How the American Dream has aided in the success of American immigration
By: Allison Burke
The United States of America, the land of white picket fences and border walls. A recent law has been proposed in congress with the intention to expel immigrants without asylum screenings along with increasing border authority. This has been proposed in order to get Republicans to back a 100 billion dollars in aid towards Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. The passing of this law would affect millions of people who immigrate to the U.S. every year. Whether people moved to the U.S. for religious freedoms, economic opportunities, or in search of a better life stereotypes of the U.S. have influenced people’s perception of the U.S. and what it means to live in the U.S..
But why have people chosen the US specifically? What makes it appealing? Why choose a country that’s riddled with racist roots and political uncertainty? While these reasons are all very specific to the individual, there can be one supporting factor: The American Dream.
Magda Leon came to the U.S. in 1979 after following her boyfriend at that time. Magda never expected to stay here; she had a B.S. degree in psychology from her education in Colombia, her family was all there, she didn’t feel trapped or unsafe, but after looking for work for 10 months with no success she decided to follow her boyfriend. Magda talked about how she ended up staying in the U.S. saying “I came without ever thinking that I was going to stay, I just stayed” but after the short time she was here she had built her own community of sorts. She lived with her friend cleaning houses while enrolled at NOVA (Northern Virginia Community College) and took English classes. She then went on to meet her now husband and worked as a school counselor until she retired.
Leon family at a park in Bogota Colombia
After 44 years in the U.S. some would look at Magdas life and say she has lived the American Dream. Magda saw this concept of the American dream reflected in her life and says “ The American dream as I understand it is that you come here with not many skills, not many abilities or money and you move up, and I can say yes.” She talked about how her mother was a nurse and the desire to help people, expressing how “Service was in my blood, and I always knew what I wanted and I did it.” While Magda came to the U.S. with no preconceived perception or in search of something she did end up staying and living her own version of the American dream.
Much like Magda, Chanthaly (Noh) Henwood wasn’t forced out of her country or in search of a better life– she was chasing love. In 2004 she moved from Laos to the U.S. She credits her visions of the U.S. to her father who would travel here and bring back stories of the country. She recounts him saying “they do so good, all the things they do are good quality, even when he talks about America today it’s always in a good way.”
She saw coming to the U.S. as a new opportunity to learn and immerse herself in a different culture and an opportunity to grow. Noh explained how she never explicitly picked the U.S. saying “I don’t say that I always wanna move here I just met Geno (her husband) that’s it. It’s not like I dreamed of coming here, to make money or to be better than my home town.” Noh claims she didn’t always envision herself in the U.S. it’s just what happened. She always knew she wanted to leave Laos to grow, learn about different cultures, and become her own person. In a way her life and what she has made of it in the U.S. is her version of the American dream. about her perceptions of it she says “the opportunity here doesn’t limit how people can think, create, and make things happen. The communities here are always in support.”
Gustavo Vives moved to the United States in 2016 at ten years old with his family from Brazil. The decision to move was rather quick for the Vives family, Gustavo states. “We planned it out in one year essentially so we just took everything we had and moved here.” The family chose the U.S. for a couple of reasons, two of them being the access to education, and getting away from the danger and crime in Brazil. It was hard for Gustavo, especially as the only one who could speak English in his family, he had to translate for his parents and talk to immigration officials, he also felt very behind in school.
The Vives family at the Brazilian World Cup in 2014 (Gustavo pictured on the far right)
When choosing to move to the U.S. Gustavo explained how it was the country his family was most familiar with, and how the American dream played a part in this familiarity. For him this concept did sound like a dream as “I had lived in apartments in very dangerous and cramped cities, and the idea of going somewhere where you could have a house, backyards, parks, and walk to school, it all sounded like a dream.” Gustavo credits this protaly of the U.S. from Hollywood, with movies depicting immigrants arriving in the U.S. starting at the bottom and working their way up through hard work.
Ultimately perceptions of the American dream are shaped by people’s own experiences. People immigrate for a multitude of reasons– from feeling lost and wanting to discover new things, to seeking safer and better opportunities for life, to just wanting to work to support their families. Most U.S. residents have some perception of the American dream aiding in their own success as well as the success of the economy. The American dream is a very individualized concept however it speaks to a larger want of people who come here in hopes to fulfill their dream – the economy writ large also depends on this want, on this dream. Without these dreams, of immigrants and U.S. citizens alike, the U.S. would fail at its promise of “unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” The new proposed laws to tighten the border would be detrimental to that dream – and to the common good of all Americans, native and immigrant.