Not "a nation of immigrants" Settler colonialism, white supremacy, and a history of erasure and exclusion

The Broadway smash-hit Hamilton reinforces a narrative evoked by presidents from Kennedy to Obama proclaiming the U.S. to be a "nation of immigrants." Wrong, says Dunbar-Ortiz, presenting a more truthful, appropriately overwhelming history of the nation called the United States. The U.S. was not founded by immigrants but rather by colonizers enacting genocide through policy, war, and enslavement, which enabled the colonists to settle and falsely self-indigenize. Readers will be challenged and may need to read slowly and reread. Each chapter is densely packed with historical research, focusing, in turn, on this repeated pattern regarding enslaved African arrivants, the colonized then made-white Irish, people of Asian origin attributed with "yellow peril," native people in taken lands now called Mexico, the American West, Appalachia, Hawaii, Alaska, and everywhere the U.S. now exists. Dunbar-Ortiz hopes to empower modern citizens with the knowledge and skills to dismantle what she convincingly argues is a fiscal-military state. Her thought-work and writing are both full-force with courage and wisdom. In the age of telling truth, she says, the U.S. has yet to correct its narrative to acknowledge its settler-colonialist and imperialist past and present. This book should be taught in classrooms; readers will finish it changed.

Historian Dunbar-Ortiz (An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States) gives the lie to America's self-image as an immigrant nation in this fiery account. She casts the current surge of populism as the latest episode in a history of U.S. nativism that stretches back before the nation's founding, and contends that America only welcomes immigrants when they can be exploited or recruited to its project of settler colonialism, which was "grounded in the violent theft of land and in racial slavery." She also deconstructs the musical Hamilton to show how it ignores the fact that Alexander Hamilton opposed immigration and owned slaves, and describes how people of Scots-Irish descent dispossessed Native Americans and then claimed themselves as indigenous to the regions they settled. Discussing waves of Irish, Italian, Jewish, Asian, and Hispanic immigration in the 19th and 20th centuries, Dunbar-Ortiz explains how each group fled persecution and poverty only to face racial, ethnic, and religious intolerance from previous U.S. settlers. Dunbar-Ortiz's careful recounting of the suffering and complicity of each group is skillfully done, though the leaps from one historical time period to the next can be jarring. This impassioned and well-documented history pulls no punches. (Aug.)

The latest book by historian Dunbar-Ortiz (professor emerita, ethnic studies, California State Univ., Hayward; An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States) provides a critical reframing of U.S. history, specifically analyzing how immigration narratives have impacted and continue to shape the country. She challenges readers to question their beliefs and consider what it means when the United States lauds its immigrant roots--and what that narrative leaves out. After beginning with a critique of the musical Hamilton, the author examines genocidal treatment of Indigenous peoples in the U.S. over the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries and of people from the African continent who were violently transported to the American colonies. Dunbar-Ortiz also discusses the experiences of race and assimilation of various immigrant groups from Europe, Asia, and Latin America, plus a brief section on Jewish immigration to the U.S. during the 19th century. Dunbar-Ortiz's message is clear: uplifting narratives about the United States as a "nation of immigrants" allow the country to hide from its history of colonialism, genocide, slavery, and racism. VERDICT A dense account covering a vast range of topics; overall, a great contribution to the study of U.S. history. Though it's better suited to scholars than casual readers, this thought-provoking account will prove insightful for all.--Sarah Schroeder, Univ. of Washington Bothell