Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
Citizenship is invaluable, yet our status as citizens is always at risk - even for those of us born on US soil. From emancipated slaves through the US-born children of undocumented immigrants in the 21st century, citizenship stripping is an important history previously neglected. In You Are Not American, writer, law professor and historian Amanda Frost tells little known stories of how our government has systematically expatriated people for its own benefit. Harriet Scott, wife of Dred, needed to be denied citizenship to profit white men; children of Chinese immigrants needed to be denied to keep them out; today, in "Operation Janus," the Trump administration has created a mass denaturalization campaign, for naturalized citizens and even people born on US soil. Through nine powerful chapters of our history, Frost explores how the concept of citizenship and the rights of citizens has evolved, and especially how it has been challenged. We come to know remarkable figures who have fought to stay Americans, and sometimes lost.
At its heart, the book grapples with what it means to be American, and with ideas of membership, identity, belonging, and exclusion--issues that continue to occupy, and divide, Americans today. Drawing on the narratives of those who have struggled to be treated as full members of "We the People," Frost exposes a hidden history that reaches forward to the present moment, when Americans are being unmade anew.
Synopsis
Citizenship is invaluable, yet our status as citizens is always at risk - even for those of us born on US soil. Citizenship stripping allows the US to cast out its unwanted in order to suppress dissent, punish what is considered to be unpatriotic, and remove the civil rights of those whose identities are considered to be "un-American" - be it their race, religion, marriage partner, or beliefs. Hundreds of thousands of people have had their citizenship stripped away from them, yet their stories are widely unknown. Through nine powerful chapters of our history, law professor Amanda Frost explores how the concept of citizenship and the rights of citizens has evolved, and especially how it has been challenged. Drawing on the narratives of those who have struggled to be treated as full members of "We the People," Frost exposes a hidden history of discrimination and xenophobia that continues to occur today.
Frost uncovers how our government has systematically expatriated people for its own benefit and has removed the political and civil rights of dissenters in order to control the narrative of what "American" is. Harriet Scott, wife of Dred Scott, was denied citizenship to profit white men; the children of Chinese immigrants were denied citizenship to keep them out; today, in "Operation Janus," the Trump administration has created a mass denaturalization campaign for naturalized citizens and people born on US soil. You Are Not American grapples with what it means to be American and the issues surrounding membership, identity, belonging, and exclusion that continue to occupy and divide Americans today.
Synopsis
Citizenship is invaluable, yet our status as citizens is always at risk--even for those born on US soil. Over the last two centuries, the US government has revoked citizenship to cast out its unwanted, suppress dissent, and deny civil rights to all considered un-American--whether due to their race, ethnicity, marriage partner, or beliefs. Drawing on the narratives of those who have struggled to be treated as full members of We the People, law professor Amanda Frost exposes a hidden history of discrimination and xenophobia that continues to this day.
The Supreme Court's rejection of Black citizenship in Dred Scott was among the first and most notorious examples of citizenship stripping, but the phenomenon did not end there. Women who married noncitizens, persecuted racial groups, labor leaders, and political activists were all denied their citizenship, and sometimes deported, by a government that wanted to redefine the meaning of American. Today, US citizens living near the southern border are regularly denied passports, thousands are detained and deported by mistake, and the Trump administration is investigating the citizenship of 700,000 naturalized citizens. Even elected leaders such as Barack Obama and Kamala Harris are not immune from false claims that they are not citizens eligible to hold office.
You Are Not American grapples with what it means to be American and the issues surrounding membership, identity, belonging, and exclusion that still occupy and divide the nation in the twenty-first century.