Cultural Contingencies of Alcoholism: Variations between and within Nineteenth-Century Urban Ethnic Groups in Alcohol-Related Death Rates

Abstract

From the 1890 U.S. Census vital statistics compilations are drawn comparisons of adult rates of death from alcohol-related causes (alcoholism, liver diseases) in urban white ethnic groups (defined by birthplace of mother), with specification of sex, sex and marital status, neighborhood status, and sex and neighborhood status. In each of three cities, the Irish have the highest rate, followed by the English, Germans, and those with U.S.-born mothers, while the Italians and especially Russian Jews have extraordinarily low rates. Furthermore, within each of the three largest maternal-origin groups (German, Irish, U.S.), death rates from alcoholism by sex and marital status conform to Durkheim's findings for suicide, with wives contributing a higher proportion of the deaths of married persons than spinsters contribute of the deaths of unmarried persons. The extraordinarily low Irish sex ratio, and the uniform effects of marital status in three ethnic groups, cast doubt on explanations of an Irish propensity to alcoholism which focus on the peculiarities of Irish bachelorhood.