A BRIEF SUMMARY ON THE PATTERNS OF THE IMMIGRANT EXPERIENCE1
The process of migration was anything but simple and while millions of individual stories
exist, scholarship over the last few decades has generated patterns which pervade time and place
about the immigrant experience. Most immigrants to the United States since the early nineteenth
century did not come looking for freedom from persecution, nor did they expect to find streets
paved with gold.
Emigration: Causes and Patterns
In the majority of cases, emigration was undertaken as a strategy to achieve economic
goals at home. The onset of industrial capitalism altered the way people earned their living. The
enclosure movement and the mechanization of agriculture accompanied this shift in rural areas
as cities rose as the site of factories and manufacturing. Certainly political and religious
upheaval as well as natural disaster prompted movement throughout history, but historians
continually see that the locus of emigration largely was from places where the economy shifted
and dislocated persons from traditional livelihoods. Most emigrants came from an agricultural
setting and hoped to return to achieve economic success in a mode most familiar to them. Many
came with the intention of returning home, hence the high incidence of single rather than family
migration. Repatriation, or return migration was also common. Even Jews, who came primarily
as part of a family migration and left Eastern Europe because of both economic dislocation and
political persecution, repatriated at the rate of 20% in the years 1880-1900.2
These two factors, varying rates of industrialization and the persistence of a family
economy, had a large impact on patterns of migration. The economic transformation was
sporadic and different places, even within the same nation, reflected the varying rates of the
1Scholarship on immigration implies a voluntary journey. Forced migration, such as the slave trade, does not reflect
general patterns of migration, although some of the macro processes of adjustment and assimilation may apply to
those brought here in chains.
2The two best overviews of the literature on reason for emigration are John Bodnar The Transplanted
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985), Chapter 1 and Ewa Morawska "The Sociology and Historiography
of Immigration" in Virginia Yans-McLaughlin, ed., Immigration Reconsidered (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1990), 192-196. Jonathan Sarna, "The Myth of No Return: Jewish Return Migration to Eastern Europe,
1881-1914," American Jewish History, Volume 70, 1981. Simon Kuznets, "Immigration of Russian Jews to the
United States: Background and Structure" in Perspectives in American History Volume 9, 1975.
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onset of industrial capitalism. It is, therefore, more accurate to focus on region rather than nation
of origin. The transition from a household to a market economy occurred in ‘fits and starts’ and
affected movement of people in a similar mode. As more people no longer produced all that they
consumed within their households, they were increasingly linked to market as both producers
and consumers. Despite this shift, family economy remained mode of operation, where all
members contributed labor and when linked to market, wages to family efforts.3
An additional impact of the uneven rate of change that resulted in emigration is that
transatlantic migration was often preceded by either seasonal and/or internal migration. Families
would send sons/daughter/ fathers a few months a year to local markets, and these sojourns
might become year round. As opportunity and demand presented themselves, migrants made
their moves permanent and/or extended the scope of the market where they sought to find
demand for their labor. Those who came to the United States were not the 'dregs' of their society
but rather those who could both afford the price of a boat ticket and had reason to believe they
would enhance their chances of economic security by migrating.
Migration was part of a family strategy. Sons and fathers and daughters came and sent
money back home, either to acquire land or send for other members of the family. In the preindustrial and industrial world, the notion of individual accomplishment is usually an
anachronism. This notion of family first is still persistent among contemporary immigrant
groups, where all members of the family contribute and collective decisions within the extended
kin network reflect the need for participation of all members. Historically, the decision to
sacrifice a child’s wages so that he or she could attend school, only occurred when there was a
perceived economic gain from the short-run sacrifice. Until 20th century, most economic success
did not require a formal education and children were more beneficial to the family as wage
earners.4
Chain Migration: Settlement, Ethnic Enclaves and Communal Networks
In addition to economic concerns, the entire migration experience was not one of
individual efforts but of networks or chains of kin and friends from the area of emigration who
assisted each other at every step from departure to arrival, including finding places to live and
3
Bodnar, 1985, Chapter 1 and Morawska.
This claim is made in made works on the immigrant experience. See, for example, Ewa Morawska, For Bread
with Butter (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985).
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work. For most groups who did not speak the language of the host country, it is crucial to have a
place to work where people literally and figuratively spoke their language. The phenomenon of
immigrants working and living amongst one another reflects both the base of adjustment that the
immigrants provided for one another as well as the desire on the part of the native born not to
associate with these newcomers in such primary associations as marriage and residence. Living
and working amongst those from their area of origin led to the creation of ethnic economic
enclaves that served as an enormous resource for immigrant adjustment. Immigrants adopted
some aspects of their host society over time, such as language and dress, but retained many of
their most important values and behaviors, especially regarding marriage, child rearing, and
religion. Immigrants used their culture as needed as a resource and buffer against the harsh
realities of new environment.5
Once here, the immigrants established their own communal organizations whose
purposes ranged from mutual aid to recreation. In addition to these formal organizations, there
were informal networks based in the neighborhood. These were especially important to
immigrant women as they relied on one another and often served as the foundation for
community protest. Immigrants received support in adjustment from those more established
members of their own group as well as charitable organizations established by the native born.
Immigrants certainly preferred that assistance which understood their cultural values.
Progressive Era efforts in the early twentieth century, for example, to ‘improve’ immigrant diet
was met with resistance and hostility. Classes designed to provide education in procedures of
naturalization and citizenship were highly attended. The immigrants created many of their own
organizations. While these initially provided mutual economic, cultural, and social support
networks, over time they would begin to look beyond the new place and provide support for
those back home. This shift in charitable perspective was an indicator of the solidification of the
groups success in their new home.6
5Morawska,
1990.
Protestant philanthropic efforts, see for example, Paul Boyer Urban Masses and Moral Order in America
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978). For immigrant assistance, see Debra Block, “Virtues out of
Necessity: Jewish Immigrant Philanthropy, 1890-1918” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1997),
Miriam Cohen "Italian-American Women in NYC, 1900-1950" in Cantor and Laurie, eds., Class, Sex and the
Women Worker (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1977), Kathleen Conzen, "Immigrants, Immigrant Neighborhoods
and Ethnic Identity: Historical Issues" in Journal of American History, Volume 66, December 1977, Donna
Gabaccia "Kinship, Culture and Migration" Journal of American Ethnic History Volume 3, Number 2, Spring
6For
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Becoming Ethnic
Through these networks and organizations, as well as workplace and neighborhood
interaction, these newcomers began seeing themselves not only as having come from a specific
town or village, but from a country. This process of ethnicization, seeing oneself as part of
larger group with common interests and identity, is an important step in immigrant history. It is
also a process that reflects the fluid nature of ethnic identity as well as the dialectic between
behavior of a specific group and its interaction with the dominant or host society as well as other
ethnic groups. Frequently distinctions made within group were lost on those outside of it and the
nature of ethnic group construction reflects this ongoing dynamic. Indeed recent theories of panethnicity, reflect this ‘lumping’ of distinct groups from different ethnic heritages by the host
society.7
Living in these 'ethnic enclaves' enabled immigrants to withstand many of the hardships
and traumas associated with emigration. Their culture is an important resource. Historians and
sociologists have long debated whether the traditions and customs, i.e. culture, of the immigrants
was primordial or resulted from the structural conditions of their lives here. While neither theory
is wholly inaccurate, both view ethnicity as a fixed rather than fluid quality. Immigration
historians have recently adapted the concept of situational ethnicity from folklorists and
anthropologists who have long understood the relational nature of intergroup contact. While
immigrants did not invent their cultural characteristics, they used them in various ways and to
varying degrees, depending on the circumstances. Assimilation and ethnicity are no longer
mutually exclusive. Generations subsequent to the immigrant one would continue to shape this
1984, and Paula Hyman, "Immigrant Woman and Consumer Protest" Journal of American Jewish History,
September 1980.
7 For these views of ethnicity, see Werner Sollors, Introduction to The Invention of Ethnicity, (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1989); Mary Waters, Ethnic Options (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990); and
Kathleen Conzen, David Gerber, Ewa Morawska, George Pozzetta, and Rudolph Vecoli, "The Invention of
Ethnicity: The View from the U.S.A," Journal of American Ethnic History 12 (Fall 1992): 3-41. On the role of the
dominant society in this process, see Yen Le Espiritu, Introduction to Asian-American Panethnicity: Bridging
Institutions and Identities (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1992).
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ethnic group identity or persona. Historians describe the notion of situational ethnicity, or ethnic
options to describe this reality for white Americans of selecting when they wish to be ethnic.8
Nor are we to assume that the immigrant generation adopted the values of the host
society immediately. The early mobility studies defined success as advancement up the
occupational ladder to white collar jobs. The implicit presumption was that the immigrants
shared the attitudes of the native-born middle class. Historians must consider the immigrants'
values and the processes that went into shaping these opinions. We may not distinguish between
various types of unskilled labor, but to those who performed the tasks, they represented very real
differences. Evelyn Glenn informs us that based on their experiences in their native country,
Japanese immigrant women preferred domestic labor to other forms of work because they were
free from direct oppression. This form of labor also enabled them to meet their responsibilities
to their own families. Conversely, according to Nancy Sinkoff, Jewish immigrant women
preferred factory to domestic employment and felt that this option provided them with a greater
sense of autonomy.9
The immigrant experience is a rich and varied one. The arrival of newcomers to the
United States continues to shape our nation. Noting these overarching patterns does not
minimize the experience of each person who has arrived at our shores but provides a valuable
context to understand them fully.
Prepared by Dr. Debra Block
January, 2004
8 For a comprehensive overview of the way historians and sociologists have considered the development of ethnic
identity, see Russell Kazal, "Revisiting Assimilation: The Rise, Fall, and Reappraisal of a Concept in American
Ethnic History," American Historical Review 100 (April 1995): 437-471.See Herbert Gutman's pathbreaking essay,
"Work, Culture and Society in Industrializing America" in Work, Culture and Society in Industrializing America
(New York: Vintage, 1977) for a discussion of culture as a resource.
9It has not been a constant approach but some historians have underscored the criteria of the immigrants as
diverging from those in the host society in their work. See Herbert Gans, Urban Villagers (New York: Free Press of
Glencoe, 1962), Diner 1983, Evelyn Glenn "The Dialectics of Wage Work: Japanese American Women and
Domestic Service 1905-1940" Feminist Studies Volume 6, Number 3, Fall 1980, Gutman, Morawska, 1985,
Barbara Myerhoff Number Our Days (New York: E.P. Dutton and Sons, 1978), and Yans-McLaughlin, 1977.
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