Week 13: VSI Chapters 3-5 Reading Questions

For Monday's class, please read Chapter 3 of American Immigration: A Very Short Introduction, and prepare written answers to the following questions:

• Why did World War II cause America to rethink its immigration policies? (45)
• What was the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952? (46)
• What was the refugee situation at the end of World War II? (46) And why did the U.S. feel the need to do something about it? (47)
• What is the Displaced Persons Act of 1948? (47)
• What is presidential parole power, and how did Eisenhower use it? (47)
• How were Cuban and Vietnamese refugees able to integrate so rapidly? (48)
• What led to the overturning of the quota system? (48-49)
• What did the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act do? (51-52)
• What were the unintended consequences of the law? (53)
• What does the book say studies have shown about the link between immigration and crime? (54)
• What caused the huge rise in illegal immigration from Mexico? (56)
• What attitudes changed and what laws were enacted because of the recession of the 1980s? (62)
• What did George W. Bush do? (63)

For Wednesday's class, please read Part II, Chapter 4 of American Immigration: A Very Short Introduction.

• What roles did mass literacy, cheap mass-produced publications, and state postal systems play in 19th and early 20th immigration? What plays those roles now? (66)
• What traits to immigrants have that lend themselves to economic and social integration and why do they have these traits? (67 and 85)
• How many people resided outside their birth countries in 2005? What percentage of the world's population is that? (68)
• Were, besides the United States, are people migrating to, and why? (69)
• What was the historical purpose of international migration between 1820 and 1924? (73)
• Why did peasants and traditional craftsmen end up living the proletarian life of wage earners in the slums of industrial cities? (75-79)
• In the 19th century, what drew immigrants to the United States? (80)
• What altered the character of immigrants after 1890? (81)
• How did Europeans who re-emigrated influence the immigration restriction debate? (83)
• What immigration was happening on the Pacific Coast at this time? (84)
• Is mass immigration chaotic or routine and predictable? (84)

For Friday's class, please read Chapter 5 of American Immigration: A Very Short Introduction.

• What made the third massive wave of immigration to the United States possible? (86)
• List the three factors that have made the United States so attractive. (87)
• Describe the nationalization of immigration. (88-89)
• What is notable able Asian (90) and Hispanic populations (91)?
• What did the 1965 immigration law give high priority to in granting visas? (92)
• How does Mira Flores in the Dominican Republic relate to the Boston area? (92-93)
• How are most of today's immigrants different from those of the past? (93)
• If the popular image of immigrants is blue collar workers, what is the reality by numbers? (94)
• What are problems for those not in the country legally? (96)
• Why are women predominate in modern migration streams? (97) And how have gender roles changed as a consequence? (98-99)
• What has the Philippines done to encourage emigration? (98)
• Why do people immigrate only to take jobs for which they are over qualified (i.e. downward mobility)? (99)