Immigrants, both legal and illegal experience a myriad of problems in their host countries. Most of their tribulations stem from the fact that they are regarded as strangers and therefore do not fit in their new setting. One of the reasons why immigrants move to other countries is to find a better life that is better than where they emanated from. Others move due to the inevitable reasons of war, political instability, and diseases among others. However, once they are in the host countries, they find it difficult to incorporate themselves into the environment and experience problems such as discrimination, low wages, and nostalgia among others. The children of the immigrants also experience a major challenge of being socialized into two different cultures. According to Simmel, (1971), various sociological perspectives attempt to develop a critical analysis of how and why these individuals are faced with problems in their new environment. The theories focus on the sociological reasons why the host nation is unlikely to welcome the immigrants and in turn subject them to antisocial practices such as discrimination, oppression, and seclusion.
Immigrants Experience according To Simmel’s Conceptualization
Simmel begins by giving the analogy of attachment and detachment in analyzing the position of the immigrant in the host country. The sociological concept of a ‘'stranger'' stems from the concept of either being attached or detached. The immigrant is viewed as a wanderer who has come and stayed in the host country. The immigrant is furthered viewed as a wanderer who has found a place to stay in or fixed within a certain jurisdictional area. The strangeness that comes with being an immigrant is regarded as a positive relationship because it gives an individual a basis for interaction. Being a stranger, in the sociological sense is a thought of total non-existence, and may also mean the feeling of being beyond far or near.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
In his analysis, he draws a difference between a stranger and a wanderer. The stranger is not similar to the wanderer because the latter comes and goes while the former has a potential, but the only problem is that he is not fully or truly accepted. Therefore, the myriad of problems faced by the immigrants such as low wages, discrimination, fear of being caught, and deportation among others are because they are ‘'strangers'' as asserted by Simmel. He further adds that a stranger is a person within the societal bounds but wasn't so from the beginning, and therefore there are no particular guarantees that they will continue to be there. With these assertions, Simmel gives a true picture of the life of an immigrant by first defining who they are. Most immigrants shift to their host countries at advanced stages of their lives for many reasons such as political, health, or to explore the life of a developed country such as the United States. He further goes on and describes their greatest problem by asserting that there is no particular guarantee that these people will continue being strangers in their new environment. In so saying, Simmel appreciates those immigrants are always in a perpetual fear of not only being accepted in their new societies but the prospect of being deported to their mother countries.
The stranger is also described as the individual that plays a critical role in uniting both distance and closeness. The stranger can be regarded as an insider and an outsider at the same time which makes them a unique people. He goes ahead and describes some of the characteristics of the stranger including the fact that they are mobile and have no particular possession either material or social possession. These assertions are true as regards the life of an immigrant who wanders within their host country without any particular legal job that could give them possession. They have no position in the society because they don’t have a particular community which they can relate to. Simmel also concludes by asserting that the only advantage possessed by a stranger is the fact that they are objective in most cases. They are not bound by the prejudices and conventions of groups and therefore visualize things without any particular bias. This is true because most immigrants do not have the moral authority or legitimacy that will enable them to influence their host country's matters such as politics, economy, and social aspects, etc.
The Concept of Veil by W.E.B Du Bois
The Veil, according to Du Bois is a thought that exists in the minds of people, especially the whites who structure the society along the lines of racism ( Du Bois, 2008). The concept, according to Du Bois, prevents the whites from visualizing anybody who is not white an American citizen. The concept mainly targeted the blacks and the Mexicans who make the largest number of immigrants in the country. The division of people based on the color lines has encroached the society leading to discrimination against people of color. The concept of Veil has been a major definition of individual's access to institutions and opportunities in America. Some of the institutions where segregation and discrimination occurred include the judicial system, the universities, and the bathrooms. The Veil concept was also central in denying the Mexicans and other immigrants a humane treatment. The Veil was also a stumbling block in the lives of the people of color such as the Mexicans and the blacks. It prevents these people from valuing themselves and not seeing themselves through the lenses of color. Bu Bois further argued that the Veil constantly occurs, however, it is not felt all the time.
Du Bois gave three important ideas with regards to the concept of Veil that can be used to analyze the lives of people with color in the United States. The first thing put forward was the difference in skin color or physical demarcation which inferred their difference with the white people. Secondly, the Veil concept outlines the fact that that the people of color were either lesser or false Americans hence alienating them from the overall culture and the tenets of the society. The third concept perpetrated by the veil refers to the fact that the people of color were unable to visualize themselves outside the premise with which the white people viewed them. The life-altering moments, as described by Du Bois, included realizing that they were people of color and the fact that being a person of color was a major problem. He further added that the Veil concept was critical in ensuring that the whites did not look at the blacks or the Mexicans through the lenses of their character or ability but the precepts of color. Historically, the veil concept was a major source of oppression, especially against the Negros. As a young person, Du Bois was ignorant about the general concept of the veil and only realized when he was subjected to discrimination. Therefore, the veil set the precedence for racism that is still experienced up to today. Most of the white Americans have failed to view the Mexicans and blacks (people of color) as legitimately America on the basis of their physical appearance.
Mead’s Perspectives
According to Mead, socialization is a process whereby human beings develop into complete social beings. The Mead's perspective is based on symbolic interaction, and how it is important in shaping the self, the roles people play, and the experiences people play throughout their lives ( Mead, 1934). Mead asserts that newborns are not human at their time of birth based on the social and emotional perspective. They have to learn some vital things including behavior, expectations, and norms to develop into holistic members of the society. Therefore, by the time they reach adulthood, they will be turned into socially tenable individuals who have thus acquired socialization skills from their social environment. The perspective postulated by Mead can be used to explain the plights experienced by the immigrant children. The particular theory that can be used in this regard is referred to as the social construction theory. The theory attempts to define what is real by based on the background assumptions and life experiences. Some of the factors that can inculcate the social construction of reality include their knowledge of belonging, obligations, and privileges that accompany their membership in a community or society, and finally the knowledge of which they depend upon to attain their basic needs in life. Therefore, the plight of the immigrant children will come when they cannot relate nor have a basic knowledge of where he or she belongs. They assess the environment and notice that they do not integrate hence the genesis of some of their problems such as withdrawal syndrome, associating in lawful incidences, and developing into social misfits.
There are certain impacts of being socialized by two cultures. For those who have immigrated to the foreign nations, they are both molded by their old culture and the new culture in which they are at the moment. Mead believed that interactions with other people are the reason for the development of the ''self.'' The ''self''consists of the personality of an individual and their image. Immigrants, for example of the Mexican origin, are likely to be influenced by two different cultures, that of their parents and the entire American culture. In this case, two scenarios are likely to happen. According to Mead, the self of an individual develops as a result of social experiences. In this regards, the first scenario that is likely to happen to such a person who is influenced by two cultures is that they will drop their original culture and adopt the culture of the country in which they have migrated to, due to the social experience they acquire. Mead adds that to develop the ''self'' fully, it is important to appreciate the role of others in the entire process. The second scenario is that the individual will continue practicing the culture of their indigenous society because they appreciate the role played by their parents in the interaction.
How the Feminist Theory Explains the Plight of the Immigrants
The feminist theory can also be used to shed light upon some of the problems faced by the immigrants especially those who have been tagged as unwanted or illegal. The feminist theory involves the general idea of elevating the members of a society who have over the years been subjected to discrimination, and in this case, it is the women. It is a theory that sheds light on trends, problems, and issues that are otherwise under looked or misidentified by the dominant side. In the perspective of immigrants, they represent a class of people who have historically been regarded as outsiders and strangers and therefore mistreated in the process. In the United States, for example, the Mexicans have been exposed to a myriad of problems that include difficulty in gaining legal status and jobs, negative stereotypes, unwarranted arrests, and deportation among others. The feminist theory is about looking at the world through the lenses that of equality, justice, and a society that is free from oppression. With regards to expression, it is also critical to analyze the Marx’s theory of exploitation and how it can be used to explain the situation faced by immigrants in the foreign countries such as the United States.
Karl Marx developed a theory of exploitation that highlighted how the capitalist society led to exploitation of workers who were forced to sell their products to the capitalists at a value that was less than what their input was during production. The theory of exploitation is a function of social stratification where the economically feeble are exploited at the expense of the rich. On a close analysis of immigrants especially the blacks and the Hispanics from Mexico, they are normally exploited in a variety of ways including meager wages, long working hours, poor working conditions, and a lack of value for their work.
In conclusion, ‘the theories have played a critical role in painting a picture as regards the lives of immigrants in a foreign land. ‘’The Stranger’’ by Simmel attempts to give an explanation based on the how the immigrant is seen as a different person in the society who is not known by anyone. Du Bois furthers the assessment of the stranger by postulating that immigrants have been subjected to racial prejudices as a result of the concept of the veil which does not recognize the people of color as true Americans. The Mead's theory gives a different perspective that mainly focuses on the difficulty of child development and finally, the feminist theory outlines how people regarded as outcasts are subjected to oppression and exploitation.
References
Du Bois, W. E. B. (2008). The souls of black folk . Oxford University Press.
Mead, G. H. (1934). Mind, self, and society (Vol. 111). University of Chicago Press. Chicago.
Simmel, G. (1971). The Stranger. On individuality and social forms , 361-365.
