Immigration Resources for Educators
Our Purpose
Our hope with this project is to provide information about immigration that is based in fact rather than sensationalism. Our hope is that you will be able to find resources on this website that allow you to share fact-based information with students about illegal immigration and immigrants so that your students are able to form well-educated and honest opinions regarding this subject.
On this website you will find three interviews and the results of a survey.
The first interview was conducted by one of our group members, Ella. She interviewed Shaolu McLaren, who came to the United States as a Chinese immigrant and has since obtained legal citizenship status. In this interview Shaolu discusses why she decided to come to the US, what the immigration process was like, and what her life is like in the US as an immigrant. She also briefly discusses her thoughts on illegal immigration.
Our second and third interviews were not conducted personally, but were found online. We wanted to hear the voices of undocumented immigrants, but due to the sensitivity of the topic and the anonymity of being undocumented, we were unable to find someone to personally interview. So, our second interview was conducted by Mark Laita, who interviewed an undocumented immigrant from Mexico named Raul. In this interview Raul discusses how he grew up, why and how he came to the US, and what his life in the US has been like ever since he came.
Our third interview was a TEDx talk conducted by Erik Gomez, who was a child immigrant, and later achieved citizenship status in the U.S. in his teenage years. In the talk, Gomez describes the kind of negative mindset that Americans have toward immigrants, and what America could look like if we embraced the different cultures and people who helped found "the greatest country in the world."
Finally, our survey was conducted online via Google Forms and was distributed mainly via social media. The purpose of this survey was to find out what participants had learned about immigration in school and how this may have differed from what they learned outside of school.
"The Melting Pot"
Exigence Questions and Answers
What is the dominant narrative surrounding immigration? and where does it come from?
The Trump administration exaggerated the effects of immigrants coming to American to follow the "American Dream." The effect of the accusations Donald Trump and his administration made resulted in a drastic increase of Americans believing the false truth that immigrants were stealing jobs from Americans and ruining the economy, all while bringing drugs across the border with them. This Washington Post article details in a timeline the false accusations Trump made during his campaign time, before taking office in 2016. He accuses illegal immigrants of never obtaining legal citizenship papers, being criminals and rapists, stealing American jobs, ruining the economy, and bringing drugs with them into America.
What is the counter narrative surrounding immigration? Why is it important?
One counter narrative about illegal immigration is that immigrants actually help the American economy. According to a study by Madeline Zavodny, an economics professor at Agnes Scott College, "every additional 100 foreign-born workers in science and technology fields is associated with 262 additional jobs for U.S. natives." It is also statistically true that immigrants do a very good job at assimilating into American culture, with almost all children of immigrants speaking fluent english. Trump also called immigrants criminals, but according to other studies and findings, immigrants are much less likely to end up in prison or mental hospitals than native-born Americans. Finally, Trump accused immigrants of ruining the economy in the U.S., but according to the Congressional Budget Office, illegal immigrants "on the path to citizenship... produce a surplus of $25 billion" in taxes. (Source)
Where do we see the dominant narrative in the United States? Where do we see the counter narrative?
The dominant narrative is widespread throughout the U.S. and is not limited strictly to members of one political party or another; however, in general people who describe themselves as Conservative, and right-leaning news sources tend to espouse this dominant narrative more often than liberal or left-leaning people/news sources. This dominant narrative is very abundant in the Trump administration, as Donald Trump’s platform for election in 2016 relied heavily on the issue of immigration and a promise to both secure the border and deal with the millions of illegal immigrants already in the United States.
Linked here is an article from 2016 that discusses the hardline stance that Trump took to get elected. In this article you can see evidence of this dominant narrative; the author writes that “[Trump] blamed President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton directly for violence perpetrated by illegal immigrants.” In this article Trump is also quoted as touting the idea that “uncontrolled, low-skilled immigration...continues to reduce jobs and wages for American workers.”
Much like the dominant narrative, the counter narrative is also not tied solely to one political party or ideology. However, similarly to the dominant narrative, the counter narrative is more prevalent with liberal-identified people as well as left-leaning news sources.
Linked here is a PBS article that breaks down 4 myths about illegal immigration and the economy.
Why is this dominant narrative dangerous to the lives of immigrants?
The effects of this dominant narrative have resulted in immigrant children being separated from their families. Because of this separation many immigrants and their families face negative psychosocial effects since the act of the family separation is usually "not by choice and often occurs suddenly and unexpectedly, with little preparation or planning." Also, because organizations like the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) actually abruptly take immigrants from their homes and places of work for deportation, many immigrants return back to their home countries, which are typically "extremely dangerous and often turbulent environments." Researchers at the Migration Project, also found "numerous cases where deportations resulted in harm, including kidnapping, torture, rape, and murder." In many cases, individuals immigrating to the U.S. do so because to escape danger in their home countries, therefore it is not unreasonable to find that many immigrants being forcibly returned to their home countries would face these negative effects.
Reference: American Journal of Community Psychology. Statement on the Effects of Deportation and Forced Separation on Immigrants, their Families, and Communities. Sep2018, Vol. 62 Issue 1/2, p3, 10p
Immigrant Representation in Media
Media such as television, movies, books, and even advertisements shapes peoples' opinions every single day - whether or not they're actively aware of it. One of the ways that people interact with the world around them is through stereotypes, and when media stereotypes portray certain groups of people negatively, this affects the way that they are treated in real life. In the past few years there has been a push for more accurate media representation for many marginalized groups, such as women, people of color, and religious minorities. One of the groups that is heavily affected by media is immigrants. Immigrants don't make up a huge percentage of characters in media, but they are overwhelmingly portrayed negatively. Many of the immigrant characters in media are underdeveloped - their personalities are flat and one-dimensional because their only purpose to the story is being an immigrant. Further, many immigrant characters are portrayed as criminals despite the fact that immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than native-born citizens (1). These flat, underwhelming, and negative portrayals of a vastly diverse group of people leaves viewers with negative opinions about immigrants that aren't based in reality. Like other underrepresented groups, immigrant characters need better representation that accurately reflects the lives of immigrants in the United States.
Immigrant Stereotypes are Everywhere on TV - This piece from the Atlantic briefly discusses the issue of how immigrants are stereotyped in media and how that has a negative effect, as well as what TV producers need to be doing to fix the issue.
Immigrants on TV
Effects of Representation - While this article also discusses the issue of immigrants being linked to crime in television, it also talks about a study that showed that people who watched TV shows with immigrant characters/immigration plotlines (such as the season of 'Orange is the New Black' that was set in an ICE detention center) were more likely to feel sympathetic toward immigrants in real life, and were more likely to take steps to advocate for them.
25 Undocumented Characters - This article briefly describes the immigration plotlines from 25 different shows (and a few movies). Undocumented immigrants are heavily overrepresented in these plotlines (despite their low rates in reality), and a common trope that pops up is an immigrant having a fake marriage to avoid deportation.
Fresh off the Boat - This clip from the ABC series 'Fresh off the Boat' (which centers around a Taiwanese-American immigrant family) has Jessica telling her husband Louis the truth behind their marriage and her immigration story, which ultimately culminates in her application for citizenship being approved. This episode deals with the struggles that immigrants face to gain citizenship in the United States and deals with hard topics such as marrying for citizenship.
Jane the Virgin - This TV review of the episode "Chapter Ten" discusses the plotline of Alba Villanueva, who has suffered a medical emergency and is now threatened with deportation because she is undocumented. Within the episode itself is the hashtag #ImmigrationReform that prompted viewers to take to social media to discuss these very real issues in more depth as a community.
Orange is the New Black - The final season of 'Orange is the New Black' focuses heavily on an immigration/ICE plotline. This article goes over how accurate the situations in this season are and sheds some light on what actually happens in immigration court and ICE detention centers.
