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Four years after arriving
in the United States,
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like any typical 16-year old,
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I went to get my driver's permit.
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After I showed the clerk
my immigration papers, my green card,
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she told me it was fake.
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"Don't come back here again," she said.
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That's how I found out
I was in America illegally.
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And I'm still here illegally.
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I'm a journalist and filmmaker.
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I live in stories,
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and what I've learned
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that what most people
don't understand about immigration
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is what they don't understand
about themselves:
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their families old migration stories
and the processes they had to go through
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before green cards and walls even existed,
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or what shaped their understanding
of citizenship itself.
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I was born in the Philippines.
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When I was 12, my mother sent me
to live with her parents,
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my grandparents,
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or, as we say in Tagalog, Lolo and Lola.
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Lolo's name was ??.
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When he legally emigrated to America
and became a naturalized citizen,
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he changed his name
from ?? to Ted,
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after Ted Danson
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from the TV show "Cheers."
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Can't get any more American than that.
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Lolo's favorite song
was Frank Sinatra's "My Way,"
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and when it came to figuring out
how to get his only grandson, me,
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to America,
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he decided to do it his way.
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According to Lolo, there was no easy
and simple way to get me here,
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so Lolo saved up 4,500 dollars --
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that's a lot of money for a security guard
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who made no more than
eight dollars an hour --
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to pay for the fake green card
and for a smuggler
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to bring me to the US.
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So that's how I got here.
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I can't tell you how many times
people tell me that their ancestors
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came to America "the right way,"
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to which I remind them,
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America's definition of "the right way"
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has been changing ever since
the first ship of settlers dropped anchor.
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America as we know it
is more than a piece of land,
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particularly because the land that now
makes up the United States of America
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used to belong to other people
in other countries.
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America as we know it is also
more than a nation of immigrants.
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There are two groups of Americans
who are not immigrants:
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Native Americans, who were
indigenous to this land,
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and who were killed in acts of genocide;
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and African Americans,
who were kidnapped, shipped, and enslaved
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to build this country.
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America is above all an idea,
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however unrealized and imperfect,
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one that only exists because
the first settlers came here freely
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without worry of citizenship.
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So where did you come from?
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How did you get here?
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Who paid?
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All across America,
in front of diverse audiences --
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conservatives and progressives,
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high school students
and senior citizens --
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I've asked those questions.
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As a person of color,
I always get asked where I'm from,
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as in, "Where are you from from?"
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So I've asked white people
where they're from from too.
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After asking a student
at the University of Georgia
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where he was from,
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he said, "I'm American."
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"I know," I said,
"but where are you from?"
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"I'm white," he replied.
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"But white is not a country," I said.
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"Where are your ancestors from?"
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When he replied with a shrug,
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I said,
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"Well where did you come from?
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How did you get here? Who paid?"
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He couldn't answer.
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I don't think you can talk
about America as America
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without answering those
three core questions.
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Immigration is America's lifeline,
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how this country has
replenished itself for centuries,
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from the settlers and the revolutionaries
who populated the original 13 colonies
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to the millions of immigrants,
predominantly from Europe,
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who relentlessly colonized this land.
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Even though Native Americans
were already here
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and had their own tribal identities
and ideas about citizenship,
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they were not considered US citizens
until the 1924 Indian Citizenship Act.
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The landmark 1964 Civil Rights Act
that Black Americans fought for
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inspired the 1965
Immigration and Nationality Act,
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which ended America's
race-based exclusionary system
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that had lasted for 40 years.
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I could go on and on here,
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but my point, my larger point, is this.
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How much do any of us,
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whether immigrants
of the past or the present,
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know of these crucial parts
of American history?
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How much of this history makes up
the actual US citizenship test?
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Have you ever seen it?
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It's a mostly oral test,
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and government officers ask applicants
up to 10 of the 100 questions.
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To pass, applicants must get
at least six answers right.
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I looked at the test recently,
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and I was aghast at the questions posed,
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what constitutes acceptable answers
to the glaring omissions.
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There's a question about
the Statue of Liberty, where it is.
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There's no question about Ellis Island,
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about the United States
as an immigrant nation,
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and the countless anti-immigrant
laws that were passed.
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There's nothing about
Native American history.
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There's a question about
what Martin Luther King, Jr. did,
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but largely there's inadequate
and irresponsible contexts
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about African Americans.
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Here's an example.
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Question number 74
under the American history section
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asks applicants to "name one problem
that led to the Civil War."
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There are three acceptable answers:
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slavery,
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states rights,
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economic reasons.
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Did my Lola and Lolo get that question?
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If they did get the question,
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do they even understand
the history behind it?
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How about my uncles
and aunties and cousins
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and millions of other immigrants
who had to take that test
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to become Americans.
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What do immigrants know
about America before we get here?
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What kind of citizenship
are we applying for?
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And is that the same kind of citizenship
we actually want to be a part of?
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Come to think of it --
I've been thinking a lot about this --
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what does dignified citizenship look like?
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How can I ask for it when I
just arrived here 26 years ago,
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when Black and Native people
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who have been here in America
for hundreds of years
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are still waiting for theirs?
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One of my favorite writers
is Toni Morrison.
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In 1996, a year before I found out
I was in the country illegally,
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my eighth grade class was assigned
to read "The Bluest Eye,"
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Morrison's first book.
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Instantly, the book challenged me
to ask hard questions.
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Why does Pecola Breedlove,
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this young Black girl
at the center of the book,
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why did she want blue eyes?
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Who told her to want it?
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Why did she believe them?
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Morrison said she wrote the book
to illustrate what happens
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when a person surrenders
to what she called "the master narrative."
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Definitions, Morrison said,
belonged to the definers, not the defined.
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Once I realized that I was here illegally,
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I convinced myself that if I was not
a legal citizen by birth or by law,
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another kind of citizenship was possible.
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Citizenship as participation.
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I engage.
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I engage with all kinds of Americans,
even Americans who don't want me here.
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Citizenship as contribution.
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I give back to my community
in whatever ways I can.
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As an undocumented entrepreneur,
and yes there is such a thing,
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I've employed many US citizens.
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Citizenship as education.
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We can't wait for others
to educate us about the past
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and how we got to this present.
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We have to educate
ourselves and our circles.
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Citizenship as something
greater than myself.
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We are, I think,
individually and collectively,
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rewriting the master narrative of America.
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The people who were once defined
are now doing the defining.
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They're asking the questions
that need to be asked.
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A core part of that redefinition
is how we define
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not only who is an American
but what constitute citizenship.
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Which, to me, is our
responsibility to each other.
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So consider your own personal narrative
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and ask yourself,
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where did you come from?
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How did you get here?
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Who paid?
Raissa Mendes
It seems to me that the speaker says "believe" and not "live" below:
0:24.64
I live in stories.