Undermining Race: Ethnic Identities in Arizona Copper Camps, 1880-1920 (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Undermining Race: Ethnic Identities in Arizona Copper Camps, 1880-1920 Marshall Schott Undermining Race: Ethnic Identities in Arizona Copper Camps, 1880-1920. By Phylis Cancilla Martinelli. (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2009. Pp. 238. Map, table, illustrations, notes, bibliography, index. ISBN 9780816527458, $50.00 cloth.) Phylis Martinelli, a professor of sociology at St. Mary's College in California, has spent most of her professional career studying the history and experiences of Italian immigrants in the United States. In her most recent work, she has raised important questions regarding the development of racial/ethnic identity and the complexity of understanding the relationships between majority and minority groups in American society. In Undermining Race, Martinelli examines the formation of ethnic identity in three Arizona mining camps and the social, economic, and political exchanges that occurred between the multiplicity of groups settling the Arizona frontier. Her work further contributes to the literature of New Western History and the evolving discussions about the place of race and ethnicity in shaping American society in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Martinelli examines the history and socio-economic development of Globe, Bisbee, and Clifton-Morenci, Arizona, during the copper mining boom of the late nineteenth century. The study focuses on the place of Italian immigrants in their respective "microclimates" and the way they establish their ethnic identity through their interactions with each other and the various other racial/ethnic groups in their respective communities. What Martinelli confirms is that the formation and persistence of ethnic identity varies a great deal from community to community based on a myriad of factors. These include the acceptance of the ethnic minority by ruling elites, access to jobs, affiliations and affinity with other ethnic minority groups based on religious and linguistic similarities, and their ability to navigate through the challenging socio-cultural hierarchy between majority and minority populations, to name a few. A real strength of Undermining Race is the extent to which it develops a holistic account of the formation of ethnic/racial identity among Italian immigrants within the context of other ethnic/racial minorities on the Arizona frontier. In the case of Globe, Arizona, for example, white community leaders provided many [End Page 104] opportunities to Italian immigrants as an "in-between" group. They were generally accepted as equivalent to whites and received higher wages and better jobs than their black or Mexican counterparts. These factors helped Italian immigrants prosper and develop a relatively self-sufficient ethnic enclave, a "Little Italy" with stores, bars, and saloons that catered to their specific needs and wants as well as those of the dominant white community. On the other hand, Italian immigrants faced greater challenges in Bisbee and Clifton-Morenci, where they found themselves subordinated within the ethnic/racial hierarchy. In the latter example, Italians fraternized closely with Mexican laborers, held offices in multiethnic mutual aid associations, attended multiethnic services at the Catholic church, and collaborated on Western Federation of Miners' activities aimed at improving wages in the region for nonwhite miners. Over time, bonds between Italians and Mexicans grew stronger with repeated union efforts to reverse the unequal wage structure. In the end, Martinelli concludes, the shared struggles of Mexicans and Italians created a melding of cultures that challenged the rigid economic and social hierarchy established by the copper barons. Perhaps the best assessment of the experience of Italians in the camps was spoken by Jeanette Monsegur Frick, a descendant of immigrants from Italy's Piedmont region, when she remarked that her "outlook is American through an Italian-Mexican view." (163-64) Although Undermining Race does not fully develop the factors shaping the world-views held by the copper barons and local ruling elites who largely established the social and economic constructs in which ethnic identity was formed, Martinelli's work does provide an interesting and innovative means through which we can gain a better understanding of the American West's multiethnic past. Marshall Schott University of Houston Copyright © 2010 The Texas State Historical Association