The American dream has been used to justify everything from starting a new life in this country to buying that new Lexus. It is personified in works like “The Great Gatsby” and has been intricately tied into the ideals of democracy, capitalism and equality. However, ask multiple people what it means, and I wish you the best of luck in getting them to agree upon a single answer.
The American dream has been idealized to such a degree that the developments this nation underwent, and is still undergoing, to achieve it are obscured. The dream is a dynamic one that cannot be compartmentalized into a single definition. Refusing to acknowledge these shifting definitions throughout our nation’s development can only serve to mar what is among the most redeeming qualities of the U.S.
Perhaps the most recognized beacons of the American dream, Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty represent a dimension that includes the foreign-born. Political asylum and economic betterment take on new definitions in this context, and controversies regarding newcomers to this American ideal serve to further expand and mold our notion of it.
The prevalence of this is observable within our own neighborhood. Los Angeles’ immense Persian population, the largest outside of Iran, can be attributed to the mass migrations that occurred following the 1979 Iranian Revolution.
More recently with the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, the debate over entitlement to education raises the question of who is eligible to take part in the American dream. The act, which would give eligible alien minors six years to either obtain a two-year college degree or undergo two years of military service, would provide the opportunity to adjust conditional permanent residency to U.S. citizenship upon successful completion.
“America has been viewed as a land of opportunity and a land to come to if you want to better yourself and make a better life for yourself. The DREAM Act gives people an avenue if they have been in the country a certain period of time, getting access to an education they would not have had access to,” said Carrie McFadden, president of Bruin Democrats.
With projections that nearly one in five Americans will be an immigrant by 2050, the applicability of the dream to a wider demographic is already taking place.
“For my family, the American dream would be not to be a doctor, not be a lawyer, but to have a good stable job where you can have some financial stability. That’s what I think most Hispanic families deal with ““ financial problems. … For us, it’s not about the big house, but a house, yes, and a car, yes,” said Samantha Ramirez, a third-year Latin American studies student whose parents immigrated to the U.S. from Mexico.
With Martin Luther King Jr. Day just a week ago, remembrance of the “I Have a Dream” speech brings up another angle of the “dream.” The dream’s evolution with societal norms coupled with the continual rejection of its narrow usage would be pivotal in its transformation across the centuries. Whether along racial lines or other, it has come to engulf a continuously growing realm that would have been unimaginable a generation before.
Take lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights in the 21st century alone. Though undoubtedly facing tremendous obstacles to this day, the “acceptability” of the LGBT community in mainstream America has no doubt grown in the past decades. Prospects like gay marriage, which would have been deemed unattainable in previous eras, have been thrust onto a national stage and gained passage in five states.
The aspirations that follow for all pursuing the American dream are not uniquely American by nature, and though “my” American dream is likely quite different from “your” American dream, the inherent desire for betterment in any sense is a universal one.
E-mail Gharibian at cgharibian@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.