An Immigrant Neighborhood: Interethnic and Interracial Encounters in New York before 1930 by Shirley J. Yee

Abstract

Book Reviews 133 An Immigrant Neighborhood: Interethnic and Interracial Encounters in New York before 1930. By Shirley J. Yee. Temple University Press, 2011, 256 pages, $27.95 Paper. Reviewed by Roger White, Whittier College Dispelling the notion that ethnic communities existed largely in isolation , Shirley J. Yee’s An Immigrant Neighborhood is a detailed, meticulously researched and well-written social history of the communities of Lower Manhattan during a unique period in American history (1865– 1930). The narrative is engaging, as the author deftly employs personal stories, which are told using information that appears, in many instances, pieced together from fragments, to motivate discussions of larger issues ranging from friendship to business relations to interracial marriage. The writing style will appeal to both academics and non-academic readers alike. Yee’s focus is “to explore the social and economic conditions under which people participated in the simultaneous development of co-ethnic and interracial/interethnic relations in their daily lives” (4). Yee’s contribution is substantial in that it offers rich details of day-to-day life that run counter to a more general, more naive view of interracial and interethnic relations during the period that includes isolation and sequestration. Yee sets out “to illuminate how they negotiated their understandings of “difference” (and similarities) in everyday life” (27). The author’s “they” includes “working-class people, reformers, police, and tourists” of the time, among others. The notion of immigrant communities living separately from one another and from the native-born whites and African Americans is quickly dispelled. Repeatedly, and effectively, the author makes a point of the extensive interactions between members of different races and ethnicities . Coincidentally, Yee accomplishes a broader, more general, but no less important, objective. During the period covered, the American identity —in terms of what race, ethnicity and gender roles meant—underwent a sustained and pronounced transformation. Yee acknowledges the broader implications when she writes, “Within this process of change, however, discourses of race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality have continued to frame the ways in which ordinary people form individual and group identities and construct families and communities” (175). 134 ■ NEW YORK HISTORY It is easy to heap praise upon Yee for her efforts. Even so, the book is not without its shortcomings. In addition to the Introduction and Conclusion, there are five chapters that comprise the book. The chapters often appear as independent works related to a common topic and that seem to be organized, as best as possible, to produce a manuscript. Yee begins the book by focusing on the personal relationships established and maintained by members of the immigrant and native-born communities. Emphasis is placed on the extent to which interethnic and interracial interaction was commonplace. This is followed, in the second chapter, by a wonderful discussion of how business relations were fomented between merchants and customers of different ethnicities and races. Chapter three blends the themes of the first two chapters, as Yee drives home the point that relationships were established and nurtured both as a matter of want and, at times, out of need. The focus of chapter four is the anti-vice movement in relation to the communities of lower Manhattan, and chapter five details the role of religion among and between the communities. The first three chapters fit together quite well. Likewise, the final two chapters fit well together. The difficulty lies here: the two parts of the work fit together poorly. This leaves the book feeling somewhat disjointed; it is as though there are two smaller works (or five short pieces) merged. The concluding section works to tie the pieces together, and does so fairly well, but it is insufficient to remedy the larger shortcoming. All criticism aside, however, as a reader I find myself contemplating the number of similar stories, from other locales and/or time periods, that are waiting to be told. In this respect, Yee’s book provides a brief glimpse into a rich American history; yet one more contribution, perhaps unintended in this case, that is made by this work. This book will be of interest to scholars of New York as well as local historical societies. The writing style is such that the...