Two sides to every immigration story
On the relationship between America and immigrants
No matter how I feel about immigrants themselves (and, for the record, I feel great about immigrants!), I would be pro-immigration for one obvious policy reason: The United States was built on and continues to thrive because of immigration.1 There’s just simply no other way to look at it.
Except this way: “Those people” look strange, they talk funny, they worship different, they eat stinky, so they can’t possibly be Americans.
The thing is, almost every American family that can remember their origins has stories about how their ancestors were disliked and, at best, tolerated when they first came to America. The American culture they joined was xenophobic, suspicious, and at the same time, sure it was the very best country in the world.
The expat life in relief
As a young woman, just finished with graduate school in Reagan’s America, I decided I was going to give up on this country. I went to Paris, where I was going to live as an expatriate writer (how romantic!). Instead, I learned one thing about myself: I’m an American. I started to quote Buckaroo Banzai:
“No matter where you go, there you are.”
Because wherever I went, I was born of the mélange that is America. My ancestors included engineers and rednecks, Catholics and Protestants, explorers and homebodies. Our family lore, like many white Americans, included a purported adopted Native American. And like many Americans, I didn’t just accept my mixed-up heritage—I embraced it. I was proud to be part of a culture founded on an ideal that we can be the person we want to be, anyone can work to get ahead, everyone should follow their dreams. I had followed my dreams to California for college, and I left my heart bleeding on the streets of San Francisco.
I came home.
Minibabbling on immigration
In the past few months, I interviewed two women with roots in Jamaica. One was Sharon Sewell-Fairman, the subject of last month’s full episode, A grandmother’s legacy: Sharon Sewell-Fairman finds her voice. The other was an interview that I did for WINGS Radio with Caribbean feminist Peggy Antrobus, “Caribbean Wisdom to Save Our World.” Sharon emigrated as a child, following her grandmother and mother to America, the land of opportunity. Peggy stayed in the Caribbean, working for the Jamaican government and setting eventually in Barbados. She has spent her life writing about and fighting for the social and economic health of the small island nations that have nurtured her.
I just published a Minibabble (short episode of The Babblery) incorporating their voices. Although they were interviewed separately about two different subjects, both of their stories were deeply intertwined with emigration and immigration. Peggy watched her family members leave; Sharon is the one who left others behind.
Listen to the Minibabble:
I hope you enjoy this interwoven conversation about the love and care of home and the will to move toward a new environment where you can thrive. (If you like to listen in your podcast app, please click here to subscribe.)
Immigration is not a simple issue. As I found out, it takes incredible determination to leave behind the country of your birth. Personally, I couldn’t do it. I returned to California with a new humility about my conflicted relationship with Reagan’s America. I also returned with a newfound admiration for people who seek The Big Rock Candy Mountains at all costs.
America was built by immigrants, and we will be less now that so many are being expelled or kept out. Immigrants give back to their countries of origin in such complex ways, from the remissions they send that bolster the economies of small nations to the innovative science and creative arts that they share with the whole world. This is a trying time in America, but because I’m a hopeful person, I still see immigration in our future.
How has immigration affected you or your family?
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I thought I was 'new' to LA. My grandad came there in the 1920s - from the east side of Canada. My dad was 'born' in LA. As it turns out, our family came from France earlier then the Mayflower - To Canada, not the US.