![]() The novel did not necessarily represent resentment against the Anglo culture and resistance. While the predicament of the Mexican migrant workers is comparable to the slavery of the blacks earlier on in the history of America, the novel depicts a young man’s struggle for self identification which ended with a reaffirmation of his bicultural predisposition as well as his patrimony and allegiance with America. Younger children incapable to work were left to fend for themselves which made them vulnerable to poor health conditions and other environmental risks. ![]() The children needed to join their parents in working in the fields to improve family earnings at the expense of not being able to attend school. The farmers bear long hours of intense work, modest food and deficient accommodations in their camps for a meager pay. In another terrifying story, “The Children Couldn't Wait”, a boy was killed because he couldn’t comply with the boss’s insistence that the workers should wait to drink water, a privilege freely endowed to cattle but not to the Mexican workers. In the story, “That It Hurts”, one boy was expelled from school because he was Mexican. The stories in the novel practically served to support and confirmed the hardships and brutalities that the immigrant Mexican farmers faced at work. Tell me, why must we live here like this? What have we done to deserve this? You’re so good and yet you have to suffer so much” (Rivera, p 189) In one instance, he even questioned God‘s wisdom in their plight. In light of their family’s struggle to become part of America, the protagonist in the novel undergoes intimate and spiritual moments of resolving one's identity, family and society beyond the sheer politics of defying the dominant culture. This example of historical account along with similar and related events tends to reduce the incidence of immigrant farm workers in the United States in American history as a mere issue of illegal immigration without due consideration and recognition to the unique experience and socio-political circumstances of Mexican migrant workers in South Texas.īy recording the lives and recounting the traditional trails of an immigrant population, the novel produces in an artistic yet authentic literary piece the spiritual history of a people thereby providing them a distinct cultural voice. The standardization of language was accordingly intended to warrant the integration of Mexican immigrants in the American community. Later on, many American states adopted the English only policy which delegates English as the exclusive official language. Strict laws that called for tighter restrictions on legal and illegal immigration to regulate the U.S.-Mexico border were implemented. Operation Wetback) initiated by the Eisenhower administration, the US government instigated a U.S.-Mexico free trade agreement with the objective of generating jobs in Mexico in order to prevent, discourage and decrease the pour of Mexican workers illegally entering the US soil. History would almost always recount the illegal immigration of Mexican farmers by reporting the series of steps used by the US government in combating illegal immigration.įor example, aside from the massive deportation of illegal Mexican immigrants (i.e. The sharp rise of illegal immigrants from Mexico especially with the Braceros program created political tensions between the US and Mexico. Mexico leads in the Latino immigration to the U.S. In a series of different stories often with unnamed characters, Tomas Rivera’s novel generally captures the struggles and challenges in the lives of Latino migrant workers in their employment in America. ![]() This prompted the US government to deport over 3 million Mexican migrants without proper regard to their individual rights, without effectively differentiating legal and illegal migrants and without due consideration to the disintegration of family relations. Many transient Mexican workers (braceros) illegally entered the US instead of returning to Mexico after the expiration of their work contracts. This program which was instituted by both the Mexican and US government to cover the need for workers lost during the previous world wars, became a channel for the exploitation and social discrimination of the temporary manpower imported from Mexico instead of providing for the fair treatment of Mexicans workers in the US. The story was set sometime between the 1940’s and 1950’s during which many Mexicans came to the US to work as farmers under the Bracero (manual labor) Program. Order custom essay And the Earth Did not Devour Him by Tomas Rivera
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