ment and many upper-class citizens would flee to the
United States, followed by relatives and friends. The
next wave of immigrants would include middle-class
citizens who had found life difficult under the new
regimes or civil wars. Finally, as the economic situa-
tions in their homelands worsened, the lower classes
would come to the United States seeking employ-
ment.
Ironically, given the size and population of the
continent, South America itself counts for the small-
est percentage of Hispanic immigrants to the United
States. They came for more traditional reasons, how-
ever, and tended to be better educated and econom-
ically middle class, leading to smoother integration
into the United States.
Latinidad and Protest Literature Immigrants from
Latin America included a wide range of races, eth-
nicities, and cultures. As they sought greater recog-
nition as a minority in U.S. culture, they attempted
to find a common cultural bond as Latinos, referred
to as Latinidad.
The entry of Hispanics into multicultural studies
was accompanied by the rise of protest literature.
Protest literature, and its accompanying social
movement, rejected the paradigm of assimilation
previously taken for granted in the American immi-
gration process, insisting that Latinos had to retain
their established culture. Previously, multicultural
studies involved studying minorities from the estab-
lishment perspective; Hispanic scholars changed that
by critiquing mainstream America from the Latino
perspective, inspiring similar changes in how Afri-
can Americans and other minorities engaged in
multicultural research.
In the 1980’s, the rise of hip-hop culture brought
together not only Latinos from various backgrounds
but also Latino and African American youths in a
common countercultural movement.
Politics Latino refugees tended to be more politi-
cally active than those who came seeking only jobs.
Cuban immigrants became very active in trying to
shape U.S. policy toward the Castro regime. Immi-
grants from Central America allied themselves with
sympathetic Anglo-Americans to prevent deporta-
tion, change U.S. policies toward Central America,
and educate the U.S. public about the situations in
their homelands.
The definition of a refugee in the U.S. Refugee
Act of 1980 required only “a well-founded fear of
persecution,” but the practical policy of the U.S. gov-
ernment was to recognize only refugees from coun-
tries that the administration considered “hostile”
and to reject refugee status to immigrants from gov-
ernments that the United States supported. By 1990,
these refugees achieved great victories both in Con-
gress and in the federal courts.
Economic Impact Like previous immigrant popu-
lations, Latinos would settle into ethnic neighbor-
hoods, called barrios. As with those previous popula-
tions, early immigrants who had already achieved
financial success in the United States, sometimes
known as “pioneers” or “godfathers,” would sponsor
other immigrants who came from their countries.
These immigrants would settle near their sponsors.
This led not only to the formation of ethnic
neighborhoods but also to large concentrations of
people of particular ethnicities in certain cities. As
immigrant populations would move into particular
cities and neighborhoods, the native populations
would relocate, often to the suburbs, leading to the
phenomenon of urban sprawl. This fueled construc-
tion, which, in turn, created jobs for low-wage immi-
grant workers.
Hispanics tended to fill the lowest-wage positions,
such as sanitation and manual labor. Many employ-
ers would seek out illegal immigrants as undocu-
mented labor in order to avoid employment taxes.
Many Latino immigrants, however, came from
middle- and upper-class backgrounds, entering the
U.S. economy at an advantage. Some looked down
on their less fortunate counterparts, especially those
who came from different countries.
The Arts and Popular Entertainment In the 1980’s,
Latino influence on the arts gradually moved from a
protest standpoint to more mainstream acceptance,
although some cultural critics argued that main-
streaming Latino art, literature, and music required
weakening it.
Like many minorities, Latinos sought acceptance
by success in the entertainment industry. Mean-
while, U.S. media companies began to recognize the
demographic trends and to integrate Latinos into
their productions. Latino characters became more
commonly represented in films and television series.
Among several Latino actors who became stars
during the 1980’s were Edward James Olmos, Andy
Garcia, and Jimmy Smits. When Ramón Gerardo An-
tonio Estévez became an actor, he took the stage576 Latinos The Eighties in America