In the reading, the case of Ozawa reveals that societal concepts of race stand above all over ideas of a \u201ctrue\u201d American when looking at citizenship. Depsite presenting as a \u201cparagon\u201d of the naturalized American citizen, Ozawa was still denied status as a White man and as a citizen. Ozawa declared that he had married a woman who attended American (as opposed to Japanese) schools, spoke only English at home so that his children would not learn the language, and that he wanted only to repay \u201cUncle Sam\u201d and the grace that America had shown him. Despite these penultimate displays of patriotism and Ozawa\u2019s argument that Japanese people were physically as \u201cwhite\u201d as \u201cWhite\u201d people, the court still ruled that Japanese people were not White and could not become citizens. Ozawa revealed to the world that the court now classified Caucasians only as true white people and possibly citizens. In Thind\u2019s case, only a few months later, being Caucasian did NOT allow him to be a white man and a citizen. As a \u201chigh caste Hindu\u201d man, despite being technically classified as Caucasian, and by the logic of Ozawa, therefore white, Thind was denied citizenship. This made it clear that citizenship was linked to a sociological concept of whiteness, rooted not in science but in sheer belief and the fabricated history of race.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Belonging and being a citizen are fairly different things in the public eye. Today, I think that citizenship is defined as someone who does not present as being TOO \u201cethnic\u201d and who can conform to American norms of being a good, upstanding citizen: speaking English without an accent, working in a \u201crespectable\u201d more white collar job, with children\/family who are also integrated into American systems of schooling, work, etc. Citizens look and act the part of an American. I think this is true because many people\u2019s perceptions of who deserves citizenship isn\u2019t necessarily true to the reality. With retorts like \u201cspeak English\u201d milling about and ideas of \u201cillegal aliens\u201d lumbering over border walls and things. People do seem to believe that being a law abiding citizen who pays taxes, contributes to the American way, and says the pledge of allegiance, hand on heart defines what a citizen is. However, I disagree, since the law is not necessarily always correct. Laws overlook concepts of race, class, gender, mental and physical disabilities, etc.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In the reading, the case of Ozawa reveals that societal concepts of race stand above all over ideas of a \u201ctrue\u201d American when looking at citizenship. Depsite presenting as a \u201cparagon\u201d of the naturalized American citizen, Ozawa was still denied status as a White man and as a citizen. Ozawa declared that he had married … Continue reading “Christal Yu DB 7”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"portfolio_post_id":0,"portfolio_citation":"","portfolio_annotation":"","openlab_post_visibility":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-961","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-discussion-board-7"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/961","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2209"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=961"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/961\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":962,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/961\/revisions\/962"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/asn-114-asian-american-history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}