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Every since I was a child, I have referred to myself as a “third-generation American.” My grandparents were all born in The United States of America, and three out of the four sets of their parents were born in Europe. The fourth set, from Ireland, came to The States earlier.
Growing up on Chicago’s Northwest side, you could hear an assortment of languages being spoken at any time, mostly Italian, German, Greek, Spanish, and Polish, to my ears. Diversity was an everyday part of my life. We talked about being more of a “tossed salad” than a “melting pot” to describe such diversity. We always talked about our cultures with pride, openly sharing our heritage and freely asking each other, “Where you from?” (Yes, Chicagoans do in fact end sentences with a preposition, and the verb is implied!) This was an unapologetic, straightforward inquiry as to the family’s country of origin.
While I was in high school, my father married a Native American woman and my baby sister soon entered the picture. My awareness of colonialism and immigration grew and, although the term “white privilege” wasn’t around back then, I did question the thoughts and feelings I had about what groups of people were better than others and why. “What if I had been born elsewhere?” I often wondered.
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The morning after the new Administration’s immigration ban, there was quite a bit of talk in the Good Men Project Premium Member group on Facebook and among members on their personal walls. Mike Kasdan posted his immigration story and others followed. I re-posted that question in the Premium group and received a few responses that I’ll share with you, below.
The respondent’s name is provided only where that person is a contributor to The Good Men Project, otherwise, I’ ve shared only their initials. I did not edit the responses.
B.S.:
My paternal grandparents came from Ireland @ 1850s, My grandfather’s family was Catholic, while my grandmother’s family was Protestant from Northern Ireland. Both families ultimately settled in Reading, PA, where there were plenty of opportunities for work. Neither of my grandparents were educated beyond the 8th grade. My father earned a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree.
Michael Kasdan:
My father was born in a displaced persons camp in Germany after WWII but his family was from Poland. He came with his parents and two half brothers to Brooklyn when he was five.
My grandmother was born on the USS Millard Filmore (an American ship – so she was an American Citizen) while pulling into NY Harbor. Her parents fled Russia, selling everything they had, and crossing the border beneath hay on a farmers wagon, and getting to Italy where they were able to come to the US.
My mom and sister are both immigration lawyers.
B.M.:
My son’s [paternal grandparents] came to this country as children, fleeing Ireland with their parents, after the Easter Rising of 1916.
Stacey Marmolejo:
My mother was born in Burnley England in 1934 to an Irish mom and an English father. Her parents divorced when she was young. During WWII my grandmother met an American GI who was stationed in the UK. They fell in love and he asked my Grandmother to marry him. With two children to consider, my grandmother told him if he still wanted to marry her at the end of the war, they would talk about it. They married on Oct 16, 1946, took my mother and aunt to France and Germany in 1946-1947 where my Grandfather was stationed with the U.S. Army Air Corps. In 1948, orders brought my Grandfather back to the U.S. and that’s how my mother came to America at the age of 14.
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African-American perspective of immigration
Two members of our writers’ community have written about the African-American perspective of immigration. You can read those essays here:
Black America: The 400 Year Rape — by Franklin Madison
In order to heal, the discussion of race in America needs to start with the same approach that you would use for a victim of sexual violence.
Diaspora’s Refugees — by Thaddeus Howze
Where can you go when you’ve been at war for 300 years?
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“Who is a Real American and what are the qualifications for such a designation?”
As the discussion on Facebook turned to who should and should not be here in the U.S., I was curious about the perspectives of my connections so I posted the question above in the Good Men Project Writers’ Group on Facebook and on my personal timeline. It was a simple post I first saw on a friend’s Facebook timeline. She meant it in a curious “what’s your perspective” way, which was exactly as I understood it. Here are some of the responses to my question:
Paul Hartzer:
If you mean the question literally, i.e., who is a real American? A real American is anyone with a US citizenship.
If you mean, “What do I hear when I hear someone refer to ‘real Americans’?”: I usually assume that person is jingoist and uses patriotism as a bludgeon, that they think a “real American” is someone who abides by some blind faith allegiance to a set of values about God, guns, and glory.
For me, “American” is a team membership, like “Canadian” or “Russian” or “Syrian,” and it’s all arbitrary. As Sting said years ago, Russians love their children, too. As long as someone isn’t trying to hurt me or mine, I don’t care what their team membership is.
(I was born in the USA. I live in the USA. My parents were both born in the USA.)
MJ:
“Someone who lives here, appreciates living here, does not take their opportunities for granted, works to make the promise of America real for everyone…and actually sat and read the Constitution.”
Mike Stalter:
I have to say this is a poorly worded question because anyone who lives in the Western Hemisphere is a “Real American”. I will step out here and assume you are asking who should be here in the United States. If that is the case then I cannot say who is a “Real American” any better than President Theodore Roosevelt did when he said
“In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person’s becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American…There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn’t an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag… We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language… and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people.”
To me this means that the immigrant comes here in good faith wanting to be a citizen of these great United States. They want to assimilate to our culture and not try to keep or transplant their culture to our land. They can protest waving the flag of their old country like many Mexicans did when protesting President Trump. They can have no divided allegiance or loyalty, the must be loyal to the United States. If they are proud to be am American and loyal to the United States then I say they are a real American no matter their creed, or birthplace, or origin.
I was born here in the United States as were my parents.
PC:
A real American is one who stands up and respects their country, no matter what the cost. An individual who upholds and defends the constitution.
MP:
I consider myself an American in the same way that Justin Trudeau is a Canadian, or Angela Merkel a German. This is the nation in which I happen to have been born, in which I happen to live, and of which I happen to be a citizen. Those facts don’t make me any more exalted, nor do they make me view the United States as inherently more exalted.
I remember reading a news item, years ago, about an inaugural address that referred to “the greatest country in the world.” Countless American politicians have uttered that phrase over the years. But the inauguration in question, which took place circa 2002, was actually not that of any official in this country, but of the new prime minister of Australia. Clearly, everything’s relative. I happen to believe that the exceptionalist attitude that many Americans hold toward America has done both the nation, and the world, far more harm than good. It would be desirable if “E Pluribus Unum,” meaning one out of many, were supplanted as the national motto–and the collective mindset behind it–by “Inter Pluribus Unum”–one among many.Which brings us to the task of defining “real Americans,” as distinct from just plain Americans. My own values on this can be summed up in what countless interviewers tell countless survey respondents is meant by countless question wordings–“it means whatever it means to you.” That said, it’s often hard for me to disabuse myself of the notion that the exponents of aggressive nationalism, reactionary religious dogma, antediluvian morality, white supremacy, ad nauseam, who made up so much of the Trump vote last November, are, in fact, the real America. Viewed in that light, I’m damn glad not to be a real American by their standards.
JK:
I think a “Real American” ought to be anyone who has chosen to live in the US and be part of that community. However, when I hear the phrase “Real American”, I picture a flag waving whiny white person afraid of losing their status as the elite. Often the flag I picture is the Red, White and Blue, but it is also often the Confederate Flag. (I was Born and Bred in the USA, but have lived most of my adult life in Canada except for a few years in the UK and one back in the USA. Both of my parents are born and bred in the USA with full American citizenship).
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Real American or Dangerous Other? Watch and listen:
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Here is a related Call for Submissions:
A Nation of Immigrants: A Call for Submissions
Tell us your family’s immigration story!
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Photo credit: Getty Images
An aunt and a cousin of mine adopted the open-source genealogy on the internet as a hobby some years back, and recently their project came to, if not an end, at least a fascinating point of interest – one of our ancestors was a passenger on the Mayflower. Turns out he wasn’t the sort of progenitor you take pride in. Within a few years of arriving, he was involved in a dispute over land which escalated into violence, and he was duly hanged for murder without any contention. His son, however, seems to have been an unobjectionable young man, and… Read more »
I think that your article is a false re-framing of the issue at hand. There are two major issues at hand. One issue is that the USA is being flooded by illegal aliens. Just to spell it out, an illegal alien entered the country illegally. It has nothing to do with arguments of “who is a real American.” These illegals were told by Obama to vote in the last election. That undermines every legal Americans vote. That is illegal. The other issue is that Issis openly says they want to enter the USA and commit terrorist acts. Extreme vetting is… Read more »