Reader: Kristy Rundell
Respondent: Dianna Ruiz                 
Recorder: Shaista Pollard

"American Dream: First Report"

By Joseph Papaleo

Vocabulary:

Steerage-  Section of inferior accommodations in a passenger ship for passengers paying the lowest fares.

Objectives:

“The Immigrant Narrative”

Stage 3:

**“First nobody liked us; they said we smelled and looked too short and dark”

Stage 2: Journey to new World (Modern culture)

Search for acceptance: (Tv use of interracial marriages between Italian immigrants and dominant culture)

**“Then the TV proposed marriage, and we said yes. Momma and sisters kept the commercials going, to prove we were married in the palaces of soap”

“Who would have guessed that the end of those voyages, the agony of steerage, insults from Yankees, the tenement rooms without windows, like fish cans, the penny pinching and fear of the bosses would end this way”

Stage 4 Assimilation to dominant American culture/loss of identity

 “ as well dressed citizens devoted to the disinfection of our carpets,”

Stage 5- reassertion of ethnic identity / (Stage 1 leave the old world….)

“as the culminating dream of Grampa (who liked to spit on the floors while he talked)?”

Narrator: Second Generation Italian Immigrant

Setting : America / Home  

Characters by generation

The narrator is a second generation immigrant- he still knows his past culture and went through stages of assimilation to the new culture. Even after he has become a part of the American culture he is still torn between that of his ancestors

The narrators parents would be the first generation or “heroic” generation

Grampa wouldn’t fit into the perfect picture that the immigrants had to conform to.

1.American Dream vs American Nightmare-

It was the dream of Grampa and the narrators ancestors to come to America. The narrator expresses that the dream of becoming American once seemed like something unimaginable. As though they went through so many struggles to become just another American.

Old Immigrant Model- earlier immigrants were unable to go back to their homeland because of cost and danger of trips and therefore cut ties with their old culture faster than immigrants of today

The poem refers to all of the struggles that they went through to become Americans.  Because of this referral I assume that it would be difficult to continue relations with their homeland. The television and the Hollywood promotion of their culture enhanced their assimilation to American culture making it easier for them to fit into their new home. In essence the Italian immigrants became part of the dominant culture leaving their old lifestyle behind.

What do immigrants see about American culture that native born cannot?

In the poem the narrator sees Americans of the dominant culture as“ well dressed citizens devoted to the disinfection of our carpets.” I think that because the immigrants are striving to fit in and become more like the dominant culture they see that Americans are plain. By plain I mean that they are all striving to fit the model of the perfect American. Americans who are born here cant see this because they have been influenced and brought up that way during most of their life. Therefore they do not know that anything else exists.

What are they talking about when they say the “palaces of soap”? Why was it easier for the Italian immigrants to assimilate into the dominant culture than some of the other immigrant groups?

My impression of this is that in order to prove that they were part of the dominant culture they supported the use of interracial relations on tv and in hollywood. This support and exposure allowed the Italian immigrants to fit into the dominant culture faster.

How does the grandfather's dream compare to what is reality of the dominant culture? Why would or wouldn’t Grampa fit into this mold of an American?

What made the immigrants that are toward the end of the poem different from the immigrants that are at the beginning of the poem? (Compare the immigrant that nobody liked (in the beginning) to the well dressed citizen(at the end))

Discussion

Student A-dirty assumption, well dressed citizen, against culture

Student B- Grandfather's dream compared to dominant culture, dream is a better life, trying to attain culture but it doesn’t work

Student C- Plumbing, suburban bathrooms

Student A- Open land plenty for everyone, contrast between dream and reality

Presenter- inferior accommodations on trip, unable to maintain contact with own culture because inability to afford trip

Student D- how can you stay attached? By choice?

Student E- sacrifice gone to achieving American Dream, Grandpa splits- dream vs. survival and social expectations

2^nd generation try to assimilate

Presenter-TV proposition-making a  commitment to assimilation

Student F- Second Generation- clean carpet, distance helps reflect process

Student E- Made money, accepted themselves and discovered culture

Dr. White- pick and choose what they want from culture

Diana- cruelty of their cleanliness –extreme individualism

Dr. White- insults from Yankees, Who are the Yankees?

early British immigrants

Student E- depends on where you are

Presenter- What would be the differences between the grandpa and the younger generation in their assimilation?

Student G- grandpa-set in ways, young ones –assimilation is easier

Student E- young ones are motivated to fit in., grandpa doesn’t care to fit in

Dr.White- Heroic generation- old country but richer get rid of old ways and find new ways. Language acquisition in Hispanic population is an example. Children translating for parents

Student A- Things that are in one language often don’t transfer into another language correctly. It looses meaning . Young ones are more likely to understand new culture

Cultural context

Student H- 1979- movies –subtitle- lost meaning, Deablo is curse words in one and not in other language- it lost meaning in the translation

Student E reading and speaking are different as well, Some things when they are translated they sound funny

Student E- Its just like the people in Texas speak differently than people from other parts of our country.