unkown knowns

The Statue of Liberty is often seen as a symbol that represents the ‘American Dream.’ It represents and symbolizes the freedom, acceptance and opportunity that is expected by many who flee to the United States. These are the words which are on the statue:

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

I recently watch a movie called ‘La Americana.’ This documentary follows the life of a South American woman who crosses the U.S. border and lives and works in New York as an illegal immigrant for many years. She is forced to flee to America because she has a young daughter who was in an accident and thereafter became a paraplegic. The woman can’t make enough money in Bolivia to cover her daughter’s medical bills so she risks her life going to America in hopes of earning money and sending it back home to help her daughter.

This movie allows the viewer to see the story and perspective of an illegal immigrant. Seeing this woman tell her story, and understanding her needs, reminded me of the discussion we had in class about ‘known known’s’ etc. and ‘unknown known’s’ which are ideas or perspectives that we should know but for some reason or another we don’t. This particular example of the perspective of an illegal immigrant made me wonder if people are simply conveniently forgetting and ‘repressing’ these thoughts and ideas, or if they are simply unaware of the other side of the story.

Immigration is a very, very complex issue and I’m still trying to sort out and figure out my thoughts and ideas on the issue, but this film really was a great documentary with a powerful story that is often times overlooked by some. It also makes you question the words and symbolic meaning of the Statue of Liberty. We are all immigrants in some way—at least our ancestors were at some point. And the statue claims that America will openly receive the ‘tired, poor, huddled masses’ but do the actions of the United States reflect those words? This movie got me thinking about how it is important to sometimes question symbols, meaning and metaphors that are often times unconsciously consumed by some of society.