Timelines

Migration is a natural part of living systems, and human history is no exception. Yet it remains one of the most debated public issues of our time.

Both people and borders move. Who is allowed to move, and who is granted rights, lies at the heart of how nations define belonging. In Germany and the United States alike, these debates have been deeply intertwined with evolving ideas of race and ethnicity.

These timelines trace how citizenship and belonging have been constructed, challenged, and redefined through laws, social movements, global events, and cultural works — and how those histories continue to shape the present.

1945

War Brides Act

Approximately one million American soldiers married foreign women during and after World War II. These women’s entry into the United States was limited until Congress passed the ,[object Object], in 1945. This act allowed foreign spouses and minor children of American servicemen to immigrate to the U.S. regardless of immigration quotas, provided that they met existing physical and mental health immigration standards. American soldiers’ brides were from allied and non-allied countries alike: Great Britain (~100,000), continental Europe (~150,000), Japan and East Asia (~50,000), Australia and New Zealand (~16,000), and Germany (~15,000).

Following the War Brides Act, in 1946, the Fiancées Act was passed to allow admission of foreign fiancées to the United States on three-month non-immigrant visitor visas. In 1947, an amendment eliminating racial categories from the War Brides Act allowed Asian spouses to enter the United States under the same standards. This remained the only legal way for Asians to immigrate to the United States until the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 removed racial categorizations from all immigration quotas.

armstrong.edu

Movie Poster of "Sayonara" 1957.

Following the War Brides Act, media pieces including non-white War brides began coming out. These pieces of media portrayed Asian women as assimilable and quiet thus making the American people more accepting towards Asian war brides. One of these media pieces was "Sayonara", a 1957 film starring Marlon Brando and Miiko Tara about an American GI falling in love with a Japanese woman and leaving his American wife for her. "Sayonara" emphasized the doting and helpless nature of Tara's character, Hana Ogi, showing American men that Asian wives upheld the strict gender norms of women who are passive wives. These portrayals have had a lasting effect, creating the stereotype that these women are docile and easily dominated which can still be felt today with East Asian women being sexualized and fetishized because of this.

United States

Sources

War Brides Recall Their Turning Points. Date accessed: December 2, 2014.
War Brides. Date accessed: June 16, 2015.