Media Resource

Immigration Keywords for Chronicling America

This resource is part of EDSITEment's Immigration and Citizenship Keyword Thesaurus for Chronicling America. Here you will find historically accurate keywords that may help in using the Chronicling America historical newspaper database to research topics related to immigration. 

We also offer a comprehensive introduction to working with historic newspapers in our teacher's guide Chronicling America: History's First Draft

Alien

Related Terms: illegal alien, enemy alien, unassimilated alien  

Definitions: Belonging to another person, place, or family; not of one’s own; from elsewhere, foreign.  

Contextual Considerations, or "How this Term was Used": First used circa 1300, alien is derived from a French word meaning “strange” or “foreign.” The later connotation implying someone from a different country comes from circa 1500s and has been used this way since. Early usage of the word in American papers gives a neutral context, simply implying the person is not from the colonies, or later the United States. Eventually a negative connection comes with the word, often being led by an antipathetic adjective. Around the 1930s, descriptors such as “illegal” were added to alien to describe someone who had entered the country without official authorization.  

Examples from Chronicling America:  

"Alien" in The American Issue (Westerville, Ohio), 01 July 1929. Chronicling America Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. 


 

“Alien” in The Potters Herald (East Liverpool, Ohio), 15 March 1951. Chronicling America Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. 

A picture containing text, newspaper

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“Alien” in Passaic City Record (Passaic City, N.J.), 22 Dec. 1906. Chronicling America Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.