Reference no: EM133648419 , Length: Words Count:1000

Assignment:

I think one of the most interesting things about is the vast, sweeping patterns of immigration all over the world during the second half of the nineteenth century.

A population that lives in one place but has ties--historical, cultural, economic--to another is usually referred to as a diaspora. The nineteenth century was in many respects the century of the diaspora. You would probably have to go all the way back to the second millennium BCE to find so many populations on the move at once.

Here in the United States were are highly aware of some diasporas: African, due to the enormity of the Atlantic slave trade in shaping our history, as well as the Irish, Italian and Eastern European diasporas that had such an impact on cities like Philadelphia. We tend to know less than we should about others, like the Chinese populations that arrived in California a generation or two earlier.

And there are many more global diaspora populations that we are barely aware of. This week's writing assignment asks you to think about two of them: The Japanese diaspora in South America (Brazil in particular) and the Lebanese diaspora in West Africa.

Please read the article "Nikkei Latin America" and watch Part I (up until around the 23:00 mark) of the documentary From Lebanon to Africa, then write a multi-paragraph essay not less than 1000 words in response to the following:

How were the origins and subsequent experiences of the Japanese in South America and the Lebanese in West Africa similar? How were they different? Use of your textbook to give us the long view of what set these populations in motion and how the world changed as a result.