The Awakening – Story of a South African American 9781078780742, written by Carmel Foster, follows the struggles of the author’s life as an immigrant woman in the United States of America. Foster writes about the abuse she faced as a domestic worker and facing homelessness after a horrific divorce. Her story exposes the rich businessmen and authorities in the U.S., who use their money and power to take advantage of struggling immigrants and women. The government never served justice to her. Now, Foster is speaking up against a system built on the exploitation of the oppressed.
Immigrants come to the U.S. in hopes of finding better opportunities, education, and a good life for their families. But many are met with life-long struggles, racism, and oppression. What they were running away from in their home countries still stands in front of them, this time it is draped in the American flag. But things are slowly and surely changing for the better for immigrants in the U.S. now. Center for American Progress reports several facts about immigrant women in America.
· Immigration enforcement is taking its toll on immigrant families. Rising deportations of undocumented immigrants are separating children from their parents. A 2011 report from the Applied Research Center found that more than 5,000 children living in foster care had parents who had been detained or deported from the United States. They estimate that another 15,000 children will end up in foster care in the next five years because of immigration enforcement. Immigrant women in particular face a burden when it comes to immigration enforcement: A recent CAP report by Joanna Dreby, assistant professor of sociology at Kent State University, finds that detentions and deportations often separate married couples, leaving single parents—and most often single mothers—struggling to cope with the burdens of supporting their families.
· Immigrant women workers are vulnerable to abuse at work and home. Immigrants comprise 46 percent of the domestic workforce and makeup close to the entire population of domestic workers in major cities such as New York. One study by Domestic Workers United found that 33 percent of domestic workers in New York City had experienced some form of physical or verbal abuse, often because of their race or immigration status. Domestic abuse affects immigrant and American-born women alike, but immigrant women suffer from particular vulnerabilities—particularly, abusive partners who use the woman’s immigration status to keep them from leaving an abusive marriage or relationship.
· Immigrant women face barriers to adequate health care. Immigrants who have resided in the United States for five years or less are barred from using federal Medicaid for the most basic and vital preventive health services such as prenatal care—even if their incomes qualify them for the program—unless their state chooses to eliminate this bar for eligible children and pregnant women. Thanks to this and an array of other factors, immigrant women are twice as likely as American-born women to lack health insurance.
· Human trafficking is another form of abuse endured by immigrant women and children. The U.S. Department of Justice estimates that each year 50,000 people are trafficked into our nation. U.S. officials can grant up to 5,000 so-called T Visas to help free immigrant women who are forced into the sex trade, among other things. But studies find that barely any are being granted. In 2012, for example, only 674 T Visas were approved.
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