The Indian Americans

School Library Journal

Gr 6-10-These series entries cover why and when inhabitants of Mexico and India left their homelands for the U.S., their journey here, their reception, their lifestyles and acculturation, and examples of highly successful individuals. Mexican Americans also includes a chapter on border crossings and illegal immigration. First-person accounts enliven the generally accurate, lucidly written texts; information is expanded upon in numerous boxes and sidebars. The books, however, are not without flaws. The format is unappealing, with an occasional dull gray, often fuzzy photograph on pages whose inner column sinks into the gutter. Mexican Americans is sometimes overloaded with acronyms. It focuses on the increasing acceptance of this ethnic group into mainstream American society without mentioning current problems, such as with gangs. In 1884, not 1880, Porfirio D'az assumed the Mexican presidency for a second time; and Edward Roybal left Congress in 1992, not 1977. Indian Americans is slightly repetitious about the conflicting views of first- and second-generation individuals. Boxed material graphically describes the retaliations by the British against the sepoys for their 1857 rebellion ("Many unarmed sepoys were bayoneted, sewn up in the carcasses of pigs or cows, or fired from cannons"), but the only mention of sepoy-committed brutalities is found earlier in the text ("Both sides committed horrible atrocities-"). The text has the wrong location for the development of Sikhism, although the boxed information is correct. Consider these as adequate updates to Alexandra Bandon's Mexican Americans (1993) and Asian Indian Americans (1995, both Silver Burdett).-Diane S. Marton, Arlington County Library, VA Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.