In this book, Bon Tempo and Diner provide a readable and expansive survey of U.S. immigration history. Moving briskly from the seventeenth century to the present day, they chart the twists and turns in U.S. immigration patterns, policies, and bureaucracies, as well as in the lives of U.S. immigrants. Along the way, they incorporate many recent, important trends in immigration historiography—including an emphasis on race and racism, on immigrants from all over the world (both women and men), and on its transnational dimensions (notwithstanding the subtitle “American History”). They also dot their narrative with compelling personal stories of varied, lesser-known immigrants—Irish union leader Leonora Barry; Sudanese refugee Achut Deng; Louise Norton, Malcolm X’s mother, who migrated to the United States from the West Indies by way of Canada; and struggling Chinese artist Qiming Lui.
In a book of such breadth, central arguments can be difficult to decipher, but Bon Tempo...