ipl-logo

So Mexicans Are Taking Jobs From America Analysis

884 Words4 Pages

“So Mexicans are Taking Jobs from Americans” by Jimmy Santiago Baca. Are Mexicans really taking jobs away from Americans? This is a question that is causing controversy in today's workforce of the United States. Jimmy Santiago Baca a Mexican poet wrote a poem title “So Mexicans are Taking Jobs from Americans” defending and shutting down the stereotype of the immigrants from Mexico that comes to find the American dream by working on the jobs that Americans do not want to get. However, Americans are misinterpreting holding resentment toward those immigrants because they believe that they are taking their jobs opportunities away. Is this really happening? No, what Americans do not realize is that Mexicans are the only ones who works on the fills that no one wants to work on because usually is paid less.
At the beginning of the poem, Baca says “O Yes? Do they come on horses / with rifles, and say, / Ese gringo, gimme your job?” (lines 1-3). These lines represent in a sarcastic manner the American stereotype of Mexicans toward the idea of them taking their jobs opportunities away. He continues by explaining what is the real truth about this controversy “Below that cool green sea of money, / millions and millions of …show more content…

He uses many literary elements to creates a more interesting and realistic reading. For example, some examples of imagery are: “crawls turtle heavy”, “ribs I see jutting out”, “search for pearls in the darkest depth of their dreams”, “cool green sea of money” and “the smell of a woman’s body bending all day long in the fields”. The tone of this poem is in a sarcastic way. While the poem goes on, we can see a tone shift as he becomes more serious. The reader can sense how angry the writer is. Also, Baca uses personification when it says “a tongue paddles”. Hyperbole is present when Baca says “a few people got all the money in the world, the rest count their pennies to buy bread and

Show More
Related
353 Words | 2 Pages

In “A Gringo in the Lettuce Fields,” Gabriel Thompson spends about two months cutting lettuce in the hot fields of Yuma alongside immigrants laborers. At first glimpse, the immigrants thought he was either crazy or an undercover immigration agent ready to deport them back to their home country. But within a few days just outside Watsonville, Thompson got to know some immigrants and sensed the backbreaking, harsh conditions work of these immigrant laborers. He would then get physically drained, and never became good enough to keep up with the machine that puts along with the rows of lettuce driving the pace of the crews. Thompson, in the end, shines a bright light on the underside of the economy, exposing injustices endured by low-paid laborers

Read More
741 Words | 3 Pages

In order to write this book, the author clearly uses different manuscripts and papers that helped him to explain and show the situation of this social movement. He also uses and gets information from people that were living those situations, for instance in Chapter one, he mentions a note from Journalist Ruiz Ibañez: “Contrary to the common belief that those groups are composed of “punks” and hoodlums….”1. Related to him, he is an American historian and sociology that obtained his sociology and political science degrees in the University of Texas at Austin and Yale University, as well. Currently, he is a professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Berkeley and he is president of the Center for Latino Policy Research. He wrote not only Quixote’s Soldiers but also, Anglos and Mexicans in the Making of Texas, 1836-1986.

Read More
1578 Words | 7 Pages

“Oranges,” “The Seventieth Year,” and “Avocado Lake,” showcase Soto’s ability to move a reader using an emotional story without the use of rhyme or rhythm. Through Soto’s poetry, he indicates the traits that define Mexican-American community

Read More
510 Words | 3 Pages

La Migra is a poem written by Pat Mora about the Mexican - American immigration issue. It’s purpose is to acknowledge the emotions and sentiments of the Mexican immigrants who try to come to the United States illegally. The denotation of the poem’s title means immigration and the connotation is referring to the police officers standing at the Mexico-United States border. The poem is divided into two stanzas to acknowledge immigration through the different perspectives of the illegal immigrant and also through the eyes of the border police. The first stanza is through the perspective of the male border cop, who thinks his power and nonessential items make his superior to the immigrants.

Read More
1103 Words | 5 Pages

Selena Quintanilla’s father once said, “We have to be more Mexican than the Mexicans and more American than the Americans.” In today’s society, many have encountered the challenge of not being able to be who they really are because they fear not being accepted by others, more specifically their culture. But, what happens when an individual is part of two worlds that have just as many rules? Gloria E. Anzaldúa was a Mexican-American writer and poet who made a major contribution to the fields of cultural, feminist, and queer theory. Anzaldúa identifies as a Chicana and speaks different variations of Spanish, some of which she exhibits in her works.

Read More
541 Words | 3 Pages

Chavez examines the assumptions made by the media and the public by drawing in sources like magazine articles and illustrations to provide the audience with exactly how these accusations are made and shared with the public. Chavez questions what it means and what it takes to be considered an American citizen and how Latinos, particularly Mexicans, have many things stacked up against. There are no doubts that the number of undocumented immigrants has steadily increased each year. Leo R. Chavez argues that because of the rise in the numbers, it makes it easier for the media to assume that undocumented immigrants, particularly Mexicans, are a threat to our nation through an invasion. Chavez’s idea of a Mexican reconquest is developed through something he calls the Quebec model.

Read More
429 Words | 2 Pages

In the poem, Pat Mora is expressing how she feels as if Americans and Mexicans both treated her like a different species. “Their eyes say, “you may speak Spanish but you are not like me”, (line 12 and 13). Here, Pat Mora is talking about how even though she speaks Spanish, and is a part of the Mexican culture, Mexicans don’t see her as a Mexican. To

Read More
750 Words | 3 Pages

Both readings claim that Hispanics are here to stay, but with opposing views on how this affects society. One place where Hispanic presence is on the rise is in schools. However, some Hispanic students know more Spanish than English, and therefore struggle in school. This idea of exemplifies the stereotype that Hispanics are “dumb”.

Read More
871 Words | 4 Pages

Octavio Paz, a Mexican poet and essayist, is one of the many philosophers with a written piece regarding his understanding of Lo Mexicano. Paz’s “Sons of La Malinche” was first published in the Labyrinth of Solitude in 1950 and is a rather grim interpretation of the Mexican character, however, it captures the crisis of identity that Mexico was burdened with after the conquest. Paz uses the Spanish term “chingar,” (when literally translated means “to screw, to violate”) and its associated phrases to understand the conquest and the effect

Read More
899 Words | 4 Pages

To counter the ahistorical views of these scholars Romano cites historical evidence of Mexican immigrant workers striking and making an effort to change their working conditions. For example, he mentions the strikes of the sugar beet workers in California, the railway workers in Los Angeles, and the sheepherders in Texas. All of these instances disprove the idea that Mexicans are

Read More
1414 Words | 6 Pages

Many stories embody the cultural aspects of Mexican-Americans and their struggles with living in a discriminatory society. Stories like With

Read More
920 Words | 4 Pages

The majority of illegal immigrant’s chances for success is limited. It is more likely for people who have already been successful in life to achieve their dream than those have not had the chance to. The Tortilla Curtain illustrates the hardships and the discriminations illegal immigrants face with higher class Americans. The coyotes symbolize the immigrant’s lifestyle and how they are viewed with disdain and mistrust. The Arroyo Blanco community presents those who view the immigrants as such, and how difficult it is to break down ignorance barriers to be accepted into it.

Read More
1479 Words | 6 Pages

This is notable as this is just one simple moment in which the film tackles disproving negative stereotypes surrounding immigration, namely how often American citizens will say they refuse immigrants because of how many jobs of theirs they would be taking away and stealing. Rather, it’s clearly presented within, and supported by, the segmented labor market theory that immigrants take up jobs within a lower-tiered, second-sector subdivision, as compared to the more lavish jobs that are encompassed within the primary sector (Massey 38). Not only is this shown as Carlos works as a low-paid, lottery-like lawn service, but real-life data supports this, with an economics professor stating “We found little to no negative effects on overall wages and employment of native-born workers in the longer term,” (Blau as cited in Preston 2016). This is incredibly common as well: perhaps due to the fact that within the current wave of immigration, wave four, people were pushed to move to the U.S for the chance to work in a society full of economic opportunities, as well as commonly taking up those jobs in shortage, that American citizens themselves rarely take up. (Pedraza

Read More
1054 Words | 5 Pages

In the poem “To live in the Borderlands means you”, the borderlands become a place of change, such as changing from just one culture or race into a diverse culture or race and not-belonging. (Singh, A., & Schmidt, P. 2000). The poem describes how the author’s own background ethnicity people, mixicanas, identifies people like her, chicanas, as “split or mixture that means to betray your word and they deny “Anlo inside you.” (Anzaldua, F. 1987). The poem describes that the borderland is a place of contradiction, such as of home not being a home.

Read More
1749 Words | 7 Pages

This poem is about a Mexican-American speaker informing the reader about the struggles in which people from different ethnic backgrounds

Read More

More about So Mexicans Are Taking Jobs From America Analysis

Related Topics

Open Document