Photojournalism: "The Golden Door" to America

“Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me: I lift my lamp beside the golden door.”

-Emma Lazarus "The New Colossus" 
(Engraved Poem on a tablet within the pedestal on which the Statue of Liberty stands.)

The foreign-born population consisted of 40.7 million people in 2012.  

The past decade saw a significant increase in the foreign-born population.

Between 2000 and 2012, there was a 31.2 percent increase in the foreign-born population.  During this period, the immigrant population grew from 31.1 million to 40.8 million people.

Immigrants today are putting down roots across the United States, in contrast to trends seen 50 years ago. 

 Through these photos, I am trying to share the literal everyday perspective of the immigrants who come to this country. I visited the same people that Lars visited and while she photographed the faces and expressions of the people we met, I took pictures from the perspective of their own front door. I wanted to show what the "golden door,"  as referred to by the Statue of Liberty, really looks like- even in everyday Provo life. I think these photos give insight as to what its like to wake up and walk out the door  in a new country and to show that despite labels and cultural differences- much of our lives still are the same. I wanted to show that there is simple beauty in discovering and understanding the perspective of someone with whom we may feel we have little in common.  I found that in order to give these photos the right look I had to do a few things: capture the entire door (to give the viewer the feeling that they were about to cross the door), use the door as a subject (this is what tells you that the big space next to it is a doorway) and stand a ways back in order to get the proper angle that captured both the subject and the background correctly.

(statistics courtesy of https://www.americanprogress.org)