Home Again?: A Forgotten Injustice chronicles mass deportation of Mexican immigrants in the 1930s

[marmar]

from In These Times:



Home Again?
A Forgotten Injustice chronicles the mass deportation of Mexican immigrants in the 1930s.

By Lou Mattei


With the economy in a rut and anxieties about national security festering in the nether regions of America’s social conscience, it’s minorities—immigrants, outsiders, heathens, you name it—who now, as in the past, bear the brunt of the backlash. Tolerance sounds swell so long as the Dow cries kowabunga. But when fat cats go belly up and “real Americans” fill unemployment lines, fear takes over.

Vicente Serrano’s documentary A Forgotten Injustice chronicles our ability to turn against our brothers and sisters during times of social panic. The film tells the hidden history of the mass deportation of more than 2 million Mexican immigrants in the 1930s. More than 60 percent of those given the boot were U.S. citizens who ended up living in Mexico as illegal aliens.

Serrano’s own grandmother was deported from Los Angeles in the 1930s and ended up living in Mexico for 70 years as an illegal alien. It was her story that, six years ago, inspired the Chicago-based, Emmy-winning Telemundo journalist to start working on A Forgotten Injustice.

“When I learned about the magnitude of the injustices of the ’30s. I felt a responsibility to tell the story of my grandma, her brother and the more than 1 million people,” says Serrano. “I always wondered why my grandmother’s stories ended with tears.” .........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/4465/home_again/