Assimilation the Latino Experience Essay - 1924 Words

Immigration has always been an issue in the United States, which is often portrayed as harmful and as major threat to American culture. As a result, various anti immigration policies have been aimed against immigrants in order to prevent and preserve the miscegenation of American culture, such as English only policies. Among the largest minority groups in the U.S, are Latinos who currently compose of 15% of the U.S population (Delgado and Stefancic 3). Unfortunately, Latinos have been accused of taking American benefits, jobs, and have wrongfully been depicted as a result of not assimilating to American culture. Latinos are often accused of resisting assimilation, but what has failed to be acknowledged is that there are obstacles set in†¦show more content†¦Unfortunately much of the Latino history has been ignored or not written in conventional textbooks, but the reality is that Latinos experienced similar experiences to the ones of African Americans. According to Richard De lgado, â€Å"Recent research by reputable historians shows that Latinos, particularly Mexican Americans in the southwest, were lynched in large numbers during roughly the same period when lynching of blacks ran rampart† (583). Moreover, Latinos have also been heavily discriminated within the educational system through segregation. Latinos along with African American were not allowed to attend school with white children and often had schools assigned to them. The purpose of segregating was to, â€Å"isolate Mexican American children and to retard their educational process† (Perea 601). Other methods of academically repressing Latinos included retaining them â€Å"in first grade for two or three years, which automatically placed them behind their Anglo peers† (Perea 602). Some of the rationale behind segregating children was that stereotypes were prevalent amid educators. Juan F. Perea sites in his article that show that, â€Å"teachers viewed their . . . stude nts as lazy and favored Anglo students in . . . leadership roles . . . [that] were necessary to teach Anglos how to control and lead Mexicans† (Perea 602). The previous clearly demonstrates that the educational system sought hinder Latinos in the educational system for the purpose of maintaining a workingShow MoreRelatedThe Issue Of Immigration Has Been On The Forefront Major Debates1684 Words   |  7 PagesThroughout America’s history, the issue of immigration has been on the forefront major debates. Immigration is among one of the most stimulating topics of discussion. Often when discussing immigration the question of assimilation also arises and whether or not immigrants are truly doing so. Since the beginning of this country, immigrants and even natives of the land have been pressured to assimilate to â€Å"American† Culture and to commit to its standards. When a group of people fail to assimilate toRead MoreCultural Assimilation Of Hispanic Immigrants996 Words   |  4 PagesCultural Assimilation of Latino Immigrants in the United States Latino immigrants have always had many obstacles when coming into the United States, the difference between the American and the Latin cultures is what has caused a huge hurdle that immigrants have found hard to overpass. This obstacle has caused many generations to go through cultural assimilation. Mize et al. (2012) explain that cultural assimilation is the adaptation of immigrants to unfamiliar cultural patterns, which includeRead MoreAssimilating to Fukuyamas Immigrants and Falmily Values Essay882 Words   |  4 Pagesidentify an American citizen. American conservatives and the author also opined that another factor that makes an immigrant stay in the United States a successful one is the assimilation process. American conservatives opined that immigrants from underdeveloped countries have unstable families that could make harder the assimilation process for the children are less likely to do economically well. However, Fukuyama explained that immigrants have strong family values and a greater level of ambition andRead MoreEthnic Assimilation From The United States1097 Words   |  5 Pagescultural assimilation; the different theories of assimilation will be explored. The idea of Assimilation came about in the early 20th century. (Golash-Boza, 2006) Assimilation is surrounded by two theories, the first that all immigrants will assimilate sooner or later and that the generational status of the individual is one of the main factors in determining the persons level of assimilation into the particular society. (Golash-Boza, 20 06) Within Assimilation there is segmented assimilation whichRead MoreAmerican Culture And Its Impact On American Society1599 Words   |  7 Pagespart of todays society.  Hispanics Americans constitute more than 15% of the U.S population, and the number is still growing. It is the country’s largest ethnic minority group. When Hispanics enter into the American mainstream, their main assimilation obstacle is acquiring the English language. Their native language is Spanish, so when they come to the United states they are are faced with many struggles as to finding jobs in which would allow them to only speak Spanish. They would have to learnRead MoreHouston Area Survey Essay1174 Words   |  5 Pagesthe future. The city has grown from being predominately Anglo to having a nice population balance between Anglos, Latinos, African Americans, and Asians. In terms of Latinos in Houston, the study places emphasis on the differences between the first generation who are foreign-born, second generation who were born in the United States with immigrant parents, and third-generation Latinos who were born in America with American parents. The study explores the differences between the generations on theirRead MoreRace As A Social Construction1679 Words   |  7 Pagesslavery attest to why this is the case, bu t that in no way should devalue the individual histories of other racial minorities in America. Each Minority group in America has had their own struggles in the when faced with the pressures of cultural assimilation. I do not have time to touch on every group, but the following are a brief compilation of cases that I believe demonstrate blatant racial bias. Asian-Americans have faced acute cases of racial discrimination. The United States government, at timesRead More Race Relations in Modern American Society Essay1587 Words   |  7 Pagesprevalent link is between the African American community and the Latino community. Here we find two groups of people with very similar lifestyles who find camaraderie between themselves when dealing with America’s racism. Although the specifics may differ, the experiences of Blacks and Latinos, specifically Mexican Americans, has impacted the two communities very similarly. For example, many sociologists agree that the slavery experience is the cause of many problems Black America has today. ThingsRead MoreB.Machismo, Marianismo Familismo . Machismo, Marianismo1049 Words   |  5 PagesB. Machismo, Marianismo Familismo Machismo, Marianismo and familismo are central to Latino culture, and all three can increase the likelihood of IPV in Latina immigrants. Machismo and its female counterpart marianismo are held as the â€Å"ideal† male and female gender roles in traditional Latino culture. These Latino cultural traditions are two-sided; machismo and marianismo can be viewed as positive qualities, however, they can also allow for an unfair balance of power between partners. StevensRead MoreEssay on cultrual cultural deprivation the hispanic challenge699 Words   |  3 Pagesmeans they have less time to meet with teachers, hire tutors, and provide continuous transportation. Therefore the lower class can’t possibly compete with the middle and upper classes. Angela Valenzuela gives the accounts of some Hispanic students’ experiences in school. These students feel that it is the inferior nature of the schools in the US that contribute to the low success levels. The schools in Mexi co have â€Å"teachers [that] value and nurture in their students an ability to communicate and express

Things Are Not Always What They Seem Free Essays

Thursday, September , 2011. This marks the start date of the Class of 2011’s first and last full year at Oxbow Prairie Horizons School (OPHS), the new K-12 school in Oxbow, Saskatchewan. It’s an absolutely gorgeous facility, complete with a large gym (equipped with top-of-the-line sound and lighting systems), integrated program for the functionally challenged students, large foyer, kitchen and even an extra gym. We will write a custom essay sample on Things Are Not Always What They Seem or any similar topic only for you Order Now The building is plenty big and even has removable classrooms, but every rose has its thorn, right? Or in OPHS’ case, thorns. Shortly after starting the 2011-2012 school term, and even shortly after moving into the school in March? of 2011, many staff and students have noticed a few glitches (so to speak) in the system. At first, small, piddly details that we can easily deal with (overcome? ). Like the room design of the biology, chemistry and physics labs where bulletin boards are blocked by the teachers’ desk and computer or even by entire counters. Like in the canteen, we were lucky enough to have beautiful cupboards installed to store our merchandise, but when it came time to actually sell it/them, students were unable to see the products anyways. So, in turn, the cupboard doors were taken off completely. Eventually, the small problems began to arise more suspicions and more noticeable and elaborate ones were recognized. Toilets in the washrooms began to constantly flush, some having to be manuallly shut off. The office in the shop has no windows, it is just a small room enclosed of cement. The parking lot is poorly designed. Trying to see around parked vehicles to hitting oncoming ones is hard and it is nearly impossible to maneuver large vehicles around at all. The buses drop students off half a block from the main entrances and when students do enter the school, depending on the weather, are required to move outdoor shoes because the parking lot is either muddy, full of water, or both. Which is not only a bother to our janitors but also to visitors, who trip over shoes trying to enter the building. Wireless internet was the first of many large problems to be noticed by the students. They were told that if you have a class where you will be using laptops and it is a larger class, to bring a personal laptop to work on as there may not be enough laptops for everyone. So, some did, until they told that the principal wasn’t given a password to the school’s public Wi-Fi network and they were unable to do homework and sassingments anyways. Even now, after Mr. Petlak has been given the password and used it on student’s computers, they are unable to access certain sites due to them being blocked. Sites that students use to complete and accomplish tasks and assignments. Why? Because staff at OPHS are unable to control this. It is government workers in either Weyburn or Regina that do. The base temperature of OPHS is, put simply, freezing. During September, where it can be twenty degrees celsius and above, most staff and students were already wearing sweaters and jackets to class. Which, in retrospect, is not uncommon for Oxbow. In the old high school, anyone working in the building would be wearing jackets, touques and mittens, unless you were in the science labs or the main office. There you would wear shorts, tank tops and flip flops. But with the excitment of the Horizons School close to being fully built, came the realization that we could actually wear seasonal appropriate clothing to school. Or so we thought. Now, in the new school, we freeze pretty well everywhere. With the exception of the Sr. Computer Lab, main office and the canteen (which are all normal temperatures), staff and students are still needing to wear layers and even haul blankets form class to class. Why? This is because of the poor commmunictation between our school and Weyburn, where they then decide whether or not to contact Regina to turn up the heat in jsut one particular room. Which, after the first few attmepts of doing so, we were told to use the thermostats located in each classroom. These allow teachers the ability to raise or lower the room temperature by 3 degrees. That’s it. In one area of the school there is actually cold air being blown throughout its rooms. But for us to fix this, we must flip a breaker. Instead of simply pushing a button on a thermostat to raise the temperature, we are required to issue a complaint to the Weyburn office, who then decide whether it is a big enough deal to report to the office in Regina. And apparently, it isn’t a problem for us to freeze. All of these problems can relate back to the fact that Oxbow has no power against the authority offices in Regina and Weyburn. We are not able to decide the climate of our classrooms, who has access to use our internet or even who is allowed put a screw in the wall to hang a picture. We are by no means, allowed to. A government office in that is 150-250 kilometers away makes the decision of what is and is not allowed. People who have no idea what goes on in our school, who attends or works there, what we are like or even where Oxbow is, has that discretion. Yes, our old school’s had a very large laundry list: plumbing, heating, electrical and just overall renovating. This article is not set out to complain about our new school. We were in much need of a new facility and are greatly appreciative for the effort, time and hard work that were pput into building it. But, with that said, I find it hard to comprehend how certain, seemingly common sense issues are ignored. The new school in Oxbow has heightened the school’s many previous strengths such as atheletics, drama, academics and even the staff and students as individuals. This school also has its negative effects though. And it is the students that are being effected. The future depends on them. So why does it have to be such a struggle to give them a proper learning environment? Teagan Loppe How to cite Things Are Not Always What They Seem, Papers

Corporate Venturing Creating New Businesses Within the Firm free essay sample

Introduction In a world which innovators are kings, interest in internal corporate ventures has grown tremendously. In my literature review, I would like to share my insights from reading the book titled â€Å"Corporate venturing: creating new businesses within the firm† by Zenas Block and Ian C. MacMillan. In this book, the authors shared their views on the importance of corporate venturing especially in this competitive global economy. Also, other aspects of venturing like the management, organisation and control of the ventures are also covered in great detail. However, much focus will be placed on the imminent need for corporate ventures and also issues like what determines the new venture success. I would also discuss the difficulties faced by managers in ventures as after all; venturing is not as simple as one would like it to be. In the later part of my review, I would also provide some evaluations in relation to this topic. What is a corporate venture? We consider a project a venture when it: †¢Involves an activity new to the organisation †¢Is initiated or conducted internally Involves significantly higher risk of failure or large losses than the organisation’s base business †¢Is characterised by greater uncertainty then the base business †¢Is undertaken for the purpose of increasing sales, profits, productivity or quality †¢Will be managed separately at some point during its life (Block Macmillan, 1993) In essence, it is a practice where a large firm takes an equity stake in a small but innovative or specialist firm, to which it may also provide management and marketing expertise. The objective of such venture is to be able to gain a specific competitive advantage. It is very important to be able to distinguish between is a corporate venture and an extension of a normal business activity as even till today, there are many misinterpretations of what entails a venture. Hence, I see the importance of being able to understand what a corporate venture is. Corporate venture: the growing phenomenon There have been a growing number of large companies creating business development organisations aimed at leveraging their IP portfolio through external licensing and/or partnerships. There are many successful examples of companies that enjoy high growth from new ventures including renowned companies like Nokia. Nokia adopted a very interesting corporate venturing approach for finding innovation. They moved beyond â€Å"not invented here† and are now embracing the idea of â€Å"finding the best ideas where ever they are†. Nokia Venturing Organisation is focused on corporate venturing activities that include identifying and developing new businesses. They introduced it as â€Å"the renewal of Nokia†. Nokia Venture Partners invest exclusively in mobile and IP related start-up businesses and they have a third group called Innovent that directly provides support and nurtures innovators in hope of creating vast future opportunities for Nokia (Docherty, 2004). It is the very fact that venture capital and opportunities is the essential tool available for companies to increase their innovativeness, quoting Wharton management professor Gary Dushnitsky and thus be able to develop a competitive edge in the economy. In another paper â€Å"When does venture capital investment create firm value,† by Dushinitsky and Lenox, they present the evidence that corporate venture capital investment is associated with the creation of firm value which goes beyond narrow financial returns and capture both the financial returns and the strategic benefits. Furthermore, in some researches, through the use of databases of hundreds of companies, the researchers compared companies that invested in venture capital and those that did not. They found that the greater the amount of corporate venture capital invested, the greater is the innovation rate of the investing company, measured by either the number of patents generated or by the citation-weighted patents output. Hence, this further presents the importance of venturing to keep up with the pace of innovation and competition in the economy. In addition it is said that corporate venture capital is one leg of a three-legged stool whose other two legs are strong internal RD capability and strong alliances with academic or government researchers. This highlights the crucial role corporate venture plays in the success of a company. Furthermore, not all firms are able to reap the full benefits of corporate ventures as results have shown that firms that invest for strategic reasons are more likely to continue to invest and in larger amounts. This is because strategically oriented firms are more likely to learn how to make good investments over time and this is not sometime that all firms are able to achieve overnight. As such, it is true that not every company can or should set up their own new ventures group due to various uncertainties or structural changes the firm might face in such circumstances. However, firms should still be focused on moving beyond the idea of â€Å"not invented here† to â€Å"finding the best ideas and technologies where ever they are†. What determines the new venture success? The strategic adaptation perspective implies that new venture success is a function of the managers or entrepreneurs ability to assess internal capabilities and environmental conditions for the purpose of developing and executing effective strategies (Andrews 1980; Porter 1980; Vesper 1980; Timmons 1982). The environment is viewed as a (major) constraint within which strategy is developed. Furthermore, environments are not immutable and are subject to negotiation and manipulation (Child 1972; Miles and Cameron 1982; MacMillan 1983). Such factor plays an important role in determining the success of the venture. Difficulties faced in venturing Reasons why companies stop venturing What we have constantly been told is the importance of venturing, the benefits that comes with it and there is a need to venture as ‘my competitors are also doing it’. However, behind the scenes, there are many circumstances that companies face which makes venturing hard and challenging and sometimes, companies are even discouraged from doing so. In order to determine why this is so, it is critical to examine the actual work of creating new businesses and distinguishing between organisational entities (such as venture companies and new venture divisions) and activities involving the development of new products, new markets and combination thereof (Block MacMillan, 1993). Much of the publicity surrounding intrapreneurship has centered on the establishment of separate organisational units within the companies. For instance, Colgate’s venture company rose and fell in three short years as well as Allied Corporation’s New Ventures operations which existed only for five years. The track record of a new venture division should not be confused or mixed with that of new venture. For organisations that put all their venturing eggs into a new venture division basket are likely to stop venturing when they disband the venturing division, only to resume as a matter of necessity after the passage of time (Block MacMillan, 1993) Another great challenge faced by organisations in their quest of venturing is that there can be extreme changes to their management teams within the company when firms engage in venturing. Such structural changes that come about with the new ventures might be a push factor for organisations considering engaging in new ventures that could potentially be of great benefits to the organisation. Furthermore, in recent years, it is frequently said that the venture industry especially in the US is facing a decline. It is thus rumoured that perhaps such venturing might not be as beneficial for the firms as it had in the past. The US venture capitalists have a depressed view of the industry mainly due to the weak IPO market and the unfavourable tax and regulatory policies present in the US domestic market. There is a shift in the amount of venture capital from the US market to the emerging market and this is a rising trend today. However, contrary to the popular belief, the venture capital industry is not a necessary condition in driving high-growth entrepreneurship, according to Right-sizing the US Venture Capital Industry, a new study by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. It is analysed that while venture capital will continue to be crucial to some forms of high growth companies, the report concluded that the sector’s size must be reduced for it to be viable. In recent years, the venture industry has been seen stagnating and declining returns coupled with rapid expansion in venture capital assets under management. It is said that the venture industry needs to shrink its way to becoming an economic force again. In various studies, it has been shown that the venture industry is profitable for many. In fact, professionals in the venture industry have gotten comfortable with the way their industry is set up in terms of size, structure and compensation. However, there is a need for venture participants to overcome their resistance to change and to get out of their comfort zone so as to be able to more effectively fund entrepreneurs and offer investors competitive returns. As such, there is a need for the venture industry to change so as to better realise the benefits it can potentially offer. Evaluation of the book This book by Block and MacMillan gave me great insight into the view of the business world and role ventures play in the economy. However, one drawback is that the context of the business world is based on that during the economic boom of the 1990s. With all the economic changes since of the following decade, some of the arguments made in the book may seem to fall flat and is less updated. Additionally, because of these new economic realities, it would be assumed venturing approached would to be reassessed with reference to the dot-com bust and the very recent global financial meltdown. Though I do not think that venturing would no longer be of importance to firms today, reassessment has to be made in the area of the risk involved, the management as well as planning due to the change in economic environment so as to ensure that firms are able to better reap the potential benefits corporate venture can offer. Conclusion The main take away from the book is that companies venture mainly to ensure growth and survival in the face of ever increasing competition. According to a number of studies and cross referencing with other academic papers, venturing is a surprisingly effective means of achieving these goals- at least for companies that create venturing programs carefully; and continually learn from their venturing experience. On a more personal note, this literature review was not an easy feat as the book includes many academic terms that I might not be clear of. However, after reading the book and other academic articles, I have to admit that this topic can indeed be interesting and it provided me with the knowledge and greater understanding of this highly debated topic. References Business dictionary. com: http://www. businessdictionary. com/definition/corporate-venturing. html Dushnitsky and Lenox, When Do Firms Undertake RD Investing in New Ventures Dushnitsky and Lenox, When Do Incumbents Learn from Entrepreneurial Ventures? Corporate Venture Capital and Investing Firm Innovation Rates Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation (2009): US venture capital industry must shrink to be an economic force http://www. kauffman. org/newsroom/venture-capital-industry-must-shrink-to-be-a n-economic-force-kauffman-foundation-study-finds. aspx Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation (2011): Right sizing the US venture capital industry http://www. kauffman. org/research-and-policy/right-sizing-the-venture-capital-industry. aspx Kenneth Liss (2000), Harvard business school: Corporate Venturing: Entrepreneurship on the Inside Leena Rao (2010), Study: U. S. Venture Capital Industry Expected To Shrink While Emerging Markets Grow http://techcrunch. com/2010/07/13/report-u-s-venture-capital-industry-expected-to-shrink-while-emerging-markets-grow/ Mike Docherty(2004), Innovation. net weblog:http://venture2. typepad. com/innovationnet/corporate_venturing/ Robert A. Burgelman and Liisa Valikangas (2005), Managing Internal Corporate Venturing Cycles Zenas Block Ian C. MacMillan (1995), Corporate Venturing: Creating new Businesses within the Firm