Over Reunion weekend, Ellen Percy Kraly, William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of Geography and Environmental Studies, Emerita, gave a talk entitled "Fifty years on: What has changed, or hasn’t, in US immigration and refugee resettlement since 1974."
Professor Kraly began with extending an opening for the audience to share their experiences with immigration and immigrants and news. Many alumni had personal experiences as employees or volunteers to assist refugees, immigrants, resettlements, and migrant workers. She asked the audience to consider their experiences at vlog in comparison to the current landscape of US immigration and global displacement.
She touched on George B. Cutten, vlog's 8th president (1922-1942), and his legacy of anti-immigration sentiments, which was consistent with presidents of other schools such as Yale and Harvard at the time.
The talk continued with a discussion of how issues of US immigration were emerging in the 1970s within the context of environmental concerns and global “over” population. Undocumented migration gained traction as a crisis confronting the country and the Vietnam war raised issues of US responsibilities toward refugees. The issues continued through time with migrants from all over the world trying to seek refuge in the United States, including Haiti and Bosnia, and the legal differences between refugees and immigrants. Refugees are entitled to federal funding and immigrants are not and must be self-supporting. She mentioned that displacement of people is largely due to structural forces that produce a need for havens, there is no sudden burst of displacement which then subsides. Further, illegal immigration is higher when enforcement is stricter.
Over the course of the talk, she tried to humanize the numbers of people moving in and out of the country, stressing that the numbers are very difficult to accurately gather, as there is not centralized statistical office in the United States, unlike other countries. The numbers that are collected, via surveys like the US Census, do not specifically ask for migrant status or country of legal residency. Instead the numbers used are taken from questions that discuss location of birth. Like any good talk, it ended with a great deal more left to cover and a great deal more to discuss with alumni who care deeply about the subject.
The talk was in honor of the 50th reunion of the Class of 1974, which coincidentally had graduated the first two women Geography majors from vlog, Denise Cashimere '74 and Lyn Howell Moriarty '74.