Literature Review Analysis

Immigration
Javier Cardenas-Munoz
University of Texas at El Paso

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Abstract
After conducting a quick and simple survey to many students at the University of Texas
at El Paso on the issue of immigration, the results came to be that students only focus on their
majors and dont look on the issues that affect them because El Paso is a border city which is a
key point in immigration. Immigration affects a big percent of the population in El Paso.
Immigration is an important issue but not many know a lot about it. Many describe an immigrant
to be a person who moves from his place of origin to a new place to look for a better living.
Many dont know what makes immigration so controversial. Researching the topic and analyzing
the data collected will create some conscience to the reader about why immigration is important.
Introduction

Passel, J. S. (2005, June 14). Unauthorized Migrants: Numbers and Characteristics. Retrieved
March 22, 2016, from http://www.pewhispanic.org/2005/06/14/unauthorized-migrants/
Immigration has always been an important topic for every country. Immigration is the
movement of people to the country where they are not native with the purpose to settle there.

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This is supposed to be a natural human instinct, because people are free to travel around the
world and live where they want. Many people support this statement, migration is a good thing
which should not be limited by the law. On the other hand, there are far more people who are
completely against immigration, because they believe it affects the general population of that
country.
Immigration, legal or illegal, is a huge issue right now. Debates rage
about how many immigrants should be allowed into the country and how zealously
we should guard out the border from illegal immigrants. By looking at immigrants of the past
and thinking about the issues in a clear and objective way, it becomes apparent that illegal
immigration is not a really the important issue compared to other ones in the world. Research
conducted supports the theory that immigration is a like a pin in a haystack. Coming up with this
conclusion is however argumentative because researching immigration can result in being really
hard because many questions come up. Narrowing down research on immigration some key
questions to ask, are for example in what era did immigration begin in the U.S.? What defines an
immigrant in the legal system and in society? Does being illegal in the U.S. mean less
opportunities? What percentage of immigrants in the U.S. actually reach their citizenship? Four
questions reduce the long hours of research because they outline immigration historically,
politically, socially and in general research.
Answering the first questions witch is in what era did immigration begin in the U.S.? A
lot of discussion has been debated as to who got here first. Discoveries made by anthropologists
of human remains over the past few decades provide evidence that long before the U.S. came
about many ethnic and cultural groups already existed in this land. However, answering the

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question, the history of US immigration spans after a long period of migration of many different
people from various parts of the world. These wanderers were believed by some to be the
founding population. Many settlers from Europe and Asia came to seek their fortune in a new
country which was thought to have unlimited resources. Many people from Africa, were bought
here against their will to work as slaves in the building of a new nation. This era was called the
colonial era starting in the 1600`s.
Through history there has been many immigration blooms, this being said because of the
new technology developed caused people to seek a better future. These people however were the
ones who put the term immigration into effect when they started to transport people and use them
as slaves. At that Era, it was not called illegal or legal it was just immigration. When the U.S.
gained all of its territory in the 1900`s is when immigration was defined to be legal or illegal
because know the U.S. Boundaries were not share and every country had also already set their
boundaries. So the true answers are that immigration began in the 1600`s and was recognized in
the 1900`s.
An immigrant is defined in many ways, you have the definition given by the dictionary,
by the legal system and by society. The dictionary says that an immigrant is a person who goes to
another country in order to settle there. The legal system definition is far more complicated and
the Federal immigration law is the law that determines whether a person is an alien. This law
states all the associated legal rights, duties, and obligations of aliens in the United States. It also
provides means or facilitations by which certain aliens can become naturalized citizens with full
citizenship rights or residents of the United States. The Immigration law also determines who
and how long visitors may stay and when they must leave, they also state the conditions these

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visitors need to follow to gain permission. Just to make things clear an "alien" is any person who
is not a citizen of the United States.
There are different categories of aliens: resident and nonresident, immigrant and
nonimmigrant, documented and undocumented. The Federal immigration law policies are
implemented by granting or denying visas. There are two types of visas: immigrant and
nonimmigrant. Nonimmigrant visas are generally issued to tourists and temporary business
visitors. Immigrant visas permit to stay in the United States permanently with the possibility to
apply for citizenship in a future. Furthermore, in society an immigrant is anyone who enters a
country without permission. After learning that the law of the U.S. says basically that an
immigrant is someone who wants to enter the U.S. and they are classified as aliens, which means
everyone but a U.S. Citizen so society has had it wrong everyone is an immigrant but U.S.
Citizens. Illegal immigrants are the ones who carry the name the most because people seem them
as bad people because they broke the law. However, this crime is not as bad as others, people are
trying to gain success, and the only detriment of illegal immigration is that you have a few that
ruin it for the general.
In the U.S. many immigrants work under illegal circumstances. Many of the immigrants
work in the fields, house cleaning, oil fields and restaurants. Many immigrants come to the
United States to take jobs that some citizens in the U.S. dont want to take. U.S. employers hire
them for wages lower than they would have to pay to hire a U.S. worker these employers take the
risk of hiring immigrants. Many immigrants sometimes have fake documents and are able to get
hired more easily. Fake documents work because there is no requirement to verify documents
presented by workers, employers can easily evade compliance. A large share of the illegal

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immigrant population is generally accepted as being in the workforce because that is what
motivates most illegal immigration. One recent estimate by researchers at the Pew Hispanic
Center puts the number of illegal immigrants in the workforce at 8 million out of an overall
estimate population of 11.2 million illegal aliens.
Answering the question does being illegal in the U.S. mean less opportunities? Being
illegal is something that prevents an individual to have many opportunities, however it is not
something that should detain that individual. This being said because there are many employers
that allow illegal immigrants to work and gain a chance in succeeding. Also it might not seem
like but the government does actually care for immigrants, this being said because once these
immigrants happen to have kids in the U.S. those kids are Citizens of the U.S. Children born
from immigrants have full rights of what being a United States citizen means. It is false that
being illegal means less opportunities you just need look for them. Many organizations work in
the benefit of immigrants, some provide the means of housing and labor, while other
organizations help an illegal immigrant gain the opportunity to live a decent life. Finally, other
organizations help immigrant to gain the right to stay in the U.S. by fixing their legal status in the
country. As for the younger generations there is many opportunities to attend college because
there are many scholarships for the kids of immigrants. Many of the people that provide these
scholarships know what the parents have done to provide for their families and decide to help
them by providing a way for many students to pursue their college degree and help their parents.
After immigrants enter the U.S. what happens next, well many look for the basics a place
to live a job. However after obtaining the basics what is next because being an immigrant in this
country has some limitations not a lot but they exist. The real question is what percentage of

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immigrants in the U.S. actually reach their citizenship? Some immigrants may want to be
citizens and some are just not able to get it because they dont comply with the requirements.
Citizens of the U.S. do have more advantages than others, but the main advantage is that The
United States of America is their home and they cannot get kicked out of their home if they make
mistakes. Immigrants on the other hand dont have that advantage if they make a mistake most
likely they are going to get kicked out. So how many immigrants actually reach their citizenship,
well that is only a range, the exact percent is not exact because we dont know how many
immigrants are in the U.S. However the estimate is of about 11.2 million immigrants and the
government on their websites says they give about 650,000 citizenships to immigrants yearly.
The calculations give a total of about 0.6 percent of immigrants who obtain their citizenship.
This happens because many immigrants sometimes dont meet the government
requirements, or it is too expensive, or they are scare because they feel they might get deported.
Do to this low percent is why many immigrants ask for reforms because a reform makes the
process of obtaining a citizenship a little more accessible. If the 11.2 million immigrants had a
citizenship, the most reasonable logic would be that The United States of America would prosper
because everyone would be the same, and have the same opportunities.
Conclusion

http://guides.lib.uh.edu/immigration

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After conducting some research and explaining some key points when talking about
immigration a person can learn that maybe immigration is not bad at all. This paper shows the
good and bad about immigration, however the good outweighs the bad. This being said because
many of the American citizens that live in the U.S. have said that there are jobs that they will not
do and when an immigrant enters the country they take those jobs. So looking at the facts
immigrants dont take American jobs they take the jobs that no one wants or will not do. Many
U.S. citizens are not educated to the point of knowing what immigration does, immigration helps
the economy, helps society, helps culture and in a way it helps the U.S. to have positive ties with
other countries.
Learning about a topic that someone wants to talk about is the first step because many
have opinions but dont have knowledge and knowledge is power. After conducting a quick
survey to students at the University of Texas at El Paso, many students dont know much about
the topic of immigration but they agreed that they do talk a lot about it. El Paso being a border
city is the main reason why many talk about immigration. Immigration is not the only issue
however it is of great importance and knowing about it is important because it affects everyone
either in a positive way or sometimes a negative way.
Immigration is an important topic for every country and it will be for many years. The
politicians of the United States of America need to learn that because they cannot get rid of
immigration they need to develop a better way to deal with The process of entering legally to the
U.S. is sometimes hard and costly making many to recur into other methods which sometimes
are not legal. Politicians do not know that immigration happens because the people are not happy
in their home country and they are looking for a better living in a new home. This is supposed to

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be a natural human instinct, because people are free and everyone is welcomed to live how they
want or to live good. Like the constitution says We The People a country is built of people and
the people need to obtain what they believe will make them reach happiness where they decide to
be.

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