How has immigration changed over time?

What does oriental mean?

well where i live which is texas there hs been a big immigartion change alot of people from mexico are come to texas

The term “oriental” is depricated and has largely been replaced with “Asian.” Much as “negro” is an obsolete and offensive term for people of African descent “oriental” is an obsolete and offensive term for people of Asian descent.

I can only say from my perspective. Immigration going back to the puritan era was basically free port and anyone was welcome to the United States, nothing bad. In the mid-to-late 1800’s near the time the industrial revolution started immigrants were coming from Asia and especially Europe. They had two main islands were they processed most of the immigrants Angel Island and Ellis Island. They accepted many people but due to taking jobs and increase in population a lot of that changed. They started only letting experienced workers who spoke English, and could buy or rent a house. I think at one point they deported many immigrants and only like a 20% or something of the people could stay. I’m not really sure but I think they made a rule that immigrants couldn’t exceed the number of immigrants there was before the industrial revolution. Now I think they let a lot of people in, but they still have their priorities and checking that they are not threat to american society and stuff (as long as they have proper documentation).

. The British used to emigrate everywhere in an attempt to colonize and dominate the globe. . Now, everybody else seems to want to come here instead, and most of the Country, Property, and Business is owned by the Russians, Chinese, Indians and various Middle Eastern oil magnates. . Oh well, what goes around comes around I suppose. .

We used it in history class where the majority of the class was Asian, I wasn’t aware that it was insulting.

In the medieval times, Europeans referred to Europe as the “Evening land” or, in Latin, the “Occident”. And they referred to the region that is currently called “Middle east” on American news as the Morning land or, in Latin, “Orient”. Thus “oriental” refers to people from eastern Asia or the Arabian Peninsula. Sometimes also to north-east Africans. The word is definitely obsolete. I do not know whether anyone considers it offensive. It is definitely an invalid generalization for people from multiple cultures and nations. Yet, “oriental music” or “oriental mocha” or “oriental art” is sometimes sold here by immigrants from those nations. So I assume that it is not considered as offensive as the “n” word…

My country has been an more of an emigration country until the 1930ies. Like most of the European countries were. In the 1933-1948 period Germany was a a total no-official-migration-anywhere country. There were some refugees though. :(

In the 1960ies, Germany had an extreme shortage of workers. So they advertised part-time immigration and attracted Italian, Turkish and other “Guest workers” who came here for better wages. Many of them stayed for several years and then returned home. But many others stayed and made their families follow them. In the 1980ies, Germany discouraged immigration as we developed an unemployment problem. We still accept anyone who is persecuted for political reasons or who would be punished for something that is not a crime in Germany. For example people who would be punished for adultery or for being homosexual in their home country can seek refuge in Germany and will be permitted to stay permanently. We also accept almost all refugees from war regions. People can also immigrate here as “qualified personnel” but that is quite difficult. You have to have an employer who hires you for at least one year and that employer has to prove that he could not possibly find a qualified person otherwise.

There is one big exception. Since some day in the 90ies… And that is EU-citizens. Since then, any EU-citizen has got the right to move to any EU country and work there. So people from the EU come and go as they please. But we don’t actually consider them immigrants. If some neighbor is from France, Spain or Italy, they just have to fill some different forms at the tax office. It’s like….Californians would not consider a person from Maine an immigrant either.

Offensive is probably too strong a word but “Asian” is the preferred term by most Asians and is listed as the preferred term in every style manual I’ve seen.

I think a majority of people who migrate here to the USA still come here legally. We only have Mexicans who come from Mexico who sneak in. I heard that Canada wont even let you in if you have had a DUI. Not even to visit!