Arab-american Immigration

            The original immigrants did serve a structural functional duty.  The majority of the immigrants that came over in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s were peddlers and shop keepers.  The peddlers typically went door to door to sell goods in rural areas.  They were selling the goods that were necessary for the people of the area to survive that they would not have had access too without the immigrants.  There were not convenience stores around until 1930 so without the peddlers the people of the rural areas would have struggled to survive. 

            The conflict theory was between the American workers and the Arab immigrants.  The factory owners used the Arabs as “Strikebreakers”.  When the American workers would go on strike due to poor labor conditions the Arabs would work because they were just looking to make money and move home.  This made it hard for the American workers to get the fair labor practices they were going on strike for because the owners could just higher people who didn’t care about the low income and poor conditions.  Due to the Arabs working it brought tension between the Americans and the Arabs.  It brought a lot of resentment to the Arabs from the Americans and in 1924 the immigration laws were changed so it was harder for people from Arab nations to gain entrance to America. 

            The symbolic interactionist theory is between recent immigrants and American citizens.  This interaction is very negative and is due to the attacks on 9/11.  Americans now relate Arab-Americans to terrorist so now all Arab immigrants are treated poorly.  They are mistreated and there is no real reason for it other than an unjust prejudice.