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Irish discrimination in USA 1920s
Discrimination against catholics
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When the Irish Populace migrated to the Land of Dreams, America, they were greeted with the signs of No Irish Need Apply. This was mainly at the end of the 19th Century when racial and ethnic discrimination was at its peak and was mainly due to the religious differences the Irish had. The Irish being followers of the Catholic Church were renounced and ridiculed, their cultural differences misinterpreted, their image disgraced by terming them alcoholics. People with Irish accent or Irish names were denied public employments and housing opportunities.
Myth of Victimization was mainly the thought process of historian RichardJ. Jensen; he argued that the Anti-Irish job discrimination was not a significant factor in the United States, that the signs stating No Irish Need Apply were quite rare or even nonexistent. He suggests in his paper that the NINA slogan might have originated in the United Kingdom after the rebellion of the Irish people by the English to indicate their distrust. His theory suggests that it was just a belief that was passed on generation after generation with no substantial evidence existing to back this up. According to him the main reason of discontent between the Irish and the Americans was the Catholic nature of most Irish men. To back his statements he performed searches on classified ads in many newspapers including the Booklyn Eagle, the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune , The Nation, The New York Times and found very few results in searches as old as 1851. There was almost entirely no Irish discrimination in Job opportunities for men (Jensen).
According to him the Irish being victimized was just an urban legend to placatethem and to motivate them to work harder to improve their socioeconomic progress. ...
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... society which despised them and was waiting to ridicule and embarrass them at their slightest mistake (Maley).
The first Irish arrivals therefore decided to stick together in groups rather than work as individuals. They formed all-Irish work crews for construction companies and eventually ended up monopolizing a few markets. This myth of being victimized at every stage warned the Irish community to be wary of others outside their community, the others who are waiting to lure them and destroy their identity and social progress. This slogan was a self-soothing explanation to their low rates of upward social mobility back in the 18th and 19th Century. It identified a culprit to blame and justified their ruffian behavior. Even after prosperity this myth didn’t vanish and still serves to keep them on guard about how other communities might betray them or pull them down.
They also felt culturally different. The Americans were well removed from their English ancestors and felt like they were being ruled by an unworthy ruler that had no right to tell them what to do. The Irish felt the same way, but did it without a massive war
Throughout the history of America people have been immigrating to America from multiple countries. People have arrived from all over Eastern and Western Europe, Asia and many other places. One country that people had immigrated from was Ireland. The Irish settled into America because of the Anti-Catholic Penal Laws in 1790. Most of the Irish were Catholic so they fled to America. The Irish also came to America because of a summer with constant rain and little sun that in turn destroyed their popular crops. Pushing this further, the Irish came to America because of the Potato Famine. Lastly, the Irish came back to America because of Hart-Cellar Act. This Act
Immigration to America from Europe was at an all time high in the mid-1800s. After the potato famine in Ireland in the 1840s, a large group of Irish immigrated to the United States. Since then, increasing numbers of Irish people have been moving to the United States, especially in Chicago. The Irish had come to realize that the United States really is the land of opportunity. With jobs being available to the immigrants, many more shipped in to start new lives for their families. However, for quite a while they did not live in the nicest of areas in Chicago. Many of the Irish resided in low-class areas such as overcrowded parts around the Loop, and out in the West Side. Not only did the West Side shelter the Irish, but many Germans and Jews lived in that area.
The first thing that we will look at is the Irish demographics. The Irish population had fluctuated tremendously over the years. When looking at where they came from, the highest group seems to have been coming from Dublin and Nothern Ireland, along with Kerry County, Ireland as well. Previous to the the 1840's, there were two other waves of Irish immigration in the US. According to the Colombia Guide to Irish American History, the first of the Irish immigrants came in the 1500's due to Sir Walter Raleigh's expedition and the population has continued to grow even since. The third wave began in the 1840's. From census data from US during the Gilded Age, in the 1860's the total number of Irish born immigrants were 22,926. Throughout this time, until around 1910, that number decreased. The number of I...
We see this most notably socially, but also politically. Very often, Irish describe the a form of abuse they endure at the hands of the “native” Americans. This is unfortunate, but the reality of immigrant live for the Irish in the 1800’s. At the core of “natives” concerns was a shift from political power in the hands of “natives” to political power in the hands of the Irish immigrants, who could be loyal to the pope in Europe. Despite this, the Irish still enjoyed the benefits of the United States nation state and celebrated in the benefits, far superior to those of Ireland at the time.vi As was seen in the movie Gangs of New York, many corrupt politicians persuaded immigrants for support in elections and often employed illegal and manipulative tactics on election day to cast multiple votes.vii There were even political cartoons included in immigration reading excerpts depicting the irish as barbaric monkeys and blaming them for election day violence as well as showing them tear apart the democratic system established by “native” Americans.viii These were likely intended for distribution amongst “native” Americans,
Swift's opposition is. indirectly presented in the report. The author uses satire to accomplish his objective not only because he is able to conceal his true identity but also because it is the most effective way to awake the people of Ireland into seeing their own deprivation. Firstly, the narrative voice begins the essay by describing the horrible conditions in which the Irish peasants live. He demonstrates there is a serious problem with a great need for a solution.
Discrimination of Immigrants in 1920's America Beginning in the early nineteenth century there were massive waves of immigration. These "new" immigants were largely from Italy, Russia, and Ireland. There was a mixed reaction to these incomming foreigners. While they provided industries with a cheap source of labor, Americans were both afraid of, and hostile towards these new groups.
The Irish began immigrating to North America in the 1820s, when the lack of jobs and poverty forced them to seek better opportunities elsewhere after the end of the major European wars. When the Europeans could finally stop depending on the Irish for food during war, the investment in Irish agricultural products reduced and the boom was over. After an economic boom, there comes a bust and unemployment was the result. Two-thirds of the people of Ireland depended on potato harvests as a main source of income and, more importantly, food. Then between the years of 1845 and 1847, a terrible disease struck the potato crops. The plague left acre after acre of Irish farmland covered with black rot. The failure of the potato yields caused the prices of food to rise rapidly. With no income coming from potato harvests, families dependent on potato crops could not afford to pay rent to their dominantly British and Protestant landlords and were evicted only to be crowded into disease-infested workhouses. Peasants who were desperate for food found themselves eating the rotten potatoes only to develop and spread horrible diseases. ¡§Entire villages were quickly homeless, starving, and diagnosed with either cholera or typhus.¡¨(Interpreting¡K,online) The lack of food and increased incidents of death forced incredible numbers of people to leave Ireland for some place which offered more suitable living conditions. Some landlords paid for the emigration of their tenants because it made more economic sense to rid farms of residents who were not paying their rent. Nevertheless, emigration did not prove to be an antidote for the Famine. The ships were overcrowded and by the time they reached their destination, approximately one third of its passengers had been lost to disease, hunger and other complications. However, many passengers did survive the journey and, as a result, approximately ¡§1.5 million Irish people immigrated to North America during the 1840¡¦s and 1850¡¦s.¡¨(Bladley, online) As a consequence of famine, disease (starvation and disease took as many as one million lives) and emigration, ¡§Ireland¡¦s population dropped from 8 million to 5 million over a matter of years.¡¨(Bladley, online) Although Britain came to the aid of the starving, many Irish blamed Britain for their delayed response and for centuries of political hardship as basi...
The life of Irish immigrants in Boston was one of poverty and discrimination. The religiously centered culture of the Irish has along with their importance on family has allowed the Irish to prosper and persevere through times of injustice. Boston's Irish immigrant population amounted to a tenth of its population. Many after arriving could not find suitable jobs and ended up living where earlier generations had resided. This attributed to the 'invisibility' of the Irish.
There is particular consideration given to the political climate in this story. It is incorporated with social and ethnic concerns that are prevalent. The story also addresses prejudice and the theme of ethnic stereotyping through his character development. O'Connor does not present a work that is riddled with Irish slurs or ethnic approximations. Instead, he attempts to provide an account that is both informative and accurate.
INTRODUCTION The history of Ireland "that most distressful nation" is full of drama and tragedy, but one of the most interesting stories is about what happened to the Irish during the mid-nineteenth century and how millions of Irish came to live in America (Purcell 31). Although the high point of the story was the years of the devastating potato famine from 1845 to 1848, historians have pointed out that immigrating from Ireland was becoming more popular before the famine and continued until the turn of the twentieth century. In the one hundred years between the first recording of immigrants in
was like as a child on an Irish farm, and how him and his family
During the twentieth century, Ireland was suffering through a time of economic hardship. “Economic growth was stagnant, unemployment was at a historic high and exceeded anywhere in the EU, except possibly Spain, and the state was one of the most indebted in the world” . Irish men and women who had received a formal education had immigrated to other nations due to the unavailability of jobs at home. This left Ireland in a state of further economic downfall, and the lack of skilled workers left Ireland stuck. The 1990’s were a turning point for Ireland. A rise in industry within the nation, as well as an increase in exports, led Ireland to become the “shining nation” in Europe. It became internationally linked with one of the biggest power nations, the United States, and international trade became Ireland’s new source for a booming economy. This brought the rise of what was known as the Celtic Tiger in Ireland.
Tovey, H and Share, P. (2002). Sociology of Ireland. 2nd ed. Dublin: Gill & Macmillen.
McCann et al. Belfast: Institute of Irish Studies, 1994, 95-109).