The reading on “Economic Restructuring
and Labor Organizing in Southeast Los Angeles 1935-2001” by Myrna Cherkoss
Donahoe, describes how history changed in the most important neighborhoods of
Los Angeles; more specifically in Southeast L.A. It talks about how Native Americans
were displaced by the Hispanics, and how they received their lands through
Spanish monarchy. It also describes the way in which Mexicans gained
independence from Spain and became Californians. At that time, Southeast
L.A was called Rancho San Antonio. By 1848, United States under the Manifest
Destiny occupied California as one of its territories and claimed it to be a
state. Undoubtedly, by then the white population known as Anglo Americans moved
to this state and specially Southeast L.A, which had the best affordable lands
and geographical position for creating factories with minimum costs and cheap
labor.
The white population’s working class men
made the first unions. However, over a long period they learned that it would
be impossible to gain the goals that they desired. At that time, they included
people of color and Latino workers in their union’s strikes. Many cases went to
court and lost and even if they succeed to win, it was too late to gain
anything from the lawsuits due to the closure of the factories. This was the
beginning of representing the minorities in general, and the union made
cross-racial alliances.
Global economic process also played a
crucial point for the minorities and especially for the Latino working
population. To make more profit, capitalists moved labor-intensive jobs and
manufacturing out, and brought modernized factories that required the knowledgeable
and the educated. Many jobs that were not part of Latino minorities and people
of color were lost. However, since unions were created they opened a new point
of view for minorities to exercise their rights, it created a new climate that
gave hope to low class workers. Therefore, new organizations were created to
stop the closure of plants.
The fight for creating and maintaining
jobs in Los Angles in 1992, was arranged by Los Angeles Manufacturing Action
Project, also known as (LAMAP), which used Latino union organizers who were
involved in political and trade unions to lead the cause.
The main lesson that I learned from this
article is that one individual alone cannot bring changes to his community, nor
can he voice his concern about problems in his neighborhood. It takes a large
group networking and gradually asking for change that would make a path for
future concerns to be brought to light.
How would you live your life back in
1840s, with restrictions placed based on race and gender?
How would you achieve the living
standards of an Anglo Americas life?
Would you say your life is different now
from what it would have been in 1840s?
I agree, one person can change the way things run. If they had the possibilities to network and the means to stand up for equality and justice then maybe a difference could be made. However, it is not always like that. There are certain exceptions though, like cesar chavez. It just takes one person to point out the issue and then everything else will follow.
ReplyDeleteI do not know how i would have lived my life back in the 1840's; there are way to many restrictions that i do not agree with. Myabe because i have grown up a different way, i do not see myself acting or having different values and morals now. As a woman, i feel i obviously have more freedom now as opposed to the 1800's. As a minority, i feel like generally, it is the same. Sure there might be more of us now, but i still feel like we are not as accepted as everyone thinks. However, it does make you wonder and think about how much life has changed, some for the good and the bad.
Do you think that homeless people chose to homeless because they didn't want to deal with society's way of "helping" the underprivileged or minorities? I just feel that the people that were trying to help the housing and working situation were only making it worse. They only would work on the surface of the problem never really dug in there and helped from the bottom up. If you don't have a good foundation, no matter how beautiful the house looks, it will still fall down. They wanted to restore the economics crisis but nothing ever really helped it. Like Kathy said, we need that one person that will change everything and change the way people look at the world. I think if we lived in the 1840 we would deal with everything just like the people back then did, we would just settle and live our lives with the barriers. We would grow so accustomed to being looked down upon, that it would just seem normal to us.
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