Immigrants Out!: The New Nativism and the Anti-Immigrant Impulse in the United States (Critical America, 76)

Nativism - an intense opposition to immigrants and other non-native members of society - has been deeply imbedded in the American character from the earliest days of the nation. Dating from the Alien and Sedition controversy of 1798 to California's recent Proposition 187, nativism has long been a driving force in policy making, a particular irony in a country founded and populated by immigrants. This anthology of original, specially commissioned essays is informed at its core by George Santayana's famous edict that "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." Examining the current surge in nativism in light of past waves of anti-immigrant sentiment, the volume takes an unflinchingly critical look at the realities and rhetoric of the new nativism. How does nativism inform our understanding of the Official English movement today? How has the symbolism of the Statue of Liberty evolved since its dedication, and what can she tell us about the American disposition to immigration? What is the relationship between the races of immigrants and the perception of a national immigration crisis? To what extent does today's political discourse resemble past discourse we comfortably identify as nativist? Juan Perea has here assembled a truly interdisciplinary group of contributors to highlight the changing relationship between citizens and immigrants, and the effects of economics, history, and demographics on that relationship. Immigrants Out! provides a needed antidote to the often poisonous attacks on America's most vulnerable.