POVERTY
Immigration is motivated and often forced by a number of reasons, all stemming from a core desire of a better life. Poverty is one such reason with a large number of individuals leaving their home country in hopes of elevating their economic status, and often, the economic status of their families back home.
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“The man’s name was Geichi Shimoda. Okamoto helped Geiichi select the perfect flowers. He thought of his daughter back home and asked Geiichi if he had a wife. He did not. He asked if Geiichi would be interested in marrying his daughter. He showed him a photograph.” [B]
The Grave on the Wall can be described as the all-encompassing experience of immigration tied to the family of Brandon Shimoda and their origins. In the previous line and throughout the book, we are introduced to the practice of picture brides that brought Shimoda’s grandparents and their lineage to the United States.
"Japanese men in British Columbia., the majority of whom had reached marriageable age and had been unable to achieve their goal of returning to Japan with sufficient capital to purchase some land or to begin a small business, sought wives. They hoped that their lives would become more comfortable and that together they could achieve their dreams sooner." [1]
Similar to many processes of immigration found in the present day and in the past, the motivations behind the practice of the Japanese picture bride stems from desires to move up economically. With Japanese men already immigrating to North America in hopes of leaving their financial status back home and finding work in the west, they are often only met with alienation and lower wages. As described in the line above, picture brides eventually become a product of the Japanse immigration of men to the west and the desire to “move up the ladder” in terms of economic status.
WAR & CONFLICT
War, whether it be between cultures, ethnicities, or different countries, is one of the biggest factors that motivate immigration. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, in 2015, 65.3 million people were forcibly displaced as a result of persecution, conflict, generalized violence, or human rights violations. [1] Immigrants who come from places ravaged by war, often find their familiar homelands turn into unfamiliar landscapes of destruction.
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“My mother’s mother put a hand over my mother’s mouth, but my mother saw, peeking between the slats of the cart, row after row of women tied to the border trees. ‘Their stomachs were cut out,’ said my Mother.” [A]
As demonstrated in the line above, Bhanu Kapi’s Schizhophrene displays the brutal and grotesque violence that ensues as a result of the Partition of India. The conflict that occurs in this fragment of memory also becomes a backdrop to the themes of immigration we find in Schizophrene, with the violence that takes part in the partition being one of the main reasons why Kapil’s family ends up migrating out of India. In Schizophrene, the violence that takes place as a result of the partition is seemingly tied in with the experiences of immigration and assimilation, as if war back home is tied to a new war of assimilation and alienation in this new landscape. In hindsight, without war, there is often no need to relocate and later endure the tribulations that come with immigration. This statement in and of itself seems to be too broad and ignorant of other causes motivating immigration. Instead, it seems as if being a victim of war brands an immigrant as war itself, and thus leading to wrongful associations to violence which subsequently leads to xenophobic and racist behavior.
As demonstrated in this glimpse of the Partition of India in Schizophrene, displays of violence are often at the basis of why groups of individuals flee the country, seeking safety and belonging. In the present-day, conflicts in South America, Africa, and the Middle East have led to large populations seeking the exact same sense of safety and belonging. El Salvador is one of the many Latin American countries that has become a source for migrants fleeing the country in hopes of finding a better life in the U.S. For not only El Salvadorians fleeing the country, but also any other immigrant seeking safety, their journeys to western, more stabilized countries are often met with resistance and denial.
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“It all goes back to a civil war that started in 1980. For 12 years, communist-leaning guerrillas fought against American-backed military forces who committed vicious atrocities against civilians. Because of the war, hundreds of thousands sought asylum in the U.S. It’s there, on the streets of Los Angeles, that many young men were introduced to gang culture. Then, after a peace treaty in 1992, the U.S deported thousands of hardened gang members back.”
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[2]
Ironically, many of these conflicts that force individuals out of the country stems from past western imperialism or interventions that destabilize these areas. The violence in the Partition of India is a byproduct of British colonialism and the division between Hindu and Muslim populations in the subcontinent. As mentioned in the video, the barrios of El Salvador have become ravaged by gang bloodshed - a result of U.S intervention. In a way, an immigrant is seemingly in contact with war, in both the homeland and their new landscape. “It is psychotic to draw a line between two places,” [A] to suggest that these two places are different based on how we understand war.
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SOCIETY & GENDER
Post-colonial nations ideally attempt to clear the negative effects of colonization on its society while trying to keep the positive. However, the changes are complex and difficult to remove. Cultural changes injected by the British into India during colonization clung despite some people’s efforts to be rid of them. The civil bloodshed between Hindus and Muslims after the Indian independence deepened the divide between India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh.
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"The colonial state was probably never intended to bear the burden of modern statehood that was thrust upon it. These were, after all, conquest states, their external boundaries defined by international rivalry." [1]
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Once upon a time, “the practice of [Hinduism and Islam] came close to blending into one.” [2] However, the arrival of European colonizers interrupted this syncretism. Drawing arbitrary boundaries between people kept colonies organized, but it also divided a people once united. The struggle for independence tore any bits of unity left between Hindus and Muslims in British India. The resulting partition between India and Pakistan came with slaughter and rape.
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“My mother’s mother put a hand over my mother’s mouth, but my mother saw, peeking between the slats of the cart, row after row of women tied to the border trees. ‘Their stomachs were cut out,’ said my mother.” [A]
Women and children often made easy targets for the oppressor. The description from Kapil’s poem book, Schizophrene, describe how a society’s unraveling can brutalize women and children specifically. Gender is inseparable from the toll such a magnanimous event takes on the population. Its treatment of the topic is relevant because the harmful effects on society are not isolated to one area. Violence is presented in all its forms, ranging from explicit slaughter to less visible mental disorders. The human cost of civil strife exceeds the casualty rate. It encompasses all the women who feel unsafe going outdoors, the “vertical graves” of physically fit but mentally drained persons.
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Events like these motivate some immigration from former colonies to former colonizers. To regain the sanity in life that they had lost, those worst affected by the horrors of abrupt decolonization uproot themselves and move. They carry with them the parts of themselves they want to be rid of too: prejudice, weakness, and self-doubt. They willingly relinquish attachment to their homeland, an action once unthinkable.