National Day Laborer Organization: A Case Study

Improved Essays
Elmer Chavarria illegally entered the US from Guatemala almost 20 years in hopes of escaping the violence in his hometown. In 2007 he married a US citizen, Cyndi, and together had a daughter. Unexpectedly, Elmer was assaulted and injured by police during a routine call in his Grand Rapids, Michigan home. After his release Elmer was advised to pursue immediate surgery for two herniated disks pinching his spinal cord which caused him severe back pain and numbness on his lower body. Before his surgery, U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement intervened and placed him at the Calhoun County Correction Center despite his medical condition. Elmer now, “risks permanent nerve damage, chronic pain, and disability” but despite knowing this information ICE has denied him prescribed medication and access to a neurosurgeon. Through their work, the Not1More Organization …show more content…
They identify as, “individuals, organizations, artists, and allies working to expose, confront, and overcome unjust immigration laws.” Their mission is to exploit the injustices behind immigration by becoming the voice for communities of people. Although their establishment is recent, they aim towards, “… challenging unfair deportation and unjust polity through organizing art, legislation, and action…reverse criminalization, build migrant power, and create immigration policies based on principles of inclusion.”
A strategy the Not1More organization uses to promote awareness of immigration issues is the use of art and similar works. Although protest and public statements are effective and most common, art represents a nontraditional method for personal and creative responses to activism. In her poem I Fear But I Pray, Emily Hernandez describes the struggles immigrants experience when reaching US soil only to encounter deportation threats once arrived. She shares:
Swimming in

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Have you ever imagined losing your rights and freedom? Back during the time of slavery, slaves did not have any privileges. Slaves were not able to speak their minds, participate in their government, or all other freedoms. Overtime, slaves gained their rights and began to fight to end segregation. Slaves were not respected and in order to gain their rights they were forced to protest for peace.…

    • 1161 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Rhetorical analysis Throughout Sonia Nazario’s book, Enrique’s Journey, she effectively uses her knowledge of language to argue against the many dangers of child immigration The author aims the stories toward a general audience nationwide to inform and make them understand what most of the illegal immigrants originating from South and Central America go through during their trek to the United States. The rhetorical strategies that the author incorporates emphasize her main points as well as reinforce her credibility. In hopes of reaching their long lost loved ones, Nazario creates intense emotional appeals through the many stories of young children’s hardships and devastating losses.…

    • 1056 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The vivid imagery that Urrea consistently uses throughout the text serves to humanize the events and processes he describes so that the audience feels more connected with the subject. He describes the events in ways that do not necessarily connect to a certain race or ethnicity, and brings in examples of people who have suffered that are not the stereotypical undocumented immigrant trying to cross the border. The author recognizes that many readers will not have established emotional ties with events that are described in this book, so he uses various other literary devices to bring what he writes to a more personal level with his…

    • 1033 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    “One out of every four children in the United States is an immigrant or the U.S.-born child of immigrants and many schools are ill-equipped to meet their needs (Tamer, 2014)”. To better prepare me to meet the needs of immigrant students I chose to read Enrique’s journey by Sonia Nazario. This book caught my attention because I know very little about immigration and reading this book will allow me to gain a better understanding of what it is like to come from a different country into the United States. I have only heard negative things about immigration. Reading this book I want to gain a new perspective on immigration and get an idea of what immigrants go through as they assimilate in a new environment.…

    • 1679 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The number of Latino immigrants deported have bloom up since the mid- 90s. In 1996, the U.S. law changed expanding the number of deportation offenses and eliminating the ability of judges to exercise any possible option to avoid majority cases. In combination with a congressionally imposed quota, which states that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the interior enforcement agency of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) detains an average of 34,000 individuals daily. In his most recent book, Reform without Justice: Latino Migrant Politics and the Homeland Security States, Alfonso Gonzales opens with the story of a veteran, who he met at a protest against U.S. immigration policy in Mexico City in November 2010. Bernardo told…

    • 1681 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Chasejamison Akilah Manar-Spears #16 CCS 100/1 Prof. Del Castillo The Revolution Begins at Home: A Societal Projection of One Joto’s Quest for Identity “In Search of My Queer Aztlán” by Luis H. Román Garcia is a beautiful and vulnerable piece of autoethnography: a mix of introspective, narrative, and academic writing that ties his personal experience to the larger social issue of homophobia in Chicano culture. Garcia defines and narrates his own struggle with the concepts of home, school, and sexuality due to his queer Chicano identity. These written experiences introduce the reader to the process and multi-dimensionality of identity, and reveal deeply entrenched family trauma. Analysis of his story, as well as its impact on his sense of…

    • 921 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Daycare In The Workplace

    • 437 Words
    • 2 Pages

    What is a daycare workplace? A daycare workplace is a providing day care in the workplace you are working in. It can have many benefits for companies, including improving employee morale, lowering turnover and, attraction of a wider variety of applicants. Although providing a workplace day care can be costly, many companies find that it actually saves money in decreasing employee absence. While the costs and liability can be discouraging, the benefit to the business can be compelling.…

    • 437 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Undocumented immigrants are prone to an oppressive social experience Because nationally, immigration policies have become less welcoming (Tumlin, 2004, p.1175) As a result of these beliefss, immigration has become more criminalized, especially for undocumented immigrants (Furman, et al., 2012). Therefore, policies such as California’s law SB-1159 provide an opportunity for undocumented immigrants to integrate into society as working professionals. In return, this is allows heir complex human experiences to be acknowledged and for their undocumented status to be one less defining aspect of her or his social identity. Furthemore, since undocumented…

    • 638 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Why do thousands of people every year immigrate into our country without proper documentation? In a myriad of these cases, the reason is to escape from hardship and suffering. One of the most common regions people emigrate from is Mexico, and the reasons for this are developed within The Distance Between Us by Reyna Grande. This book tells the true story of a girl that journeyed to the United States of America with her brother and sister, all as undocumented immigrants, in order to live with their father. The author of this memoir not only explains the privation she dealt with in her home land of Mexico, but she also demonstrates the racial division and other forms of adversity that were present within the United States of America, or El Otro…

    • 1201 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Lesson’s poem " Please Resist Me" highlights attitudes and prejudices that many people in our society hold against immigrants, reflecting Zervos’ work. Still, rather that demanding acceptance and proclaiming his right to be accepted as an Australian and human being, Lesson takes on an opposing view point of disregard and defiance. He speaks of rebellion against the social pressure to conform to the clichéd Australian identity. With the sole intent of carving his own identity from the rubble left behind by those to whom he used to look to for acceptance.…

    • 1151 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    As a freshman in the EC program at Center Grove High School, I wanted to address the controversial topic of whether or not Sonia Nazario’s memoir Enrique’s Journey. I believe that the high school curriculum should include Sonia Nazario’s memoir Enrique’s Journey because it teaches students to appreciate the things they have, and in addition it informs students about the dangers and problems of immigration they never knew.…

    • 689 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    “My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant” How is it that we can live a life and contribute to our community but still not ever be considered a member in it? Journalist, Jose Antonio Vargas, in his personal essay, “My life as an Undocumented Immigrant,” tells his journey and experiences that have factored in to his daily life since he first came to the United States when he was twelve years old. Vargas is able to effectively convey his point across, reaching into an emotional level as well as establishing a strong sense of credibility with his audience. Creating a stronger link, opening a window into a different perspective to view his lifelong issues with immigration. Vargas begins by recalling the day he set his journey to the United States, only being twelve years old.…

    • 902 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Today are more than eleven million of immigrants that live undocumented in the United States. In fact, all those immigrants have to deal every day with an insecure situation that affects their whole lives. The author of Undocumented Dan-el Padilla Peralta described with interesting details his undocumented life. He came from the Dominican Republic to live in the USA with his family. Dan-el faced with a different reality from his family life in the original country.…

    • 1071 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Historically, America has been a country that opens its doors to newcomers. However, national frustration with the United States’ immigration laws has been increasing rapidly over the last couple of years due to the high influx of unauthorized immigrants entering the country. In fact, according to the Pew Research Center, there were 11.3 unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. in 2014 (Krogstad and Passel). Society often blames these illegal aliens for local increases in drug use, crime, and job loss. Therefore, the Minuteman Project emerged in order to draw national attention to this issue and to advocate for deportation of all unauthorized immigrants.…

    • 198 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    It is good to see that an increasing number of protests spread nationwide every year because people increasingly become aware of the necessity of speaking out. However, some people still keep silent when injustices happen. In “How to Tame a Wild Tongue”, Gloria Anzaldua, a Chicana author, writes about the partial judgment on her accents when she speaks English, but she feels proud of her mother language, Chicano Spanish, because she realizes that her mother tongue is her distinctive identity. Also, she encourages her chicano friends to keep their identities. Likewise, in “To the Lady”, Mitsuye Yamada, a Japanese American poet and activist, writes to a lady in San Francisco and claims that the consequence of people not protesting when injustice…

    • 1747 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays