Mexican American Culture

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dominant culture. Such constructs are dynamic, or influenced by many different elements, including the "spirit of the times" and are limited by socially derived stereotypes (Short and Magana 701). This seems especially true for the Mexican American culture. Cultural issues such as the exploitation of unskilled immigrants, the lessening degree of assimilation and the combination of these factors has lead to a new immigrant 'underclass' that contains a disproportionate number of Mexican Americans.
Mexican immigrants tend to look at the life they left as being limited by the fact that, no matter how hard they worked, they would never be able to earn the same kind of wages they can in the United States. Many of the Mexican immigrants come from a rural lifestyle where subsistence is the best they can ask for or expect. Leslie Reese explains, " Mexico is where many have experienced discriminatory treatment, not as members of an ethnic minority group, as illegal residents, or as ...

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a year in the mid-1940s to 55,000 a year in the early 1960s" (Martin 1128).
It makes sense that the migrant workers that chose to stay would want their families to join them and that they would migrate to the urban centers in search of more reliable work situations. The Bracero program ended in 1964. The decrease of legal means meant an increase in illegal immigrants. The influx caused a mixture of positive and negative sanctioning measures as the need for workers continued (Martin 1129). In the urban centers, the Mexican women were hired as housecleaners and care providers because they were willing to work for less and had been found to be diligent workers (Ibarra 264).
A ...

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