Immigration Quotes From The Bean Trees

Since the creation of the United States, there have been several enormous waves of immigration into the country. Many people come here to pursue the freedom they have always craved. In the book, The Bean Trees, this is a familiar concept to the characters Estevan and Esperanza. They have migrated from Guatemala all the way to the state of Arizona where they will meet the protagonist, Taylor. Throughout the story Taylor learns the couple’s struggle of being undocumented immigrants in the United States. Along the way, she will learn about Estevan and Esperanza’s heart-breaking background stories as well. These characters will journey on through life despite the hardships of immigration. The book shows the struggle that they should not have to

The way Barbara Kingsolver worded it was through the use of dialogue in the book. “People don’t look the same, talk the same, nothing. Half the time I have no idea what’s going on around me here” (135). This was spoken by Taylor when she was talking to Estevan. Technically Taylor was a foreigner to Arizona which is quite different than where she originally came from, Kentucky. She felt foreign and different from everybody else; she did not feel as if she belonged there. Now imagine how an immigrant would feel in a whole new country with a different culture and language. Their sociable abilities would definitely be at a low point to where they hardly talk to people, due to such a contrasting and new environment. In correlation to that, Nancy Rodriguez-Lora, a bilingual clinical therapist in Goshen, states “dealing with the issues that come with transitioning to a life in a new culture, called acculturative stress, can be tough enough for legal immigrants and doubly so for those lacking papers”(The Elkhart Truth). It has basically become a fact that immigrants will deal with social issues wherever they might go to. Barbra Kingsolver clarifies this even more by the use of characterization, specifically about Esperanza. “While the rest of us talked and splashed and laughed she [Esperanza] sat still…” (93). Her actions makes the

In rising action, using the conflict person versus society, Kingsolver adds, “the only legal way a person from Guatemala can stay here is if they can prove in court that their life was in danger when they left” (159). This was dialogue said by Mattie, a minor character in the story who was using her shop as an asylum for immigrants. When she described by what means immigrants can stay, readers can realize that the laws are not very fair. It is challenging to prove that someone was in danger as a refugee who probably does not have any papers or evidence. The government requests too much of them, which limits the probabilities of immigrants becoming legal. Kingsolver also incorporates Taylor’s, the protagonist, perspective regarding the situation. “Mattie said that of out some-odd thousand Guatemalans and Salvadorans who had applied for this, only one-half of one percent of them had been granted it…” (103-104). By the way the text was worded, it causes the United States government to sound very exclusive. With that in mind, Kingsolver portrays with that text how difficult it must be to even live in America due to the fact governments prefer certain groups of people to migrate into it. To continue, the author uses the conflict of person versus society to indicate the legal consequences people must face regarding immigration. “She told me that if I got caught I could get 5