Joseph Bruchacs Ellis Island and Gloria Anzalduas To Live In the Border Lands Means You - Essay Example

Section/# Comparison/Contrast of Joseph Bruchac’s “Ellis Island” and Gloria Anzaldua’s “To Live in the Border Lands Means You” A great amount of scholarship has been devoted to answering the question of what America means to the disparate groups that call it home. Some authors have noted that what they see represented is a melting pot of cultures all seeking to find a better life and work towards adopting a new culture of Americanism in what can only be described as an unrealistic and old-fashioned approach to patriotic virtue. Similarly, other authors have sought to magnify rather than diminish the role that ethnic identity has on the way that different groups of emigres identify with and incorporate themselves with the idea of the United States. Still others acknowledge that there is no unifying truth with respect to how immigrants identify with the new host country as each group has a peculiar past which shapes their understanding and development in ways that a single unifying approach could not accept. For purposes of this brief essay, the author will attempt to compare and contrast two poems which serve to exhibit two different approaches to the way in which the authors of these poems present their subject matter. The first of these differences is the contrasting way in which the issue of identity and ethnic origin is expressed to the reader. Secondly, this brief analysis will consider and compare the identification with the topic of Native Americans that both authors reference. With regards to the first poem, the author works to express a fairly common Western view of the immigrant experience. Of particular note is the fact that the poem casts the immigrant experience in a rather positive light. Says the author, “after leaving the sickness/the old Empires of Europe/a Circle Line ship slips easily/on its way to the island/of the tall woman, green/as dreams of forests and meadows/waiting for those who’d worked/a thousand years/yet never owned their own” (Bruchac 5-13). In this way, the reader can quickly infer that the author has an overall positive outlook on the hope for a positive change and a new start that the promise of immigration held for the new immigrants. Although this is doubtless the truth for many different groups that have reached the shores of the United States in the hopes of claiming the promise inscribed upon the base of the Statue of Liberty.1 However, as will be demonstrated later within this analysis, such a rosy picture is not always a defining element of the immigrant experience. With respect to the second topic of interest with which this essay will analyze, the author of the first poem makes an interesting choice to grapple with the many wrongs that were inflicted upon the Native American population so that his ancestors could enjoy such a “free and open” nation. This is unique because it gives a thoughtful and pensive tone to the otherwise upbeat and hopeful imagery that had thus far been presented to the reader. Furthermore, the way in which this author chooses to deal with the difficult injustices that were wrought on the Native population as a means by which such an entity as the United States could be built helps to differentiate a formerly black and white view of morality that the author seemed to lay out in the opening stanza. Says the author, “Yet only part of my blood loves that memory/Another voice speaks/of native lands/within this nation/Lands invaded/when the earth became owned/Lands of those who followed/the changing Moon/knowledge of the seasons/in their veins” (Bruchac 19-28). Such a consideration helps to show that even though a general sense of awe and respect is reserved for the transformative power that the United States was able to bestow on his grandparents, this transformative power came at quite a high cost for the native inhabitants of the land. Such a cost of course cannot be justified or swept under the figurative rug. In this way, Bruchac feels compelled to discuss this with his readers. The second poem Gloria Anzaldua’s “To Live in the Border Lands Means You”, features the ethnic struggle that the immigrant from the Latino/Hispanic countries face when attempting to reconcile their ethnic culture/history with the demands that the new culture places upon them. The biggest part of the problem stems from the fact that those immigrants that seek to incorporate themselves into the United States that hail from southern regions struggle to ever feel accepted into the new culture of the United States. Unlike the implicit sense of “oneness” that Bruchac’s poem symbolized, “To Live in the Border lands Means You” seeks to paint a far different image for an immigrant experience that does not begin and end with simply crossing a border and expressing some existential sign of fealty to the new state. Due to the fact that racism and prejudice plays such an integral role, Anzaldua’s explanation of the experience takes on a far different perspective than does that of Bruchac. However, similar to the first poem, the second also considers the issue of the Native Americans and how their experience continues to define the way that immigrants interact with and seek to settle into normal lives within the new host country. What is especially unique about Anzaldua’s poem is the fact that she seeks to incorporate the “Native America” ethnic characteristics as part of the identity of the individuals who are the subject matter of her piece; Amer-Indians/Latino/Hispanic. Although these three races have mixed so thoroughly with relation to Hispanic/Latino communities, the author still finds it of import to discuss the ways in which this unique background and culture fits into the host country. Says the author: are neither hispana india negra espanola ni gabacha, eres mestiza, mulata, half-breed caught in the crossfire between camps while carrying all five races on your back not knowing which side to turn to, run from (Anzaldua 1-5). In this way, Anzaldua expresses the inherent complexity of carrying “five races” on one’s back while all the time attempting to coalesce into yet another ethnic and cultural system. What is of importance within this particular idea is the fact that one of the races that such individuals represent is of course the very race that was for so long repressed, driven from their native lands, and murdered; that of Native Americans. Although these poems handle subject matter in different ways, the end result is that much of the same subject matter is discussed; albeit from diverse angles. As a result, the comparison and contrast between the viewpoints helps to paint a more clear and concise picture of how the American experience is differentiated and varied between such diverse groups. Rather than merely conforming to a comfortable interpretation of what the immigrant experience entails and what thoughts different immigrants share with relation to their own culture and the culture they are coming to interact with and ultimately adopt, these authors seek to express to the reader more thoughtful narratives that are based on the causal mechanisms that work to define the level of mutual/shared heritage that the meeting of cultures is likely to exhibit. Furthermore, the fact that both poems sought to explain the role of the Native American is indicative of a new genre and a new era of thought that had hitherto not existed in the poems of other authors that sought to exemplify and define America as well as the immigrant experience. Works Cited Anzaldua, Gloria. "To live in the borderlands means you | The Feminist Texican." The Feminist Texican. N.p., 15 Sept. 2011. Web. 7 Nov. 2012. . Bruchac, Joseph. "Challenge 1: Literature." Columbia University in the City of New York. N.p., 8 Mar. 2010. Web. 7 Nov. 2012. . Read More