Katherine Rearick

(Planned and made notes for about one hour; wrote for about an hour)

            America is a country built by immigrants; it is only logical, therefore, that the immigrant narrative is a fundamental story line for organizing American multicultural literature. Immigrant literature has a distinct form and common characteristics that appear repeatedly within the genre, and it is the primary means by which the American Dream has achieved mythical status within our society. The immigrant experience requires that, for a time at least, an individual must remain an “outsider,” a position that allows the immigrant author to observe the commonalities and differences, and the opportunities and exploitation, which affect numerous marginalized groups within society. Because the immigrant narrative is often a commentary on the minority experience, too, as well as the dominant culture, it is an all-purpose tool for defining the American experience.

            For the purpose of organization within this class, we have examined the immigrant experience in terms of three basic groups—Immigrant, Minority, and New World Immigrant—as well as each of these groups’ relationship to the dominant culture. In exploring the dynamics of each of these groups within American society, I have found it useful to ask three basic questions about each one: First, why did the particular group or individual come here? Second, what were their experiences in adapting to life in the United States? And third, how did their experiences affect their attitudes of either assimilation or resistance to the dominant culture? These questions coincide fairly well with the five basic stages of the immigrant narrative outlined in Course Objective 2, and the answers to these questions explain a great deal about the American experience each group encounters.

            For the most part, the classic immigrant narrative begins with a journey to the New World in which the narrator describes great hope for a better future for himself and his family. The journey, though difficult, is still portrayed as a positive step; and the narrator, though perhaps apprehensive, is also optimistic. Carlos Bulosan, in America is in the Heart, describes this feeling: “My first sight of the approaching land was an exhilarating experience. Everything seemed native and promising to me. It was like coming home after a long voyage, although as yet I had no home in this city. Everything seemed familiar and kind…With a sudden surge of joy, I knew that I must find a home in this new land” (60). Sui Sin Far expresses a similar feeling in In the Land of the Free; as a young Chinese boy and his mother see San Francisco for the first time as they approach it by ship, she tells him, “See, Little One—the hills in the morning sun. There is thy home for years to come. It is very beautiful and thou wilt be very happy there…there is where thy father is making a fortune” (3).

            Once in the United States, however, the immigrant narrative often depicts great struggle or exploitation at the hands of the dominant culture. Bulosan’s aforementioned feelings of optimism are quickly diminished when he and his fellow travelers lose all of their money in a card game they do not understand and are subsequently forced into indentured servitude to pay off their debts. The same is true of the Chinese mother in Sui Sin Far’s story; she and her husband lose their small son to the American government officials who claim the child’s immigration paperwork is not in order. In both cases, the immigrants’ ignorance of American laws and social mores has disastrous results. It happens repeatedly in immigrant literature, this sudden and exploitative dashing of the immigrant’s initial high hopes about life in America.

            The third question the immigrant narrative must answer, then, is how the immigrant will overcome these obstacles. Will he remain strong and focused in order to achieve the American Dream, or will he let bitterness overcome him and become resistant to assimilation? Course Objective 2 tells us that a recurrent theme of pure immigrant literature is the acceptance of assimilation and the ideal of the “melting pot, in which ”ethnic differences disappear through intermarriage, common language, and shared opportunity or ideology as a result of a shared background in a ‘nation of immigrants.’” While a “Model Immigrant” may not assimilate quickly, his family will usually be fully integrated into American culture within several generations. These immigrants accomplish this by taking advantage of America’s educational and economic opportunities and becoming productive members of society. “The English Lesson” by Nicholosa Mohr portrays a group of immigrants from all over the world eager to better their stations in life by learning English; when their teacher asks them to briefly explain their reasons for taking the class, “All had similar statements. They had migrated here in search of a better future…” (25). These immigrants believe that education is the key to financial success in the United States, and they are well on the way to achieving the American Dream.

            Minority literature shares many commonalities with immigrant literature; as a result, in analyzing the minority narrative, one can ask the same three basic questions one can ask about immigrant literature: why did they come here, what were their experiences in adapting to American life, and how did their experiences affect their assimilation or resistance to the dominant culture? But while the minority story shares some of the same characteristics with the immigrant story—the journey motif, for example, among others—there are also some significant differences between the two. According to Course Objective 3, “the two most persistent or least-assimilated minority groups, African Americans and Native Americans, were not immigrants, at least in any normal sense.” Unlike the hopeful, optimistic journey to America described in the immigrant narrative, Olaudah Equiano describes a very different kind of journey in his slave narrative: “The first object that saluted my eyes when I arrived on the coast was the sea, and a slave ship, which was then riding at anchor, and waiting for its cargo. These filled me with astonishment, that was soon converted into terror, which I am yet at a loss to describe, and much more the then feelings of my mind when I was carried on board. I was immediately handled and tossed up to see if I was sound by some of the crew; and I was now persuaded that I had got into a world of bad spirits, and that they were going to kill me… Indeed such were the horrors of my views and fears at the moment; that if ten thousand worlds had been my own, I would have freely parted with them all to have exchanged my condition with the meanest slave in my own country.” His journey is filled not with hope for the future, but with terror and confusion.

Minorities came to be Americans not by choice, but by force, which naturally changes their social contract. Their American Dream experience may have been more of an American Nightmare; they may speak of exploitation and victimization rather than opportunity and advancement. As a result, the minority narrative is often more fiercely defensive, more angry, than that of the immigrant, thereby making it more “difficult” for readers from the dominant culture. While the sunny rags to riches, melting pot, immigrant mentality is one with which most readers feel comfortable, the exploitative nature of the minority experience often requires a condemnation of white society that is hard for many readers to digest. In addition, minorities often condemn other minorities rather than reward them for success, as success is often seen as conforming to the dominant culture. Minorities who achieve academic or financial success are often considered traitors to their race---“acting white” or “trying to be white.” In “The Lesson” by Toni Cade Bambara, the black Miss Moore is painted as a pariah within the black community because of her education and knowledge of culture. The narrator points out that “…the grown-ups…talked behind her back like a dog” because “she’d been to college” (145).

Likewise, these successful minorities often experience guilt and shame when attempting to reconcile their success (modernity) with their home culture (traditionalism). This is a struggle that many second- and third-generation children of immigrants also face, but it seems to evoke even more emotion in minority literature. In “No Name in the Street,” James Baldwin speaks extensively of this guilt: “The guilt of the survivor is a real guilt…[it] meant that I had betrayed the people who had produced me. Nothing could be more unutterably paradoxical: to have thrown in your lap what you dreamed of getting, and, in sober, bitter truth, could never have dreamed of having, and that at the price of an assumed betrayal of your brothers and sisters” (285-286)! June Jordan, too, in “Report from the Bahamas,” conveys a similar feeling when she realizes she has more of a connection to white American dominant culture than she does to the black laborers she meets during her Caribbean vacation; she recognizes with guilt and shame that she herself is now part of the “weird succession of crude intruders” who have invaded and overrun the islands (306).

This mention of June Jordan, who is not only a minority in that she is a black woman, but who is also the child of Jamaican immigrants, introduces the idea of one more category of immigrant literature—that of the “New World Immigrant.” This is a term used to describe groups who immigrate to the United States from within the Western Hemisphere; this group includes Mexicans and other Latinos, Afro-Caribbeans, and Cubans, among others. Theirs is a condition in which the line between minority and immigrant is blurred; as a result, the literature that has emerged from this segment of society is rather ambiguous when it comes to issues of how race, culture, and ethnicity affect the American experience. According to Course Objective 3, many of these groups have historic identities in relation to the United States that make them “more ambivalent regarding assimilation to the dominant American culture.” In addition, many of these immigrants come to the United States seeking political asylum; because they left only to protect their own safety, they may still retain strong loyalty to their home countries. Finally, in the particular case of Afro-Caribbeans, these immigrants may have more of a minority experience than an immigrant experience because of their common skin color with African-Americans.

The result of all of these ambiguities is a blended narrative that contains elements of both immigrant and minority literature and depicts a truly unique American experience.  For example, in “How to Date a Browngirl…” by Junot Diaz, a Dominican author, the narrator explains his technique for skillfully navigating a racially diverse dating pool; he explains the proper methods for successfully wooing girls according to their skin color. This frank acceptance of interracial dating and marriage is a classic immigrant trait, but there are many instances of minority experience within the story, too; he lives in an ethnically diverse but low-income area, “the Terrace,” and his family is obviously receiving government assistance, hence the dreaded “government cheese.” In “The Making of a Writer,” Paule Marshall also exhibits this New World dualism. In almost a single breath, she establishes a connection and loyalty to the home country (Barbados), a strong immigrant work ethic and the concept of the American Dream, and a minority experience that stems from racism: “Then there was home. They reminisced often and at length about home…The little Caribbean island in the sun they loved but had to leave…And naturally they discussed their adopted home. America came in for both good and bad marks. They lashed out at it for the racism they encountered…Yet although they caught H in ‘this man country,’ as they called America, it was nonetheless a place where ‘you could at least see your way to make a dollar’” (85). Marshall concludes the passage by pointing out that her parents’ all-consuming ambition in life was “…’to buy house’ and to see the children through” (85).

            All in all, as a frame for organizing American multicultural literature, the immigrant narrative is a complex yet invaluable tool. The story of the American immigrant in all of its variations is the story of the American experience, and one cannot describe a true American character without factoring in the immigrant consciousness. In addition, if Americans are ever going to constructively move beyond the usual polite yet uncomfortable discussions of the implications of race and ethnicity in our society, the immigrant narrative must be a tool in achieving that goal. Early in my graduate school career, I became embroiled in a heated debate when I arrogantly insisted that true oppression in this country no longer exists, that oppression is a self-inflicted wound that certain groups use to avoid hard work. My work over the past two years, especially in classes such as this one, has changed my own worldview tremendously. The value, then, in the study of immigrant and minority literature is apparent in my very own character, and my perception of the United States as a multicultural nation has been deepened by my ability to understand and empathize with people I never thought I would identify with.