Almost All Aliens

Almost All Aliens offers a unique reinterpretation of immigration in the history of the United States. Setting aside the European migrant-centered melting-pot model of immigrant assimilation, Paul Spickard, Francisco Beltrán, and Laura Hooton put forward a fresh and provocative reconceptualization that embraces the multicultural, racialized, and colonially inflected reality of immigration that has always existed in the United States. Their astute study illustrates the complex relationship between ethnic identity and race, slavery, and colonial expansion. Examining the lives of those who crossed the Atlantic, as well as those who crossed the Pacific, the Caribbean, and the North American Borderlands, Almost All Aliens provides a distinct, inclusive, and critical analysis of immigration, race, and identity in the United States from 1600 until the present. The second edition updates Almost All Aliens through the first two decades of the twenty-first century, recounting and analyzing the massive changes in immigration policy, the reception of immigrants, and immigrant experiences that whipsawed back and forth throughout the era. It includes a new final chapter that brings the story up to the present day. This book will appeal to students and researchers alike studying the history of immigration, race, and colonialism in the United States, as well as those interested in American identity, especially in the context of the early twenty-first century.

Almost All Aliens offers a unique reinterpretation of immigration in the history of the United States. Leaving behind the traditional melting-pot model of immigrant assimilation, Paul Spickard puts forward a fresh and provocative reconceptualization that embraces the multicultural reality of immigration that has always existed in the United States. His astute study illustrates the complex relationship between ethnic identity and race, slavery, and colonial expansion. Examining not only the lives of those who crossed the Atlantic, but also those who crossed the Pacific, the Caribbean, and the North American Borderlands, Almost All Aliens provides a distinct, inclusive analysis of immigration and identity in the United States from 1600 until the present. For additional information and classroom resources please visit the Almost All Aliens companion website at www.routledge.com/textbooks/almostallaliens.

Scholarship on immigration to America is a coin with two sides: it asks both how America changed immigrants, and how they changed America. Were the immigrants uprooted from their ancestral homes, leaving everything behind, or were they transplanted, bringing many aspects of their culture with them? Although historians agree with the transplantation concept, the notion of the melting pot, which suggests a complete loss of the immigrant culture, persists in the public mind. The Oxford Handbook of American Immigration and Ethnicity bridges this gap and offers a comprehensive and nuanced survey of American racial and ethnic development, assessing the current status of historical research and simultaneously setting the goals for future investigation. Early immigration historians focused on the European migration model, and the ethnic appeal of politicians such as Fiorello La Guardia and James Michael Curley in cities with strong ethno-political histories like New York and Boston. But the story of American ethnicity goes far beyond Ellis Island. Only after the 1965 Immigration Act and the increasing influx of non-Caucasian immigrants, scholars turned more fully to the study of African, Asian and Latino migrants to America. This Handbook brings together thirty eminent scholars to describe the themes, methodologies, and trends that characterize the history and current debates on American immigration. The Handbook's trenchant chapters provide compelling analyses of cutting-edge issues including identity, whiteness, borders and undocumented migration, immigration legislation, intermarriage, assimilation, bilingualism, new American religions, ethnicity-related crime, and pan-ethnic trends. They also explore the myth of "model minorities" and the contemporary resurgence of anti-immigrant feelings. A unique contribution to the field of immigration studies, this volume considers the full racial and ethnic unfolding of the United States in its historical context.

A 'cultural history' of the alien phenomenon, this book looks at our fascination with all things alien, as well as explaining what this says about us in the post-religious age.

Since 1988, Jim Sparks has been working with intelligent, non-human beings from off-planet locations. Unlike any other abductees, he has conscious awareness of his experiences with approximately 95 percent clear recall of technology, including time travel, invisibility, multidimensionality, and manipulation of gravity and electromagnetic fields. His firsthand reports of sperm extraction, breeding programs, shape-shifting, and thought-activated transport are astonishing, as is his personal journey from anger at the invasion to gratitude for the opportunity to be a part of saving the Earth from self-destruction. After a 1996 mass abduction, Jim was initiated as a participant, rather than as an unwilling abductee. It became clear to him that some ETs have become very concerned about their investment in planet Earth. He was given a message: "Your planet is dying". He was told to instruct humanity to: restore the Earth's ecological balance, grant amnesty to those who have suppressed the truth about the long-term alien presence on Earth, and bring forth all the concealed knowledge and technologies that extraterrestrial visitors have given to humans. He is an ambassador for human cosmic awareness and a voice for the ridiculed and dismissed people who have been contacted by alien civilisations

American by Birth explores the history and legacy of Wong Kim Ark and the 1898 Supreme Court case that bears his name, which established the automatic citizenship of individuals born within the geographic boundaries of the United States. In the late nineteenth century, much like the present, the United States was a difficult, and at times threatening, environment for people of color. Chinese immigrants, invited into the United States in the 1850s and 1860s as laborers and merchants, faced a wave of hostility that played out in organized private violence, discriminatory state laws, and increasing congressional efforts to throttle immigration and remove many long-term residents. The federal courts, backed by the Supreme Court, supervised the development of an increasingly restrictive and exclusionary immigration regime that targeted Chinese people. This was the situation faced by Wong Kim Ark, who was born in San Francisco in the 1870s and who earned his living as a cook. Like many members of the Chinese community in the American West he maintained ties to China. He traveled there more than once, carrying required reentry documents, but when he attempted to return to the United States after a journey from 1894 to 1895, he was refused entry and detained. Protesting that he was a citizen and therefore entitled to come home, he challenged the administrative decision in court. Remarkably, the Supreme Court granted him victory. This victory was important for Wong Kim Ark, for the ethnic Chinese community in the United States, and for all immigrant communities then and to this day. Though the principle had links to seventeenth-century English common law and in the United States back to well before the American Civil War, the Supreme Court’s ruling was significant because it both inscribed the principle in constitutional terms and clarified that it extended even to the children of immigrants who were legally barred from becoming citizens. American by Birth is a richly detailed account of the case and its implications in the ongoing conflicts over race and immigration in US history; it also includes a discussion of current controversies over limiting the scope of birthright citizenship.

In a 1950 conversation at Los Alamos, four world-class scientists generally agreed, given the size of the Universe, that advanced extraterrestrial civilizations must be present. But one of the four, Enrico Fermi, asked, "If these civilizations do exist, where is everybody?" Given the fact that there are perhaps 400 million stars in our Galaxy alone, and perhaps 400 million galaxies in the Universe, it stands to reason that somewhere out there, in the 14 billion-year-old cosmos, there is or once was a civilization at least as advanced as our own. Webb discusses in detail the 50 most cogent and intriguing solutions to Fermi's famous paradox.

"Aliens love underpants, in every shape and size, But there are no underpants in space, so here's a big surprise...." This zany, hilarious tale is delightfully brought to life by Ben Cort's vibrant illustrations. With a madcap, rhyming text by award-winning Claire Freedman, this is sure to enchant and amuse the whole family! Perfect for joining in, this story is fantastically fresh and funny - you'll laugh your pants off!