Race and Ethnicity

I was originally drawn to the article How Did Jews Become White Folks? because I'm Jewish and it seemed interesting from the start.  Most jewish people are white so I was intrigued to see how the author explained for Jewish people became white folks.  I knew it had to do with the characterization of what it is to be Jewish in comparison to just being white.  It was believed that Jews were part of an inferior race and because their beliefs and traditions were not the same of the majority then  they became part of a sub-culture inside the larger.  There were right there next to African Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans, everyone who wasn't white.  I liked the bit about the division of the inferior and superior races and how the Jewish people were categorized into that division.  It gave me a history of the immigration process and I learned that before the 19th century it says we resembled the white people but were still not considered white folks. 


I liked the idea that there could be a “race suicide” because of the integration of the different immigrants from all over.  Couldn't people realized that multiculturalism is good!  I understand that it was a different time but come on!  It was a different time when everyone was used to people of one "origin" and similar in most of their characteristics and change was different and scary. But it is also educational.

"The existence of anti-immigrant, racist, and anti-Semitic barriers kept the Jewish middle class confined to a small number of occupations." As they came into society and people began to realize Jews are smart and resourceful and education oriented, they were limited to a few occupations.  Assumption they should just stick to what they were good at?  Not allow them to branch out?  I was confused but understood the confinement.  This was the societies way of integrating the Jewish people into their already integrated society but keeping the confinement to only certain neighborhoods and jobs.  Their way of acceptance but confinement? Seems kind of contradictory to me.  I think depending on how religious a person is depicts today how "isolated"they may be and how surprised people might be if they knew how many Jewish people walked among them never knowing they were even Jewish.

                                                                                                                                                                  

Just look around today.  Who seems to be the majority in our society today doing so many of our lower paying jobs.  How do we think they came here and became so integrated into our everyday lifestyles.  It is more interesting to me to study how the behavior or lifestyle of Mexico-born Mexicans and U.S-born Mexican Americans and how much of our lifestyle has been adapted and what has stayed the same within families.  The integration process has changed greatly over the last century as it does in every society but I think the isolation is less seen with Mexicans and Mexican-Americans.  They are in every neighborhood, every job occupation.  I think we learn from them just as much as they learn from us about family and values.  Deportation is a whole other story and the increasing and decreasing and increasing amount that we've seen over the last century.  

There are other factors that are seen in Mexican culture seen over the generations.  Education levels seem lower, people tend to work jobs at lower pay and less prestigious job titles and tend to marry within their own race.  I think that has to do with a level of comfort and where they are in status.  In today's society unless you are here on a visa or work passport it is harder to establish a success high paying life in fear of deportation.  It is also so much harder for those people who have been here for decades to establish residency and citizenship without being deported first.  Before one could just pay a penalty and gain citizenship now everything is carefully considered and those sort of penalties don't exist.  Citizenship is earned and not so easily given away.  

"Mexican Americans in San Antonio had more ethnic lifestyles and behaviors, including retaining Spanish fluency into the third and fourth generation" In areas that are closer to Mexico where many people integrate into the United States there is more spanish spoken are lifestyles are different but its the idea that people from Mexico want to come to the United States for new experiences and a new life from their homes but the process is changing so raidply and more rules put into place that makes it so much more difficult.  Some of my best friends are Mexican and few are Mexican-American so the process of citizenship and gaining residency is something that affects me personally.  This is also why I chose this article to focus on because I was more intrigued to learn the history of the incorporation process in the United States.  I think it is important to keep different cultures and identities rather than trying to form immigrants into white americans that fit one type.  It is important to keep multi-culturalism in every society and without that we can't grow.