Peter H. Schuck
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198292296
- eISBN:
- 9780191599569
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198292295.003.0007
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics
This chapter analyses the reasons behind increasing debates on the issue of American citizenship. It is argued that the intensity of these debates reflects the tensions arising within and among three ...
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This chapter analyses the reasons behind increasing debates on the issue of American citizenship. It is argued that the intensity of these debates reflects the tensions arising within and among three analytically distinct relational domains: international law and politics, national politics, and federalism. Observations are presented on the theory of “post-national citizenship”.Less
This chapter analyses the reasons behind increasing debates on the issue of American citizenship. It is argued that the intensity of these debates reflects the tensions arising within and among three analytically distinct relational domains: international law and politics, national politics, and federalism. Observations are presented on the theory of “post-national citizenship”.
Denis Lacorne
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780199245000
- eISBN:
- 9780191599996
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199245002.003.0018
- Subject:
- Political Science, European Union
Draws an analogy between the threats posed by social heterogeneity in the USA and the threats posed by differing national allegiances in the EU. The author reminds USA that core political identities ...
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Draws an analogy between the threats posed by social heterogeneity in the USA and the threats posed by differing national allegiances in the EU. The author reminds USA that core political identities can vary over time and that early conceptions of citizenship in the USA focussed almost exclusively on state, not federal, citizenship; in his view, within unitary states communities of identity are fine so long as individuals do not conflate these with their core political identity. In a federal system, the problem or challenge is exactly that of belonging to several political communities. Lacorne argues that pure constitutional patriotism will not suffice, since individuals require a substantial citizenship; what is needed instead are ‘common and concrete political experiences’ that would give rise to ‘a new European ethics of responsibility’. The two sections of the chapter are: The Irrelevance of the American Model of Federal Citizenship; and The Relevance of the American Multicultural Model.Less
Draws an analogy between the threats posed by social heterogeneity in the USA and the threats posed by differing national allegiances in the EU. The author reminds USA that core political identities can vary over time and that early conceptions of citizenship in the USA focussed almost exclusively on state, not federal, citizenship; in his view, within unitary states communities of identity are fine so long as individuals do not conflate these with their core political identity. In a federal system, the problem or challenge is exactly that of belonging to several political communities. Lacorne argues that pure constitutional patriotism will not suffice, since individuals require a substantial citizenship; what is needed instead are ‘common and concrete political experiences’ that would give rise to ‘a new European ethics of responsibility’. The two sections of the chapter are: The Irrelevance of the American Model of Federal Citizenship; and The Relevance of the American Multicultural Model.
Ellen D. Wu
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691157825
- eISBN:
- 9781400848874
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691157825.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
This chapter talks about how the ethnic Chinese throughout the United States greeted the news of the People's Republic of China's entry into the Korean War with immense trepidation. Almost overnight, ...
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This chapter talks about how the ethnic Chinese throughout the United States greeted the news of the People's Republic of China's entry into the Korean War with immense trepidation. Almost overnight, the prevailing images of Chinese in the American public eye had metamorphosed from friendly Pacific allies to formidable, threatening foes. Chinatown's Korean War Red Scare dramatized the ways in which the Cold War structured the reconfiguration of Chinese American citizenship in the post-Exclusion era. The ascendance of anti-Communism as the defining paradigm of US foreign policy after World War II introduced new imperatives to clarify Chinese America's social and political standing. To address these issues, both parties looked to the identification of Chinese in the United States as Overseas Chinese—that is, members of a global Chinese diaspora with ties to each other and China.Less
This chapter talks about how the ethnic Chinese throughout the United States greeted the news of the People's Republic of China's entry into the Korean War with immense trepidation. Almost overnight, the prevailing images of Chinese in the American public eye had metamorphosed from friendly Pacific allies to formidable, threatening foes. Chinatown's Korean War Red Scare dramatized the ways in which the Cold War structured the reconfiguration of Chinese American citizenship in the post-Exclusion era. The ascendance of anti-Communism as the defining paradigm of US foreign policy after World War II introduced new imperatives to clarify Chinese America's social and political standing. To address these issues, both parties looked to the identification of Chinese in the United States as Overseas Chinese—that is, members of a global Chinese diaspora with ties to each other and China.
Christopher Capozzola
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- September 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195335491
- eISBN:
- 9780199868971
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195335491.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
This chapter presents some concluding thoughts about the impact of World War I on America. The war demanded moral resources, political capital, and even the very flesh and bones of national citizens. ...
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This chapter presents some concluding thoughts about the impact of World War I on America. The war demanded moral resources, political capital, and even the very flesh and bones of national citizens. The war was also a crucial moment in the history of American political culture in the 20th century, part of a massive and sometimes contradictory restructuring of the relationship between Americans and state power — indeed, of the basic terms of American citizenship itself. The history of Americans' wartime obligations brings several themes into focus: the changing relationship between individuals, voluntary associations, and the state; the connections between duties and rights in theory and political experience; and the role of law and political violence in everyday life. It also helps explain some of the legacies of the wartime experience for later generations of Americans.Less
This chapter presents some concluding thoughts about the impact of World War I on America. The war demanded moral resources, political capital, and even the very flesh and bones of national citizens. The war was also a crucial moment in the history of American political culture in the 20th century, part of a massive and sometimes contradictory restructuring of the relationship between Americans and state power — indeed, of the basic terms of American citizenship itself. The history of Americans' wartime obligations brings several themes into focus: the changing relationship between individuals, voluntary associations, and the state; the connections between duties and rights in theory and political experience; and the role of law and political violence in everyday life. It also helps explain some of the legacies of the wartime experience for later generations of Americans.
Yossi Harpaz
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780691194066
- eISBN:
- 9780691194578
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691194066.001.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Migration Studies (including Refugee Studies)
This book focuses on an important yet overlooked dimension of globalization: the steady rise in the legitimacy and prevalence of dual citizenship. Demand for dual citizenship is particularly high in ...
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This book focuses on an important yet overlooked dimension of globalization: the steady rise in the legitimacy and prevalence of dual citizenship. Demand for dual citizenship is particularly high in Latin America and Eastern Europe, where more than three million people have obtained a second citizenship from EU countries or the United States. Most citizenship seekers acquire EU citizenship by drawing on their ancestry or ethnic origin; others secure U.S. citizenship for their children by strategically planning their place of birth. Their aim is to gain a second, compensatory citizenship that would provide superior travel freedom, broader opportunities, an insurance policy, and even a status symbol. The book analyzes three cases: Israelis who acquire citizenship from European-origin countries such as Germany or Poland; Hungarian-speaking citizens of Serbia who obtain a second citizenship from Hungary (and, through it, EU citizenship); and Mexicans who give birth in the United States to secure American citizenship for their children. The book reveals the growth of instrumental attitudes toward citizenship: individuals worldwide increasingly view nationality as rank within a global hierarchy rather than as a sanctified symbol of a unique national identity.Less
This book focuses on an important yet overlooked dimension of globalization: the steady rise in the legitimacy and prevalence of dual citizenship. Demand for dual citizenship is particularly high in Latin America and Eastern Europe, where more than three million people have obtained a second citizenship from EU countries or the United States. Most citizenship seekers acquire EU citizenship by drawing on their ancestry or ethnic origin; others secure U.S. citizenship for their children by strategically planning their place of birth. Their aim is to gain a second, compensatory citizenship that would provide superior travel freedom, broader opportunities, an insurance policy, and even a status symbol. The book analyzes three cases: Israelis who acquire citizenship from European-origin countries such as Germany or Poland; Hungarian-speaking citizens of Serbia who obtain a second citizenship from Hungary (and, through it, EU citizenship); and Mexicans who give birth in the United States to secure American citizenship for their children. The book reveals the growth of instrumental attitudes toward citizenship: individuals worldwide increasingly view nationality as rank within a global hierarchy rather than as a sanctified symbol of a unique national identity.
Hannah Rosen
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- July 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780807832028
- eISBN:
- 9781469605715
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/9780807888568_rosen
- Subject:
- History, African-American History
The meaning of race in the antebellum southern United States was anchored in the racial exclusivity of slavery (coded as black) and full citizenship (coded as white as well as male). These ...
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The meaning of race in the antebellum southern United States was anchored in the racial exclusivity of slavery (coded as black) and full citizenship (coded as white as well as male). These traditional definitions of race were radically disrupted after emancipation, when citizenship was granted to all persons born in the United States and suffrage was extended to all men. This book argues that in this critical moment of Reconstruction, contests over the future meaning of race were often fought on the terrain of gender. Sexual violence—specifically, white-on-black rape—emerged as a critical arena in postemancipation struggles over African American citizenship. Analyzing the testimony of rape survivors, the book finds that white men often staged elaborate attacks meant to enact prior racial hierarchy. Through their testimony, black women defiantly rejected such hierarchy and claimed their new and equal rights. The book explains how heated debates over interracial marriage were also attempts by whites to undermine African American men's demands for suffrage and a voice in public affairs. By connecting histories of rape and discourses of “social equality” with struggles over citizenship, it shows how gendered violence and gendered rhetorics of race together produced a climate of terror for black men and women seeking to exercise their new rights as citizens. Linking political events at the city, state, and regional levels, the book places gender and sexual violence at the heart of understanding the reconsolidation of race and racism in the postemancipation United States.Less
The meaning of race in the antebellum southern United States was anchored in the racial exclusivity of slavery (coded as black) and full citizenship (coded as white as well as male). These traditional definitions of race were radically disrupted after emancipation, when citizenship was granted to all persons born in the United States and suffrage was extended to all men. This book argues that in this critical moment of Reconstruction, contests over the future meaning of race were often fought on the terrain of gender. Sexual violence—specifically, white-on-black rape—emerged as a critical arena in postemancipation struggles over African American citizenship. Analyzing the testimony of rape survivors, the book finds that white men often staged elaborate attacks meant to enact prior racial hierarchy. Through their testimony, black women defiantly rejected such hierarchy and claimed their new and equal rights. The book explains how heated debates over interracial marriage were also attempts by whites to undermine African American men's demands for suffrage and a voice in public affairs. By connecting histories of rape and discourses of “social equality” with struggles over citizenship, it shows how gendered violence and gendered rhetorics of race together produced a climate of terror for black men and women seeking to exercise their new rights as citizens. Linking political events at the city, state, and regional levels, the book places gender and sexual violence at the heart of understanding the reconsolidation of race and racism in the postemancipation United States.
Christopher S. Parker and Matt A. Barreto
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691163611
- eISBN:
- 9781400852314
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691163611.003.0006
- Subject:
- Political Science, American Politics
This chapter considers the extent to which a positive orientation toward the Tea Party influences attitudes and opinions about the president beyond ideology, partisanship, general out-group ...
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This chapter considers the extent to which a positive orientation toward the Tea Party influences attitudes and opinions about the president beyond ideology, partisanship, general out-group hostility, and racism. It argues that Barack Obama's ascendance to the White House, and his subsequent presidency, triggered anxiety, fear, and anger among those who support the Tea Party because of what he represented: tangible evidence that “their” America is rapidly becoming unrecognizable. Even as Tea Party supporters railed against government spending, it seemed that their underlying frustration was with Barack Obama himself. This so called Obamaphobia appears to transcend simple policy disagreement, with many Tea Party supporters openly questioning the president's patriotism and his American citizenship on several occasions.Less
This chapter considers the extent to which a positive orientation toward the Tea Party influences attitudes and opinions about the president beyond ideology, partisanship, general out-group hostility, and racism. It argues that Barack Obama's ascendance to the White House, and his subsequent presidency, triggered anxiety, fear, and anger among those who support the Tea Party because of what he represented: tangible evidence that “their” America is rapidly becoming unrecognizable. Even as Tea Party supporters railed against government spending, it seemed that their underlying frustration was with Barack Obama himself. This so called Obamaphobia appears to transcend simple policy disagreement, with many Tea Party supporters openly questioning the president's patriotism and his American citizenship on several occasions.
Chong Chon-Smith
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781628462050
- eISBN:
- 9781626745292
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781628462050.003.0006
- Subject:
- Sociology, Race and Ethnicity
This conclusion introduces Corporal Edward Chin, the American soldier who tied the noose around Saddam Houssein’s statue in Iraq. It interrogates the parable of racial magnetism within the context of ...
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This conclusion introduces Corporal Edward Chin, the American soldier who tied the noose around Saddam Houssein’s statue in Iraq. It interrogates the parable of racial magnetism within the context of U.S. empire, the story of where Asian Americans fit into the logic of white supremacy in relation to class relations within and between racial minorities, and how it constitutes the subjectification and denial of Black liberation. This condition, in and of itself, constitutes the whole system of hegemony that relies upon racial hierarchy, in such a form as racial magnetism, in order to maintain cross-racial hostilities and cross-racial alienation and ultimately the “pains of modernity”—the alienation of modernity’s underbelly—the working-class peoples and peasants who show the social death associated with poverty, dispossession, and invisibility.Less
This conclusion introduces Corporal Edward Chin, the American soldier who tied the noose around Saddam Houssein’s statue in Iraq. It interrogates the parable of racial magnetism within the context of U.S. empire, the story of where Asian Americans fit into the logic of white supremacy in relation to class relations within and between racial minorities, and how it constitutes the subjectification and denial of Black liberation. This condition, in and of itself, constitutes the whole system of hegemony that relies upon racial hierarchy, in such a form as racial magnetism, in order to maintain cross-racial hostilities and cross-racial alienation and ultimately the “pains of modernity”—the alienation of modernity’s underbelly—the working-class peoples and peasants who show the social death associated with poverty, dispossession, and invisibility.
Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na‘im
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199895694
- eISBN:
- 9780199350742
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199895694.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Islam
This chapter suggests that the outlook for American Muslims who want to embrace their American citizenship is promising. It contends that the fact that the process for acquiring US citizenship has ...
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This chapter suggests that the outlook for American Muslims who want to embrace their American citizenship is promising. It contends that the fact that the process for acquiring US citizenship has not always been humane, enlightened, coherent, or rational offers hope for a more inclusive future. It discusses the evolution of the concept of American citizenship and the evolving framework and practice of citizenship. This article analyzes the “founding myth” of religious freedom and explains how the legal dimension of American citizenship developed. It also argues that American Muslims can look for guidance from the experiences in exclusion and inclusion of other religious communities, including Catholics, Jews and Mormons.Less
This chapter suggests that the outlook for American Muslims who want to embrace their American citizenship is promising. It contends that the fact that the process for acquiring US citizenship has not always been humane, enlightened, coherent, or rational offers hope for a more inclusive future. It discusses the evolution of the concept of American citizenship and the evolving framework and practice of citizenship. This article analyzes the “founding myth” of religious freedom and explains how the legal dimension of American citizenship developed. It also argues that American Muslims can look for guidance from the experiences in exclusion and inclusion of other religious communities, including Catholics, Jews and Mormons.
Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199895694
- eISBN:
- 9780199350742
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199895694.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Islam
This volume is about the need for American Muslims to move “beyond minority politics” in their quest for religious self-determination. This volume aims to contribute to advancing self-transformation ...
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This volume is about the need for American Muslims to move “beyond minority politics” in their quest for religious self-determination. This volume aims to contribute to advancing self-transformation among American Muslims and to help in setting priorities and deploying effective approaches to religious self-determination. It analyzes the multiple and overlapping identities that different communities of Americans tend to share and examines the complex and evolving meaning of American citizenship, highlighting the historically harsh policies of racial exclusion. It also describes the significant variety of American Muslims and their diverse experiences of citizenship, explains the constitutional and legal framework of religious self-determination in relation to traditional interpretations of Sharia, and examines the mediation of tensions between separation of religion and state. This volume also calls on American Muslims to embrace both their citizenship and faith.Less
This volume is about the need for American Muslims to move “beyond minority politics” in their quest for religious self-determination. This volume aims to contribute to advancing self-transformation among American Muslims and to help in setting priorities and deploying effective approaches to religious self-determination. It analyzes the multiple and overlapping identities that different communities of Americans tend to share and examines the complex and evolving meaning of American citizenship, highlighting the historically harsh policies of racial exclusion. It also describes the significant variety of American Muslims and their diverse experiences of citizenship, explains the constitutional and legal framework of religious self-determination in relation to traditional interpretations of Sharia, and examines the mediation of tensions between separation of religion and state. This volume also calls on American Muslims to embrace both their citizenship and faith.
Aihwa Ong
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520229983
- eISBN:
- 9780520937161
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520229983.003.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Migration Studies (including Refugee Studies)
This introductory chapter is concerned with Asian immigrants, specifically Cambodians, Mien, and Laotians. It first discusses the debate surrounding American citizenship before looking at the various ...
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This introductory chapter is concerned with Asian immigrants, specifically Cambodians, Mien, and Laotians. It first discusses the debate surrounding American citizenship before looking at the various concepts of political identity. This is followed by a section on gender differentiation and racial bipolarism. It then discusses the techniques the text uses to examine citizenship and other techniques for self-making and subject-making. The chapter ends with a section on the transition of the Cambodians from the utopian communism introduced by Pol Pot to the advanced liberalism of the United States. A summary of the other chapters is included.Less
This introductory chapter is concerned with Asian immigrants, specifically Cambodians, Mien, and Laotians. It first discusses the debate surrounding American citizenship before looking at the various concepts of political identity. This is followed by a section on gender differentiation and racial bipolarism. It then discusses the techniques the text uses to examine citizenship and other techniques for self-making and subject-making. The chapter ends with a section on the transition of the Cambodians from the utopian communism introduced by Pol Pot to the advanced liberalism of the United States. A summary of the other chapters is included.
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- March 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780226796086
- eISBN:
- 9780226796109
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226796109.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
This book's narrative begins shortly after the passage of the Jones Act, tracing Puerto Rican migrants' interpretations of their United States citizenship and what it promised in terms of civic, ...
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This book's narrative begins shortly after the passage of the Jones Act, tracing Puerto Rican migrants' interpretations of their United States citizenship and what it promised in terms of civic, political, and social rights. This seemed an ideal place to begin an inquiry about the political identities of the United States' first and only citizen-immigrants. This introductory chapter discusses the problem of United States citizenship for Puerto Ricans; rights, liberalism, and the problem of colonialism; and Puerto Ricans and the challenge of recognition.Less
This book's narrative begins shortly after the passage of the Jones Act, tracing Puerto Rican migrants' interpretations of their United States citizenship and what it promised in terms of civic, political, and social rights. This seemed an ideal place to begin an inquiry about the political identities of the United States' first and only citizen-immigrants. This introductory chapter discusses the problem of United States citizenship for Puerto Ricans; rights, liberalism, and the problem of colonialism; and Puerto Ricans and the challenge of recognition.
Aihwa Ong
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520229983
- eISBN:
- 9780520937161
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520229983.001.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Migration Studies (including Refugee Studies)
Fleeing the murderous Pol Pot regime, Cambodian refugees arrive in America as at once the victims and the heroes of America's misadventures in Southeast Asia; and their encounters with American ...
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Fleeing the murderous Pol Pot regime, Cambodian refugees arrive in America as at once the victims and the heroes of America's misadventures in Southeast Asia; and their encounters with American citizenship are contradictory as well. Service providers, bureaucrats, and employers exhort them to be self-reliant, individualistic, and free, even as the system and the culture constrain them within terms of ethnicity, race, and class. This book tells the story of Cambodian Americans experiencing American citizenship from the bottom-up. Based on extensive fieldwork in Oakland and San Francisco, the study puts a human face on how American institutions—of health, welfare, law, police, church, and industry—affect minority citizens as they negotiate American culture and re-interpret the American dream. Earlier work has described elite Asians shuttling across the Pacific. This parallel study tells the very different story of “the other Asians” whose route takes them from refugee camps to California's inner-city and high-tech enclaves. In this book we see these refugees becoming new citizen-subjects through a dual process of being-made and self-making, balancing religious salvation and entrepreneurial values as they endure and undermine, absorb and deflect conflicting lessons about welfare, work, medicine, gender, parenting, and mass culture. Trying to hold on to the values of family and home culture, Cambodian Americans nonetheless often feel that “Buddha is hiding”.Less
Fleeing the murderous Pol Pot regime, Cambodian refugees arrive in America as at once the victims and the heroes of America's misadventures in Southeast Asia; and their encounters with American citizenship are contradictory as well. Service providers, bureaucrats, and employers exhort them to be self-reliant, individualistic, and free, even as the system and the culture constrain them within terms of ethnicity, race, and class. This book tells the story of Cambodian Americans experiencing American citizenship from the bottom-up. Based on extensive fieldwork in Oakland and San Francisco, the study puts a human face on how American institutions—of health, welfare, law, police, church, and industry—affect minority citizens as they negotiate American culture and re-interpret the American dream. Earlier work has described elite Asians shuttling across the Pacific. This parallel study tells the very different story of “the other Asians” whose route takes them from refugee camps to California's inner-city and high-tech enclaves. In this book we see these refugees becoming new citizen-subjects through a dual process of being-made and self-making, balancing religious salvation and entrepreneurial values as they endure and undermine, absorb and deflect conflicting lessons about welfare, work, medicine, gender, parenting, and mass culture. Trying to hold on to the values of family and home culture, Cambodian Americans nonetheless often feel that “Buddha is hiding”.
Hoang Gia Phan
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814738474
- eISBN:
- 9780814738931
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814738474.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This book demonstrates how American citizenship and civic culture were profoundly transformed by the racialized material histories of free, enslaved, and indentured labor. It illuminates the ...
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This book demonstrates how American citizenship and civic culture were profoundly transformed by the racialized material histories of free, enslaved, and indentured labor. It illuminates the historical tensions between the legal paradigms of citizenship and contract, and in the emergence of free labor ideology in American culture. The book argues that in the age of emancipation the cultural attributes of free personhood became identified with the legal rights and privileges of the citizen, and that individual freedom thus became identified with the nation-state. It situates the emergence of American citizenship and the American novel within the context of Atlantic slavery and Anglo-American legal culture, placing early American texts alongside Black Atlantic texts. Beginning with a revisionary reading of the Constitution's “slavery clauses,” the book recovers indentured servitude as a transitional form of labor bondage that helped define the key terms of modern U.S. citizenship: mobility, volition, and contract. It demonstrates how citizenship and civic culture were transformed by antebellum debates over slavery, free labor, and national Union, while analyzing the writings of Frederick Douglass and Herman Melville alongside a wide-ranging archive of lesser-known antebellum legal and literary texts in the context of changing conceptions of constitutionalism, property, and contract. Situated at the nexus of literary criticism, legal studies, and labor history, the book challenges the founding fiction of a pro-slavery Constitution central to American letters and legal culture.Less
This book demonstrates how American citizenship and civic culture were profoundly transformed by the racialized material histories of free, enslaved, and indentured labor. It illuminates the historical tensions between the legal paradigms of citizenship and contract, and in the emergence of free labor ideology in American culture. The book argues that in the age of emancipation the cultural attributes of free personhood became identified with the legal rights and privileges of the citizen, and that individual freedom thus became identified with the nation-state. It situates the emergence of American citizenship and the American novel within the context of Atlantic slavery and Anglo-American legal culture, placing early American texts alongside Black Atlantic texts. Beginning with a revisionary reading of the Constitution's “slavery clauses,” the book recovers indentured servitude as a transitional form of labor bondage that helped define the key terms of modern U.S. citizenship: mobility, volition, and contract. It demonstrates how citizenship and civic culture were transformed by antebellum debates over slavery, free labor, and national Union, while analyzing the writings of Frederick Douglass and Herman Melville alongside a wide-ranging archive of lesser-known antebellum legal and literary texts in the context of changing conceptions of constitutionalism, property, and contract. Situated at the nexus of literary criticism, legal studies, and labor history, the book challenges the founding fiction of a pro-slavery Constitution central to American letters and legal culture.
Kim Cary Warren
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- July 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780807833964
- eISBN:
- 9781469604978
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/9780807899441_warren
- Subject:
- History, African-American History
This book examines the formation of African American and Native American citizenship, belonging, and identity in the United States by comparing educational experiences in Kansas between 1880 and ...
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This book examines the formation of African American and Native American citizenship, belonging, and identity in the United States by comparing educational experiences in Kansas between 1880 and 1935. The author focuses her study on Kansas, thought by many to be the quintessential free state, not only because it was home to sizable populations of Indian groups and former slaves, but also because of its unique history of conflict over freedom during the antebellum period. After the Civil War, white reformers opened segregated schools, ultimately reinforcing the very racial hierarchies that they claimed to challenge. To resist the effects of these reformers' actions, African Americans developed strategies that emphasized inclusion and integration, while autonomy and bicultural identities provided the focal point for Native Americans' understanding of what it meant to be an American. The book argues that these approaches to defining American citizenship served as ideological precursors to the Indian rights and civil rights movements. This comparative history of two non-white races provides an analysis of the intersection of education, social control, and resistance, and the formation and meaning of identity for minority groups in America.Less
This book examines the formation of African American and Native American citizenship, belonging, and identity in the United States by comparing educational experiences in Kansas between 1880 and 1935. The author focuses her study on Kansas, thought by many to be the quintessential free state, not only because it was home to sizable populations of Indian groups and former slaves, but also because of its unique history of conflict over freedom during the antebellum period. After the Civil War, white reformers opened segregated schools, ultimately reinforcing the very racial hierarchies that they claimed to challenge. To resist the effects of these reformers' actions, African Americans developed strategies that emphasized inclusion and integration, while autonomy and bicultural identities provided the focal point for Native Americans' understanding of what it meant to be an American. The book argues that these approaches to defining American citizenship served as ideological precursors to the Indian rights and civil rights movements. This comparative history of two non-white races provides an analysis of the intersection of education, social control, and resistance, and the formation and meaning of identity for minority groups in America.
Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na‘im
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199895694
- eISBN:
- 9780199350742
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199895694.003.0003
- Subject:
- Religion, Islam
This chapter examines the issue of religious self-determination for American Muslims who want to embrace their American citizenship. It suggests that American Muslims should explore strategies to ...
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This chapter examines the issue of religious self-determination for American Muslims who want to embrace their American citizenship. It suggests that American Muslims should explore strategies to pursue their priorities on their own terms through so-called religious self-determination. It explains that religious self-determination means both the individual experience and the collective expression of a foundational freedom, subject to the equal rights of other citizens. This article also discusses the three main factors that influence the options now available to Muslims in public and political life and calls on American Muslims to take a proactive and affirmative view of their American citizenship.Less
This chapter examines the issue of religious self-determination for American Muslims who want to embrace their American citizenship. It suggests that American Muslims should explore strategies to pursue their priorities on their own terms through so-called religious self-determination. It explains that religious self-determination means both the individual experience and the collective expression of a foundational freedom, subject to the equal rights of other citizens. This article also discusses the three main factors that influence the options now available to Muslims in public and political life and calls on American Muslims to take a proactive and affirmative view of their American citizenship.
Lorrin Thomas
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- March 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780226796086
- eISBN:
- 9780226796109
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226796109.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
By the end of the 1920s, just ten years after the Jones Act first made them full-fledged Americans, more than 45,000 native Puerto Ricans had left their homes and entered the United States, ...
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By the end of the 1920s, just ten years after the Jones Act first made them full-fledged Americans, more than 45,000 native Puerto Ricans had left their homes and entered the United States, citizenship papers in hand, forming one of New York City's most complex and unique migrant communities. This book unravels the many tensions—historical, racial, political, and economic—that defined the experience of this group of American citizens before and after World War II. Building its incisive narrative from a wide range of archival sources, interviews, and first-person accounts of Puerto Rican life in New York, it illuminates the history of a group that is still largely invisible to many scholars. At the center of the book are Puerto Ricans' own formulations about political identity, the responses of activists and ordinary migrants to the failed promises of American citizenship, and their expectations of how the American state should address those failures.Less
By the end of the 1920s, just ten years after the Jones Act first made them full-fledged Americans, more than 45,000 native Puerto Ricans had left their homes and entered the United States, citizenship papers in hand, forming one of New York City's most complex and unique migrant communities. This book unravels the many tensions—historical, racial, political, and economic—that defined the experience of this group of American citizens before and after World War II. Building its incisive narrative from a wide range of archival sources, interviews, and first-person accounts of Puerto Rican life in New York, it illuminates the history of a group that is still largely invisible to many scholars. At the center of the book are Puerto Ricans' own formulations about political identity, the responses of activists and ordinary migrants to the failed promises of American citizenship, and their expectations of how the American state should address those failures.
Jacob Rama Berman
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814789506
- eISBN:
- 9780814789513
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814789506.003.0007
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Cultural Studies
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the figure of the Arab in the nineteenth-century American discourse. Arab could and did indicate an intermediary position between foreigner and ...
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This introductory chapter provides an overview of the figure of the Arab in the nineteenth-century American discourse. Arab could and did indicate an intermediary position between foreigner and citizen, black and white, primitive and civilized. The discursive creation of these figurative Arabs speaks to the shifting racial parameters of American citizenship, as well as to American writers' propensity to use foreign references to redefine those parameters. Figurative Arabs thus acted as cross-cultural references that destabilized the very terms of identification by which American national discourse distinguished the United States as a historically and spatially unique entity. This book provides an account of why these figurative Arabs of American literature were created and how they influenced definitions of national belonging.Less
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the figure of the Arab in the nineteenth-century American discourse. Arab could and did indicate an intermediary position between foreigner and citizen, black and white, primitive and civilized. The discursive creation of these figurative Arabs speaks to the shifting racial parameters of American citizenship, as well as to American writers' propensity to use foreign references to redefine those parameters. Figurative Arabs thus acted as cross-cultural references that destabilized the very terms of identification by which American national discourse distinguished the United States as a historically and spatially unique entity. This book provides an account of why these figurative Arabs of American literature were created and how they influenced definitions of national belonging.
Melissa R. Klapper
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814748947
- eISBN:
- 9780814749463
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814748947.003.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
This chapter traces Jewish women's suffrage activism from the creation of National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) in 1890 through the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920 and ...
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This chapter traces Jewish women's suffrage activism from the creation of National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) in 1890 through the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920 and its aftermath. Jewish women primarily worked for suffrage as individuals, though intense debate flourished among Jewish women's groups. The American Jewish press also devoted time and space to suffrage, and rabbis aired the issue within the community. Once the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified in August 1920, Jewish women moved to apply their new rights to their sense of Jewish communal status as well as American citizenship. Indeed, immediately after winning the vote, the members of the sisterhood of The Temple in Atlanta successfully demanded representation on the synagogue board.Less
This chapter traces Jewish women's suffrage activism from the creation of National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) in 1890 through the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920 and its aftermath. Jewish women primarily worked for suffrage as individuals, though intense debate flourished among Jewish women's groups. The American Jewish press also devoted time and space to suffrage, and rabbis aired the issue within the community. Once the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified in August 1920, Jewish women moved to apply their new rights to their sense of Jewish communal status as well as American citizenship. Indeed, immediately after winning the vote, the members of the sisterhood of The Temple in Atlanta successfully demanded representation on the synagogue board.
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- March 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780226554235
- eISBN:
- 9780226554259
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226554259.003.0004
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
This chapter investigates the contingencies among American masculinity, American citizenship, and African American identity. It argues that James Baldwin's essays, like “The Fight,” punched out ...
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This chapter investigates the contingencies among American masculinity, American citizenship, and African American identity. It argues that James Baldwin's essays, like “The Fight,” punched out creative cultural space for his fictional characters to fill in with improvised narratives about manhood, democracy, and African American identity. “The Fight” presents Baldwin at a philosophical crossroads: he was completely invested in the fight for Negro political equality. His essays accentuate a striking style of black intellectual practice: the black intellectual as prizefighter. The improvised expression of suffering, community, and freedom inspires Baldwin's closing. By 1965 the rise in popularity of black nationalism, the aggressive, militant, and politically necessary ideas of Black Power and Black Art, crowded Baldwin out of his position as the primary independent public intellectual voice of the civil rights movement.Less
This chapter investigates the contingencies among American masculinity, American citizenship, and African American identity. It argues that James Baldwin's essays, like “The Fight,” punched out creative cultural space for his fictional characters to fill in with improvised narratives about manhood, democracy, and African American identity. “The Fight” presents Baldwin at a philosophical crossroads: he was completely invested in the fight for Negro political equality. His essays accentuate a striking style of black intellectual practice: the black intellectual as prizefighter. The improvised expression of suffering, community, and freedom inspires Baldwin's closing. By 1965 the rise in popularity of black nationalism, the aggressive, militant, and politically necessary ideas of Black Power and Black Art, crowded Baldwin out of his position as the primary independent public intellectual voice of the civil rights movement.
