중남미

Since the passage of American immigration law of 1965, American immigration has increased dramatically, creating the so-called “the third wave” in American immigration history. Most of immigrants in this era came from the third world countries, especially from the Latin and Central America, which led to enormous changes in every aspect of American Life. Under the circumstances, there emerged a fear and anxiety regarding Latino immigration, and a public discourse emerged on the dangers that U.S. faces by the Latino immigration. The discourse on the Latino threat assumes that there has been the alleged threat to the nation posed by Mexican and other Latin American immigration and the growing number of Mexican descent in the U.S. Thus, firstly, this study, with an emphasis on Mexican immigration, discusses that the basic components of the Latino threat narrative were already formed in the course of the Mexican immigration to the U.S., creating illegal alien and other “alienated”images of the Mexicans in America. Secondly, this study explores the so-called “the Latino threat narrative,” focusing on how popular discourse and the media represented the Mexican immigrants as an invading force that is conspiring to reconquer the U.S. Southwest. And this study also tries to catch the public image of the Mexican immigration and the Mexican immigrants as a threat to the national security, the image that appears in the narrative.