Keywords: Mexican Amer... (150 Results)
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Grounds For Dreaming: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the California Farmworker Movement
Lori A Flores
10.12987/yale/9780300196962.001.0001
Society and Culture, Latin American Studies
Known as "The Salad Bowl of the World," California's Salinas Valley became an agricultural empire due to the toil of diverse farmworkers, including Latinos. A sweeping critical history of how Mexican ... More
Known as "The Salad Bowl of the World," California's Salinas Valley became an agricultural empire due to the toil of diverse farmworkers, including Latinos. A sweeping critical history of how Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants organized for their rights in the decades leading up to the seminal strikes led by Cesar Chavez, this important work also looks closely at how different groups of Mexicans—U.S. born, bracero, and undocumented—confronted and interacted with one another during this period. An incisive study of labor, migration, race, gender, citizenship, and class, this book offers crucial insights for today's ever-growing U.S. Latino demographic, the farmworker rights movement, and future immigration policy.Less
Grounds For Dreaming : Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the California Farmworker Movement
Known as "The Salad Bowl of the World," California's Salinas Valley became an agricultural empire due to the toil of diverse farmworkers, including Latinos. A sweeping critical history of how Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants organized for their rights in the decades leading up to the seminal strikes led by Cesar Chavez, this important work also looks closely at how different groups of Mexicans—U.S. born, bracero, and undocumented—confronted and interacted with one another during this period. An incisive study of labor, migration, race, gender, citizenship, and class, this book offers crucial insights for today's ever-growing U.S. Latino demographic, the farmworker rights movement, and future immigration policy.
Keywords: immigration policy, California, Salinas Valley, Latinos, Mexican Americans, Mexican immigrants, Cesar Chavez, farmworker rights movement
Significant to Whom?: Mexican Americans and the History of the American West
David G. GutiéRrez
in A New Significance: Re-Envisioning the History of the American West
History, Historiography
In considering Mexican-American history, one might argue that the debate about the significance or importance of ethnic Mexican people in the American West has reflected the central themes of the ... More
In considering Mexican-American history, one might argue that the debate about the significance or importance of ethnic Mexican people in the American West has reflected the central themes of the social and political history of the region. The most important theme unifying this chapter was obvious concern to represent ordinary working-class Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants as complex, fully formed, and fully functional human beings. Although this might not seem to be a significant point, when viewed in the context of the times this work should be seen as the first stage of a bold project of excavation and recovery that was designed, at least partially, to upset the prevailing regional social order by demonstrating the extent to which stereotypes about Mexicans were the products of Americans' active, and truly powerful, imaginations. A brief discussion of George I. Sánchez's research helps illustrate some of the ways Mexican-American scholars of this period used their work both to advance objective knowledge and to alter what had become the master discourse used to describe Mexicans in the United States.Less
In considering Mexican-American history, one might argue that the debate about the significance or importance of ethnic Mexican people in the American West has reflected the central themes of the social and political history of the region. The most important theme unifying this chapter was obvious concern to represent ordinary working-class Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants as complex, fully formed, and fully functional human beings. Although this might not seem to be a significant point, when viewed in the context of the times this work should be seen as the first stage of a bold project of excavation and recovery that was designed, at least partially, to upset the prevailing regional social order by demonstrating the extent to which stereotypes about Mexicans were the products of Americans' active, and truly powerful, imaginations. A brief discussion of George I. Sánchez's research helps illustrate some of the ways Mexican-American scholars of this period used their work both to advance objective knowledge and to alter what had become the master discourse used to describe Mexicans in the United States.
Keywords: Mexican Americans, Mexicans, immigrants, George I. Sánchez, stereotypes, United States, American West, history, social order
Bound in Tension: Mexican Americans, Braceros, and Undocumented Migrants, 1947–1960
Lori A. Flores
in Grounds For Dreaming: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the California Farmworker Movement
This chapter examines the attitudes of Mexican Americans toward braceros and "wetbacks" in the Salinas Valley during the period 1947–1960, with particular emphasis on how the tension between them ... More
This chapter examines the attitudes of Mexican Americans toward braceros and "wetbacks" in the Salinas Valley during the period 1947–1960, with particular emphasis on how the tension between them hindered the formation of a larger transnational Mexican-origin community in the region. It considers the concerns of some Mexican American middle-class civil rights leaders about the threat posed by undocumented immigrants on their economic stability and social respectability. It also discusses two particular flashpoints that brought the intraethnic conflict between Mexican Americans, braceros, and undocumented migrants into greater relief: the Immigration and Naturalization Service's "Operation Wetback" of 1954 and the peak of the Bracero Program in 1956. The chapter shows that the Mexican American agricultural working class felt betrayed by the state for creating a Bracero Program and immigration system that served at the pleasure of agribusiness instead of protecting them as worker-citizens.Less
Bound in Tension : Mexican Americans, Braceros, and Undocumented Migrants, 1947–1960
This chapter examines the attitudes of Mexican Americans toward braceros and "wetbacks" in the Salinas Valley during the period 1947–1960, with particular emphasis on how the tension between them hindered the formation of a larger transnational Mexican-origin community in the region. It considers the concerns of some Mexican American middle-class civil rights leaders about the threat posed by undocumented immigrants on their economic stability and social respectability. It also discusses two particular flashpoints that brought the intraethnic conflict between Mexican Americans, braceros, and undocumented migrants into greater relief: the Immigration and Naturalization Service's "Operation Wetback" of 1954 and the peak of the Bracero Program in 1956. The chapter shows that the Mexican American agricultural working class felt betrayed by the state for creating a Bracero Program and immigration system that served at the pleasure of agribusiness instead of protecting them as worker-citizens.
Keywords: braceros, Mexican Americans, wetbacks, Salinas Valley, undocumented immigrants, intraethnic conflict, Immigration and Naturalization Service, Bracero Program, immigration, agribusiness
Racial Meeting Grounds and Battlegrounds During Wartime, 1941–1947
This chapter examines the conflict between Mexican Americans and a white mainstream that denied them equal treatment, and between Mexican Americans and braceros in a militarized, masculinized ... More
This chapter examines the conflict between Mexican Americans and a white mainstream that denied them equal treatment, and between Mexican Americans and braceros in a militarized, masculinized agricultural context, in the Salinas Valley during the World War II years (1941–1947). It considers the ways that Latinos negotiated their relationships with other racial groups—and with each other—during wartime as well as the impact of the Bracero Program on the region's labor and power landscapes and race relations. It also explains why the activism of Mexican Americans living in agricultural California appeared weaker, or progressed at a slower pace, than that of urban Mexican Americans. It argues that the intraethnic conflict between four groups of Mexican-origin men—military servicemen, braceros, U.S.-born farmworkers, and "zoot suiters"—created tension in the larger Latino community which, along with the Bracero Program, slowed the evolution of a postwar Latino civil rights movement in the Salinas Valley.Less
This chapter examines the conflict between Mexican Americans and a white mainstream that denied them equal treatment, and between Mexican Americans and braceros in a militarized, masculinized agricultural context, in the Salinas Valley during the World War II years (1941–1947). It considers the ways that Latinos negotiated their relationships with other racial groups—and with each other—during wartime as well as the impact of the Bracero Program on the region's labor and power landscapes and race relations. It also explains why the activism of Mexican Americans living in agricultural California appeared weaker, or progressed at a slower pace, than that of urban Mexican Americans. It argues that the intraethnic conflict between four groups of Mexican-origin men—military servicemen, braceros, U.S.-born farmworkers, and "zoot suiters"—created tension in the larger Latino community which, along with the Bracero Program, slowed the evolution of a postwar Latino civil rights movement in the Salinas Valley.
Keywords: intraethnic conflict, Mexican Americans, braceros, Salinas Valley, World War II, Latinos, Bracero Program, race relations, activism, civil rights movement
CorazÓn De Dixie: Mexicanos in the U.S. South since 1910
Julie M. Weise
University of North Carolina Press
10.5149/northcarolina/9781469624969.001.0001
History, American History: 20th Century
When Latino migration to the U.S. South became increasingly visible in the 1990s, observers and advocates grasped for ways to analyze "new" racial dramas in the absence of historical reference ... More
When Latino migration to the U.S. South became increasingly visible in the 1990s, observers and advocates grasped for ways to analyze "new" racial dramas in the absence of historical reference points. However, as this book is the first to comprehensively document, Mexicans and Mexican Americans have a long history of migration to the U.S. South. Their experiences there provide critical lessons to better understand the South's recent changes as well as the larger histories of the United States and Mexico. Corazón de Dixie recounts the untold histories of Mexicanos' migrations to New Orleans, Mississippi, Arkansas, Georgia, and North Carolina as far back as 1910. It follows Mexicans and Mexican Americans into the heart of Dixie, where they navigated the Jim Crow system, cultivated community in the cotton fields, purposefully appealed for help to the Mexican government, shaped the southern conservative imagination in the wake of the civil rights movement, and embraced their own version of suburban living at the turn of the twenty-first century. These migrants remained invisible in prior written histories because they left little trace in U.S. archives and local memories. Corazón de Dixie uses U.S. sources creatively, but critically depends on archives in Mexico, oral history interviews, and family photographs to unearth not just the facts of Mexicanos' longstanding presence in the U.S. South but also their own expectations, strategies, and dreams.Less
CorazÓn De Dixie : Mexicanos in the U.S. South since 1910
When Latino migration to the U.S. South became increasingly visible in the 1990s, observers and advocates grasped for ways to analyze "new" racial dramas in the absence of historical reference points. However, as this book is the first to comprehensively document, Mexicans and Mexican Americans have a long history of migration to the U.S. South. Their experiences there provide critical lessons to better understand the South's recent changes as well as the larger histories of the United States and Mexico. Corazón de Dixie recounts the untold histories of Mexicanos' migrations to New Orleans, Mississippi, Arkansas, Georgia, and North Carolina as far back as 1910. It follows Mexicans and Mexican Americans into the heart of Dixie, where they navigated the Jim Crow system, cultivated community in the cotton fields, purposefully appealed for help to the Mexican government, shaped the southern conservative imagination in the wake of the civil rights movement, and embraced their own version of suburban living at the turn of the twenty-first century. These migrants remained invisible in prior written histories because they left little trace in U.S. archives and local memories. Corazón de Dixie uses U.S. sources creatively, but critically depends on archives in Mexico, oral history interviews, and family photographs to unearth not just the facts of Mexicanos' longstanding presence in the U.S. South but also their own expectations, strategies, and dreams.
Keywords: Latinos in the South, Mexican Americans, Jim Crow, Race, Mexico, U.S. South, Migration to the U.S. South
This book investigates the history of the Salinas Valley to show how agriculture-centered environments and economies affected the politicization of U.S.-born and immigrant Mexicans in ... More
This book investigates the history of the Salinas Valley to show how agriculture-centered environments and economies affected the politicization of U.S.-born and immigrant Mexicans in twentieth-century California. Located in Monterey County on California's central coast, the Salinas Valley occupied a central place in debates over agribusiness, labor, and immigration policy during the 1960s. Today, the valley's multibillion-dollar agricultural industry, and U.S. agriculture more generally, remains heavily dependent on Latino (mostly Mexican immigrant) labor. This book argues that the Salinas Valley, as an agricultural empire, was a microcosm of key transitions and moments in America's labor, immigration, and Latino history. It examines how Mexican Americans navigated their social place and political identity in an increasingly corporatized agricultural setting, especially in the face of a large influx of Mexican guestworkers brought by the government-sponsored Bracero Program (1942–1964). It also considers how people "became Mexican American" and articulated that identity in agricultural settings, as well as how these Mexican Americans then became Chicanos. Finally, it traces the Chicano Movement's evolution in California.Less
This book investigates the history of the Salinas Valley to show how agriculture-centered environments and economies affected the politicization of U.S.-born and immigrant Mexicans in twentieth-century California. Located in Monterey County on California's central coast, the Salinas Valley occupied a central place in debates over agribusiness, labor, and immigration policy during the 1960s. Today, the valley's multibillion-dollar agricultural industry, and U.S. agriculture more generally, remains heavily dependent on Latino (mostly Mexican immigrant) labor. This book argues that the Salinas Valley, as an agricultural empire, was a microcosm of key transitions and moments in America's labor, immigration, and Latino history. It examines how Mexican Americans navigated their social place and political identity in an increasingly corporatized agricultural setting, especially in the face of a large influx of Mexican guestworkers brought by the government-sponsored Bracero Program (1942–1964). It also considers how people "became Mexican American" and articulated that identity in agricultural settings, as well as how these Mexican Americans then became Chicanos. Finally, it traces the Chicano Movement's evolution in California.
Keywords: agribusiness, Mexicans, California, Salinas Valley, immigration policy, agriculture, Mexican Americans, Bracero Program, Chicanos, Chicano Movement
The Community Service Organization, 1953–1963
This chapter focuses on a local Community Service Organization (CSO) in the Salinas Valley and how it operated in the agriculture-centered environment of the region in the years 1953–1963. It first ... More
This chapter focuses on a local Community Service Organization (CSO) in the Salinas Valley and how it operated in the agriculture-centered environment of the region in the years 1953–1963. It first provides an overview of the beginnings of the CSO chapter in Monterey County, founded by Fred Ross as a platform for Mexican Americans to prove their good citizenship while asserting their right to equal treatment. It then considers the CSO's membership, goals, and trajectory as well as its impact on California's Mexican-origin population and members' attitudes toward braceros and the Bracero Program. It also highlights the CSO's successes and failures, with particular emphasis on its inability to create interracial alliances, involve the larger Mexican-origin community in specific protests, maintain stable leadership, and risk its cultivated image of respectability.Less
This chapter focuses on a local Community Service Organization (CSO) in the Salinas Valley and how it operated in the agriculture-centered environment of the region in the years 1953–1963. It first provides an overview of the beginnings of the CSO chapter in Monterey County, founded by Fred Ross as a platform for Mexican Americans to prove their good citizenship while asserting their right to equal treatment. It then considers the CSO's membership, goals, and trajectory as well as its impact on California's Mexican-origin population and members' attitudes toward braceros and the Bracero Program. It also highlights the CSO's successes and failures, with particular emphasis on its inability to create interracial alliances, involve the larger Mexican-origin community in specific protests, maintain stable leadership, and risk its cultivated image of respectability.
Keywords: citizenship, braceros, Community Service Organization, Salinas Valley, Monterey County, Fred Ross, Mexican Americans, California, Bracero Program
Chicano Labor and Multiracial Politics in Post-World War II Texas: Two Case Studies
Max Krochmal
in Life and Labor in the New New South
10.5744/florida/9780813037950.003.0006
Focusing on two ordinary Chicano workers who became prominent labor, civil rights, and political organizers, this chapter demonstrates that workplace struggles and multiracial alliances with whites ... More
Focusing on two ordinary Chicano workers who became prominent labor, civil rights, and political organizers, this chapter demonstrates that workplace struggles and multiracial alliances with whites and African Americans stood at the center of the broader Mexican American and Chicano movements. The two union organizers, Francisco F. "Pancho" Medrano of Dallas and Arnold Flores of San Antonio, fought discrimination at work and in their unions as well as in the cities in which they lived. They joined and transformed local chapters of well-known ethnic Mexican civil rights organizations, actively supported the African American freedom struggle, and became driving forces in building powerful multiracial coalitions. Their life stories transcend the whiteness arguments and generational framework that have dominated Chicano historiography.Less
Focusing on two ordinary Chicano workers who became prominent labor, civil rights, and political organizers, this chapter demonstrates that workplace struggles and multiracial alliances with whites and African Americans stood at the center of the broader Mexican American and Chicano movements. The two union organizers, Francisco F. "Pancho" Medrano of Dallas and Arnold Flores of San Antonio, fought discrimination at work and in their unions as well as in the cities in which they lived. They joined and transformed local chapters of well-known ethnic Mexican civil rights organizations, actively supported the African American freedom struggle, and became driving forces in building powerful multiracial coalitions. Their life stories transcend the whiteness arguments and generational framework that have dominated Chicano historiography.
Keywords: Chicano/Chicana, civil rights, Francisco F. "Pancho" Medrano, Arnold Flores, black-brown relations, Dallas, San Antonio, Whiteness, Mexican Americans
A Migrating Revolution: Mexican Political Organizers and Their Rejection of American Assimilation, 1920–1940
John H. Flores
in Workers Across the Americas: The Transnational Turn in Labor History
History, World Early Modern History
This chapter examines immigrant political culture, the phenomenon of transnational social movements, and the formation of binational identities through a study of a Midwestern Mexican American ... More
This chapter examines immigrant political culture, the phenomenon of transnational social movements, and the formation of binational identities through a study of a Midwestern Mexican American immigrant community during the first half of the 20th century. It reveals the relationship between international and local politics by reconstructing the history of a segment of the Mexican population of Chicago, which is termed here the "Revolutionary Generation." These political activists, whose ranks included men and women, white-collar workers, blue-collar laborers, and rural folk, formed liberal, conservative, and radical associations in Chicago. As diverse and divisive as these immigrants were, the chapter groups them together as a political generation because their collective ideology was shaped by their experience and understanding of the Mexican Revolution (1910–20). After migrating to Chicago, they began adapting their particular understanding of revolutionary politics to the city with the aim of shaping the identities and influencing the political outlooks of Mexicans residing within the United States. Although various revolutionary factions eventually made their way to Chicago, the chapter focuses on the liberal and radical wings of this political generation and compares them as they evolved outside the borders of the Mexican nation-state.Less
A Migrating Revolution : Mexican Political Organizers and Their Rejection of American Assimilation, 1920–1940
This chapter examines immigrant political culture, the phenomenon of transnational social movements, and the formation of binational identities through a study of a Midwestern Mexican American immigrant community during the first half of the 20th century. It reveals the relationship between international and local politics by reconstructing the history of a segment of the Mexican population of Chicago, which is termed here the "Revolutionary Generation." These political activists, whose ranks included men and women, white-collar workers, blue-collar laborers, and rural folk, formed liberal, conservative, and radical associations in Chicago. As diverse and divisive as these immigrants were, the chapter groups them together as a political generation because their collective ideology was shaped by their experience and understanding of the Mexican Revolution (1910–20). After migrating to Chicago, they began adapting their particular understanding of revolutionary politics to the city with the aim of shaping the identities and influencing the political outlooks of Mexicans residing within the United States. Although various revolutionary factions eventually made their way to Chicago, the chapter focuses on the liberal and radical wings of this political generation and compares them as they evolved outside the borders of the Mexican nation-state.
Keywords: Mexican Americans, immigration, transnational, Mexican Revolution, revolutionary politics
Mexicano Stories and Rural White Narratives: Creating Pro-immigrant Conservatism in Rural Georgia, 1965–2004
in CorazÓn De Dixie: Mexicanos in the U.S. South since 1910
From the 1960s through the 1990s, millions of Mexican immigrants, Tejanos, and Mexican Americans journeyed through the rural U.S. South as agricultural migrant workers and tens of thousands settled ... More
From the 1960s through the 1990s, millions of Mexican immigrants, Tejanos, and Mexican Americans journeyed through the rural U.S. South as agricultural migrant workers and tens of thousands settled there. Chapter Four argues that Mexicanos of this generation arrived to southern Georgia's agricultural areas with diminished expectations of citizenship in the Americas' neoliberal era. Though locals initially treated them as objects of curiosity or hostility, soon influential white employers and church leaders both Catholic and Evangelical framed Mexican migrants' lifestyles as archetypical examples of upright working poor who merited the opportunity to stay in town, earn wages, attend school, and receive charity despite their foreign accents and racial difference. Mexicanos reciprocated the interest, and did not become involved in labor or political organizing, albeit for their own reasons. In this way, a fragile peace around immigration issues settled over southern Georgia and much of the rural agricultural South through the end of the 1990s, even as farmworker organizing and populist anti-immigrant backlash took hold elsewhere in the country during the same period.Less
Mexicano Stories and Rural White Narratives : Creating Pro-immigrant Conservatism in Rural Georgia, 1965–2004
From the 1960s through the 1990s, millions of Mexican immigrants, Tejanos, and Mexican Americans journeyed through the rural U.S. South as agricultural migrant workers and tens of thousands settled there. Chapter Four argues that Mexicanos of this generation arrived to southern Georgia's agricultural areas with diminished expectations of citizenship in the Americas' neoliberal era. Though locals initially treated them as objects of curiosity or hostility, soon influential white employers and church leaders both Catholic and Evangelical framed Mexican migrants' lifestyles as archetypical examples of upright working poor who merited the opportunity to stay in town, earn wages, attend school, and receive charity despite their foreign accents and racial difference. Mexicanos reciprocated the interest, and did not become involved in labor or political organizing, albeit for their own reasons. In this way, a fragile peace around immigration issues settled over southern Georgia and much of the rural agricultural South through the end of the 1990s, even as farmworker organizing and populist anti-immigrant backlash took hold elsewhere in the country during the same period.
Keywords: Conservatism, Georgia, Farmworkers, Migrant workers, Mexicans, Mexican Americans, Anti-immigrant, Neoliberalism, Evangelicals, Tejanos
The Farmworker Movement in the Post-Bracero Era
This chapter examines the farmworker movement in the Salinas Valley after the termination of the Bracero Program. It first considers the rise of Cesar Chavez and his United Farm Workers Organizing ... More
This chapter examines the farmworker movement in the Salinas Valley after the termination of the Bracero Program. It first considers the rise of Cesar Chavez and his United Farm Workers Organizing Committee (UFWOC) and the lawsuits filed by Salinas farmworkers with the help of the California Rural Legal Assistance. It then explores how the continued importation of braceros in what was supposed to be a post-bracero era affected Salinas's farmworkers, the majority of whom were Mexican Americans. It also discusses the legal actions and victories of Salinas farmworkers against growers who sought to continue importing braceros and prevent their employees from joining the UFWOC. These legal actions and victories, the chapter argues, were evidence of the farmworker movement's revival in the Salinas Valley.Less
This chapter examines the farmworker movement in the Salinas Valley after the termination of the Bracero Program. It first considers the rise of Cesar Chavez and his United Farm Workers Organizing Committee (UFWOC) and the lawsuits filed by Salinas farmworkers with the help of the California Rural Legal Assistance. It then explores how the continued importation of braceros in what was supposed to be a post-bracero era affected Salinas's farmworkers, the majority of whom were Mexican Americans. It also discusses the legal actions and victories of Salinas farmworkers against growers who sought to continue importing braceros and prevent their employees from joining the UFWOC. These legal actions and victories, the chapter argues, were evidence of the farmworker movement's revival in the Salinas Valley.
Keywords: farmworker movement, Salinas Valley, Bracero Program, Cesar Chavez, United Farm Workers Organizing Committee, lawsuits, farmworkers, California Rural Legal Assistance, braceros, Mexican Americans
A Blossoming of Red Flags: The Salinas UFWOC Strike of 1970
This chapter examines the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee's (UFWOC) 1970 strike in the Salinas Valley and the various groups of UFWOC allies and detractors involved. It first considers the ... More
This chapter examines the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee's (UFWOC) 1970 strike in the Salinas Valley and the various groups of UFWOC allies and detractors involved. It first considers the circumstances that led to the strike before discussing the strike in more detail. In particular, it analyzes the battle between Cesar Chavez's supporters, including farmworkers, and opponents as hundreds of incidents of violence erupted between the UFWOC and Teamsters Union during the strike's initial weeks. It also explores the various tactics employed by growers in response to the strike, the racial violence that erupted, the involvement of women such as Ethel Kennedy and Coretta Scott King, and the unprecedented cooperation seen between Mexican Americans and Mexicans.Less
A Blossoming of Red Flags : The Salinas UFWOC Strike of 1970
This chapter examines the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee's (UFWOC) 1970 strike in the Salinas Valley and the various groups of UFWOC allies and detractors involved. It first considers the circumstances that led to the strike before discussing the strike in more detail. In particular, it analyzes the battle between Cesar Chavez's supporters, including farmworkers, and opponents as hundreds of incidents of violence erupted between the UFWOC and Teamsters Union during the strike's initial weeks. It also explores the various tactics employed by growers in response to the strike, the racial violence that erupted, the involvement of women such as Ethel Kennedy and Coretta Scott King, and the unprecedented cooperation seen between Mexican Americans and Mexicans.
Keywords: strike, United Farm Workers Organizing Committee, Cesar Chavez, farmworkers, Teamsters Union, racial violence, women, Mexican Americans, Mexicans, Salinas Valley
¡Ya Basta! Latino/a Protestant Activism in the Chicano/a and Farm Workers Movements
Paul Barton
in Latino Religions and Civic Activism in the United States
This chapter examines the responses of los Protestantes in the US Southwest to the Chicano/a and farm worker movements, illuminating their role in the public arena during the last thirty-five years. ... More
This chapter examines the responses of los Protestantes in the US Southwest to the Chicano/a and farm worker movements, illuminating their role in the public arena during the last thirty-five years. The primary goals are: firstly, to highlight the catalytic ability of a cadre of Chicano/a "mainline" Protestant leaders to move their churches and ecclesial organizations to endorse and support the Chicano/a and farm worker movements in Texas from the 1960s until the early 1980s; and secondly, to examine the three basic responses of Latino/a Protestants to these social justice movements (solidarity, ambivalence and indifference, and opposition). As the Chicano/a Protestants led their church co-faithful into the public struggle of these popular movements, they caused a realignment of loyalties among a number of "mainline" Latino/a Protestants. Ethnic affiliation became as important to them as their denominational affiliation. Additionally, they promoted a theological understanding of the Gospel that embraced the oppressed and viewed the kingdom of God as a goal to strive for in contemporary society.Less
This chapter examines the responses of los Protestantes in the US Southwest to the Chicano/a and farm worker movements, illuminating their role in the public arena during the last thirty-five years. The primary goals are: firstly, to highlight the catalytic ability of a cadre of Chicano/a "mainline" Protestant leaders to move their churches and ecclesial organizations to endorse and support the Chicano/a and farm worker movements in Texas from the 1960s until the early 1980s; and secondly, to examine the three basic responses of Latino/a Protestants to these social justice movements (solidarity, ambivalence and indifference, and opposition). As the Chicano/a Protestants led their church co-faithful into the public struggle of these popular movements, they caused a realignment of loyalties among a number of "mainline" Latino/a Protestants. Ethnic affiliation became as important to them as their denominational affiliation. Additionally, they promoted a theological understanding of the Gospel that embraced the oppressed and viewed the kingdom of God as a goal to strive for in contemporary society.
Keywords: Mexican American Protestants, farm worker movements, social movements, Southwest
"The Lord Requires Justice": Lessons on Leadership from the African American Church for Mexican American Catholics
Alberto López Pulido and Santos C. Vega
In an attempt to understand the relationship between religion and political leadership for Mexican American Roman Catholics, this chapter compares and contrasts a Mexican American Roman Catholic ... More
In an attempt to understand the relationship between religion and political leadership for Mexican American Roman Catholics, this chapter compares and contrasts a Mexican American Roman Catholic Church with an African American Baptist Church to demonstrate strategies for political and civic engagement implemented by the African American Church. These experiences serve as examples and teachings that Mexican American Roman Catholics can learn in order to foster and increase civic and political involvement in their communities. The chapter presents a structural, historical, and theological analysis of both religious institutions. It concludes by underscoring the important role and function of the national parish in the history of the American Catholic Church, the Cursillo and National Encuentro movements. It recommends these institutional strategies as viable avenues for political and civic engagement for Mexican American Roman Catholics in the United States.Less
Alberto López PulidoSantos C. Vega
In an attempt to understand the relationship between religion and political leadership for Mexican American Roman Catholics, this chapter compares and contrasts a Mexican American Roman Catholic Church with an African American Baptist Church to demonstrate strategies for political and civic engagement implemented by the African American Church. These experiences serve as examples and teachings that Mexican American Roman Catholics can learn in order to foster and increase civic and political involvement in their communities. The chapter presents a structural, historical, and theological analysis of both religious institutions. It concludes by underscoring the important role and function of the national parish in the history of the American Catholic Church, the Cursillo and National Encuentro movements. It recommends these institutional strategies as viable avenues for political and civic engagement for Mexican American Roman Catholics in the United States.
Keywords: Mexican American Roman Catholics, religion, political leadership, African American Baptists, civic involvement, national parish
Mexican Americans or Coconuts? Middle-Class Minority and American Identities
in Barrios to Burbs: The Making of the Mexican American Middle Class
10.11126/stanford/9780804781398.003.0005
Sociology, Migration Studies (including Refugee Studies)
A comparison of middle-class Mexican Americans from different class backgrounds and generations will reveal the nuances of ethnic identity. According to traditional assimilation theorists, ... More
A comparison of middle-class Mexican Americans from different class backgrounds and generations will reveal the nuances of ethnic identity. According to traditional assimilation theorists, structurally incorporated immigrants and their descendants will exhibit fading patterns of ethnicity and identify with whites, the dominant group. However, the Mexican American middle-class category includes individuals who adopt a variety of ethnic identities, from Latino to American, Mexican, and Mexican American. These socially constructed identities are shaped by class background, a component of ethnic identity that has received little attention. By interacting with whites as well as with coethnics within and outside the ethnic community, especially in the workplace, middle-class Mexican Americans exhibit class and generational differences in ethnic identification that enable others to determine what side of the ethnic boundary they belong. Ultimately, Mexican Americans who were raised in middle-class households will follow a path of linear assimilation and crossing boundaries with middle-class whites. In contrast, those who grew up in poor households and communities will follow a minority pathway into the middle class.Less
A comparison of middle-class Mexican Americans from different class backgrounds and generations will reveal the nuances of ethnic identity. According to traditional assimilation theorists, structurally incorporated immigrants and their descendants will exhibit fading patterns of ethnicity and identify with whites, the dominant group. However, the Mexican American middle-class category includes individuals who adopt a variety of ethnic identities, from Latino to American, Mexican, and Mexican American. These socially constructed identities are shaped by class background, a component of ethnic identity that has received little attention. By interacting with whites as well as with coethnics within and outside the ethnic community, especially in the workplace, middle-class Mexican Americans exhibit class and generational differences in ethnic identification that enable others to determine what side of the ethnic boundary they belong. Ultimately, Mexican Americans who were raised in middle-class households will follow a path of linear assimilation and crossing boundaries with middle-class whites. In contrast, those who grew up in poor households and communities will follow a minority pathway into the middle class.
Keywords: Mexican Americans, middle class, whites, assimilation, ethnic identity, immigrants, class background, ethnicity
Rachel St. John
in Line in the Sand: A History of the Western U.S.-Mexico Border
History, American History: early to 18th Century
This introductory chapter provides a history of the U.S.–Mexico border. Long before the border existed as a physical or legal reality it began to take form in the minds of Mexicans and Americans who ... More
This introductory chapter provides a history of the U.S.–Mexico border. Long before the border existed as a physical or legal reality it began to take form in the minds of Mexicans and Americans who looked to maps of North America to think about what their republics were and what they might someday become. Their competing territorial visions brought the United States and Mexico to war in 1846. Less than two years later, the border emerged from the crucible of that war. With U.S. soldiers occupying the Mexican capital, a group of Mexican and American diplomats redrew the map of North America. In the east, they chose the Rio Grande, settling a decade-old debate about Texas's southern border and dividing the communities that had long lived along the river. In the west, they did something different; they drew a line across a map and conjured up an entirely new space where there had not been one before.Less
This introductory chapter provides a history of the U.S.–Mexico border. Long before the border existed as a physical or legal reality it began to take form in the minds of Mexicans and Americans who looked to maps of North America to think about what their republics were and what they might someday become. Their competing territorial visions brought the United States and Mexico to war in 1846. Less than two years later, the border emerged from the crucible of that war. With U.S. soldiers occupying the Mexican capital, a group of Mexican and American diplomats redrew the map of North America. In the east, they chose the Rio Grande, settling a decade-old debate about Texas's southern border and dividing the communities that had long lived along the river. In the west, they did something different; they drew a line across a map and conjured up an entirely new space where there had not been one before.
Keywords: U.S.–Mexico border, Mexicans, Americans, territorial visions, Mexican–American War, North America, Rio Grande
Spiritual Affirmation and Empowerment: The Mexican American Cultural Center
Socorro Castañeda-Liles
This study of Mexican Americans demonstrates that, despite the structural problems of the US Catholic Church, US Latina/o Catholics find empowerment through spiritual affirmation. Latino/a practices ... More
This study of Mexican Americans demonstrates that, despite the structural problems of the US Catholic Church, US Latina/o Catholics find empowerment through spiritual affirmation. Latino/a practices of faith and the search for a respected space in the US Catholic Church are transforming this social institution. This chapter presents a sociological analysis of the life histories of Mexican Americans using religion as a theoretical lens. First, it sketches the social movements with ties to the Mexican American Cultural Center (MACC). Next, it addresses the reasons behind the founding of the cultural center and discusses women's contributions. Then it explores two ways through which Mexican American Catholics have exercised their voice and agency to claim a religious space in the US Catholic Church from which social change is envisioned. The first of these is through Virgilio Elizondo's Mexican American Catholic theological influence on MACC. In the second section on symbolic capital, Pierre Bourdieu's theories of symbolic and social capital are used to explore three ways that Mexican American Catholicism challenges the exclusionary history of the religious institution.Less
This study of Mexican Americans demonstrates that, despite the structural problems of the US Catholic Church, US Latina/o Catholics find empowerment through spiritual affirmation. Latino/a practices of faith and the search for a respected space in the US Catholic Church are transforming this social institution. This chapter presents a sociological analysis of the life histories of Mexican Americans using religion as a theoretical lens. First, it sketches the social movements with ties to the Mexican American Cultural Center (MACC). Next, it addresses the reasons behind the founding of the cultural center and discusses women's contributions. Then it explores two ways through which Mexican American Catholics have exercised their voice and agency to claim a religious space in the US Catholic Church from which social change is envisioned. The first of these is through Virgilio Elizondo's Mexican American Catholic theological influence on MACC. In the second section on symbolic capital, Pierre Bourdieu's theories of symbolic and social capital are used to explore three ways that Mexican American Catholicism challenges the exclusionary history of the religious institution.
Keywords: social change, Mexican American Catholics, Catholic Church, spiritual affirmation, social movements
Mexican Americans: A Second Generation at Risk
David E. López and Ricardo D. Stanton-Salazar
in Ethnicities: Children of Immigrants in America
10.1525/california/9780520230118.003.0003
This chapter tells the story of the new Mexican-origin second generation, drawing from the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study (CILS) surveys of Mexican-American youth in San Diego, U.S. Census ... More
This chapter tells the story of the new Mexican-origin second generation, drawing from the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study (CILS) surveys of Mexican-American youth in San Diego, U.S. Census data, and other related research. It examines the trajectory of socioeconomic adaptation and advancement for this rapidly growing segment of the population. The chapter focuses on California, because the Mexican-American CILS sample comes from San Diego and because immigration and settlement, and the children who result from it, have a greater impact in California than in the rest of the United States. It discusses race and perceived discrimination among Mexican Americans, and reviews the socioeconomic status and accomplishments of second-generation Mexican Americans, from the school and labor-force accomplishments of an earlier second generation through the school performance of second-generation youth in San Diego and California today.Less
Mexican Americans : A Second Generation at Risk
David E. LópezRicardo D. Stanton-Salazar
This chapter tells the story of the new Mexican-origin second generation, drawing from the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study (CILS) surveys of Mexican-American youth in San Diego, U.S. Census data, and other related research. It examines the trajectory of socioeconomic adaptation and advancement for this rapidly growing segment of the population. The chapter focuses on California, because the Mexican-American CILS sample comes from San Diego and because immigration and settlement, and the children who result from it, have a greater impact in California than in the rest of the United States. It discusses race and perceived discrimination among Mexican Americans, and reviews the socioeconomic status and accomplishments of second-generation Mexican Americans, from the school and labor-force accomplishments of an earlier second generation through the school performance of second-generation youth in San Diego and California today.
Keywords: CILS, Mexican-American youth, San Diego, California, socioeconomic status, school, labor force, immigration, settlement
A New Significance: Re-Envisioning the History of the American West
Clyde A. Milner (ed.)
This book presents a view of the history of the American West at the end of the 20th century. It is a systematic assessment of the current state of Western history. The book covers major new areas of ... More
This book presents a view of the history of the American West at the end of the 20th century. It is a systematic assessment of the current state of Western history. The book covers major new areas of emphasis. The debate over the history of the American West has become as energetic as the older debate over the meaning of the frontier in American history. Contrived confrontations are tedious, but legitimate intellectual inquiry can be exciting. Other voices need to be included in this intellectual conversation. For this reason, scholars of diverse backgrounds and interests have written shorter chapters that respond to one of the seven major chapters. Native Americans, Mexican Americans, Asia and Asian Americans, gender, the natural environment, human perception, and the role of the West itself in America's history are all vital subjects.Less
A New Significance : Re-Envisioning the History of the American West
This book presents a view of the history of the American West at the end of the 20th century. It is a systematic assessment of the current state of Western history. The book covers major new areas of emphasis. The debate over the history of the American West has become as energetic as the older debate over the meaning of the frontier in American history. Contrived confrontations are tedious, but legitimate intellectual inquiry can be exciting. Other voices need to be included in this intellectual conversation. For this reason, scholars of diverse backgrounds and interests have written shorter chapters that respond to one of the seven major chapters. Native Americans, Mexican Americans, Asia and Asian Americans, gender, the natural environment, human perception, and the role of the West itself in America's history are all vital subjects.
Keywords: American West, 20th century, history, Frederick Jackson Turner, frontier, gender, Native Americans, Mexican Americans, Asian Americans
Fighting the Segregation Amendment: Black and Mexican American Responses to Proposition 14 in Los Angeles
Max Felker-Kantor
in Black and Brown in Los Angeles: Beyond Conflict and Coalition
This chapter focuses on the responses of African Americans and Mexican Americans to Proposition 14—dubbed the antifair housing initiative—in Los Angeles, with particular emphasis on the interracial ... More
This chapter focuses on the responses of African Americans and Mexican Americans to Proposition 14—dubbed the antifair housing initiative—in Los Angeles, with particular emphasis on the interracial cooperation and tension that marked the battle against the proposed amendment to California's constitution that allowed homeowners and landlords to sell or rent—or refuse to sell or rent—their property to anyone they wished. Proposition 14 was an effort in 1964 to basically overturn California's Rumford Fair Housing Act and to open the door once again to residential segregation. Activists, especially in the African American community, developed an intensive campaign to overturn the initiative. Early plans calling for cooperation with Mexican Americans never materialized. This chapter shows that Blacks were able to overcome their class divisions and close ranks in the fight against Proposition 14, whereas Mexican American remained a split community and vote.Less
Fighting the Segregation Amendment : Black and Mexican American Responses to Proposition 14 in Los Angeles
This chapter focuses on the responses of African Americans and Mexican Americans to Proposition 14—dubbed the antifair housing initiative—in Los Angeles, with particular emphasis on the interracial cooperation and tension that marked the battle against the proposed amendment to California's constitution that allowed homeowners and landlords to sell or rent—or refuse to sell or rent—their property to anyone they wished. Proposition 14 was an effort in 1964 to basically overturn California's Rumford Fair Housing Act and to open the door once again to residential segregation. Activists, especially in the African American community, developed an intensive campaign to overturn the initiative. Early plans calling for cooperation with Mexican Americans never materialized. This chapter shows that Blacks were able to overcome their class divisions and close ranks in the fight against Proposition 14, whereas Mexican American remained a split community and vote.
Keywords: residential segregation, African Americans, Mexican Americans, Proposition 14, housing, Los Angeles, interracial cooperation, California, Rumford Fair Housing Act, class divisions