnicity are examined across different ethno-cultural traditions in order to interweave diverse experiences into a larger synthesis of the meaning of race and ethnicity in American life. In this course, we conceive of “race” and “diversity” as references to the entire American population, even as we recognize that different groups have unique historical experiences resulting in distinctive and even fundamental cultural differences. We treat race and ethnicity as dynamic, complex ideological and cultural processes that shape all social institutions, belief systems, inter-group relationships, and individual experiences.

De la lección

Historical Legacies of Race in the United States

This module begins to address in greater detail a number of specific issues in the context of the United States: the legacy of slavery in the case of African Americans, the position of native Americans post colonization, and the particular circumstances of Asian American immigrants. These examples raise further complexity in the understanding of race and ethnicity.

2.1 Race: The Power of an Illusion2:08

2.2 Race in the Foundation of American Society8:33

2.3 Slavery as an Economic and Political System, and its Abolition8:47

2.4 Racial Exclusion for Asians and Native Americans4:57

2.5 Revisiting “Race” as a Socio-historical Construction6:11

2.6 Race and Immigration4:41

2.7 Practices of Racial Subordination8:55

2.8 Laws and Customs Based on Race2:34

2.9 Past Is Prologue2:56

Conoce a los instructores

James D. Anderson
Edward William and Jane Marr Gutsgell Professor of Education
Education Policy, Organization and Leadership

This question of race and citizenship continued with

the immigration acts that succeeded the 1952 McCarran Act.

In 1965, there was an important shift in how the Congress regarded

naturalization and who was actually eligible to naturalization.

And so in the Hart-Celler Act, it abolished all racial quotas and

established a race-neutral immigration act.

Now, that did not change the quotas that still existed from different nations,

different countries.

And the quotas that existed at the time heavily favored Northern European

countries.

But it was an important step in eliminating from our Naturalization Act

from the notion of who could become a citizen of the United State,

the matter of race.

But it didn't go away.

It keeps coming back because race is such

a fundamental part of the social foundations of our society.

In 2008, Representative Nathan Deal and also Tancredo tried to include

a revocation of birthright citizenship by amending an immigration bill.

That's an important and critical movement.

And they also got about 92 members of Congress to sign onto this.

What they are trying to do in this move, is to go back in time, back actually

to the passage of the 14th Amendment in 1868, which says that all persons born or

naturalized are citizens, and revoke the birthright clause.

Now the reason behind that is that there are many people who are concerned and

even upset with the idea that undocumented immigrants who have

kids in the United States, those kids have birthright citizenship.

Because the 14th Amendment says all persons born on American

soil are citizens of the United States.

They would like to figure out a way to revoke that.

Now there have been two attacks on this.

One has been to repeal the 14th Amendment.

And Governor Wilson of California also proposed that when he was governor.

And Tancredo and Deal have also suggested that.

The other one is to try to find some loophole in the 14th Amendment.

And the logic of that goes something like this.

They believe that the clause in the 14th Amendment,

which says that in order to be a citizens, and particularly a naturalized citizen,

you must be subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.

And they argue that children born of undocumented parents are not subject to

the jurisdiction of the United States because they didn't have the free will

to commit to that jurisdiction.

Now, there's little understanding as to why that clause is there and

what it actually means in the 14th Amendment.

And so I think there is not a chance that they could use that as a loophole to

revoke the citizenship of the American-born children of undocumented

immigrants.

That clause has two meanings.

One, is the children of foreign-born diplomats,

that they are not citizens of the United States.

But also, the clause,

subject to the jurisdiction thereof in the 14th Amendment, actually replaced

the clause that had been used since the 1790s census, Indians not taxed.

And so, they'd always use that, in order to deny citizenship to Native Americans.

And in the 14th Amendment, it is discussed explicitly on the floor of the House and

the Senate, that they are now changing the clause from Indians not taxed

to subject to the jurisdiction thereof.

And that clause was also used to deny citizenship to the about 90% of

the Native American population.

Because in Congress at the time,

they argued that Native Americans had quasi-nation status and

therefore were not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.

And thus, Native Americans born within the United States were not citizens of

the United States.

And that was also upheld also by the Supreme Court.

And so, the notion that you could use that as a loophole has very low chance.

The only way to revoke birthright citizenship would be to repeal the 14th

Amendment.

And that would require two-thirds votes of both houses of the Congress.

And it also would require ratification by three-fourths of the states of

the United States.

So it's very much an uphill climb.

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