A Different Mirror and the Prologue in the New Americans (Essay Sample)

A Different Mirror and the Prologue in the New Americans
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A Different Mirror and the Prologue in the New Americans
The book, "A Different Mirror" by Ronald Takaki focuses on outlining the American history by discussing different ethnic groups. These ethnic groups include Native Americans, Jews, Irish Americans, Asian Americans, African Americans and others. Ronald Takaki discusses the meaning of being an American, by outlining historical perspective. This book creates understanding of the U.S through presentation of multicultural perspective (Stefoff & Takaki, 2012). The writer concentrated on identifying the disagreement between and among individuals to evaluate how the state of mind develops that sets one group against another. In this section, this paper concentrate on presenting ways in which labor exploitation and legalized racial discrimination affected building of the United States, by focusing on Native Americans, Irish Americans, Mexican Americans, Chinese Americans, Japanese Americans, African Americans, and Jewish Americans.
Labor exploitation played an important role in the building of the United States. Due to the presence of many people seeking for employment in various fields owned by Americans, people from different ethnic background give unfair treatments by their employers (Stefoff & Takaki, 2012). Although people from different ethnic groups could be employed to work in the same field, by the same employers, they were treated differently depending on their ethnic background. Depending on the ethnic background of individuals, different laborers offered different wage rates. In most cases, Native Americans were favored (Wurl, 2004). They were given better salaries compared to another laborer from ethnic groups.
As a result of wage discrimination, laborers from different ethnic background felt aggrieved and, as a result, they focused on repelling against their employers. In order for all individuals from different ethnic background to be heard, they organized strikes that would force their employers stop wage discrimination (Stefoff & Takaki, 2012). Since many ethnic groups were affected by wage discrimination, they all came together in order to achieve a common goal. Labor exploitation led people from different background to collaborate. This collaboration helped most people, from different ethnic background, realize the importance of maintaining unity in the fight against oppression (Wurl, 2004). This helped people realize that, in America, people need to work together despite their ethnic background.
In order for their employers to hear their grievances, laborers from different ethnic background formed a union through which they would be able to air their complaints (Wurl, 2004). The act of different people coming together due to unfair treatment by their employers means that the labor exploitation played a significant contribution in building the United States (Stefoff & Takaki, 2012). It is through labor exploitation that people from different backgrounds united and worked toward realizing a common objective. This is important in promoting ethnic solidarity in the country. In any country that has different ethnic groups, must ethnic solidarity. The reason is that, for any country to grow and develop; people need to work together, despite their cultural background, view, creed and color of their skin (Wurl, 2004). Thus, labor exploitation led to ethnic solidarity that is essential in building the United States.
Just like labor exploitation, legalized racial discrimination made a significant contribution in the building of the United States. According to Ronald Takaki, there was racial discrimination in America since there were many people in the country who came from different races (Wurl, 2004). There existed racial prejudice in the Armed Forces, employment opportunity and the labor market. According to Takaki, racial tension increased when after Japanese planes were attached. Increase in racial tension helped in brings people from different racial background together, in a way; most people would never have imagined (Stefoff & Takaki, 2012). Mexican, Japanese, African, Chinese, and Native Americans created national identities, endeavored to get rid of racial prejudice and made a contribution in economic and political atmosphere of the 20th century. Before Pearl Harbor attack, people from different races were discriminated against. In most cases, the white were considered superior while people from other races were viewed the alien (Wurl, 2004). Japanese Americans were considered dangerous forcing the government officials to sent the to captivity camps, leaving most of their possessions behind.
After Pearl Harbor attack, people from different races, including Native American realized that the country is at great danger if the whole population remains divided (Wurl, 2004). Although it was not easy for Native American to allow people from other races to enjoy the available opportunities, especially in the military, other races decided to end racial discrimination and in the end, the Native American had no choice but to start treating people from other races with respect. With time people from different races began to see the importance of promoting unity in order to ensure that the country continue to grow and develop (Stefoff & Takaki, 2012). Regardless of their background, people from different races started to make their full contribution in order to ensure that the country is progressing economically and politically (Wurl, 2004). This means that legalized racial discrimination played an important role in the building of the United States. Without having legalized racial discrimination at some point, it could have been impossible for people in America see the danger (Pearl Harbor attack) of racial discrimination. Thus, legalized racial discrimination helped in eliminating racial discrimination.
An example of labor exploitation effecting different ethnic groups is that Mexican Americans fought labor exploitation; Their employers always favored native Americans; African Americans were considered slaves by Americans; Irish Americans joined Mexican in resisting changes; Chinese Americans were very innovative while fighting for justice on matters related to labor exploitation; while Japanese Americans were considered hard to deal with, and Jewish Americans collaborated with other workers from different ethnic group (Stefoff & Takaki, 2012).
Native Americans treated people from other ethnic groups as alien; African Americans were viewed as people who cannot occupy a leadership position; Irish Americans and Chinese Americans and Japanese Americans were seen as troublemakers, Mexican Americans were not allowed to join the military, and Jewish Americans were not allowed to join armed forces (Stefoff & Takaki, 2012).
There are numerous lessons that can be leant from contemporary experiences of Ruben Martinez from the book "The New Americans." Ruben Martinez was not a Native American, but he made much contribution through his work (as an author, journalist, and musician) in inspiring people in building of the U.S. today. Martinez concentrated on globalization and immigrant life as well as political and cultural history of Los Angeles, A city in United States.
In his book, book “The New Americans,” Martinez focuses on the changing pattern of migration in the country. He gave a narrative of seven families who were migrating to ...