The Italian Emigration Of Modern Times

The Italian Emigration of Modern Times examines diplomatic issues that arose between Italy and the United States over a series of lynchings of Italian immigrant labourers before World War I. The work explores a significant epoch in Italian economic and diplomatic history which became intertwined with American ethnic and race relations issues. On one level, the book emphasises the pragmatism and restraint which characterized Italy’s official reactions to these repeated episodes of murder of its nationals. On another level, it shows that the diplomatic crises which swirled around the lynching of Italians pushed onto the American political scene the question of whether there should be a federal anti-lynching law. Naturally, the lynching of Italian nationals in the US produced wide public outrage in Italy. Italian domestic outcries presented the Italian government with a serious dilemma. Emigrant savings and financial transfers to family members remaining in Italy were an important economic asset. Italian diplomats launched investigations and protested vigorously, but ended up accepting federal financial compensation for the victims’ families. The consistent pragmatism and restraint of the Italian government through these episodes of violence is the unifying theme of the entire work.

Most studies of immigration to the New World have focused on the United States. Samuel L. Baily's eagerly awaited book broadens that perspective through a comparative analysis of Italian immigrants to Buenos Aires and New York City before World War I. It is one of the few works to trace Italians from their villages of origin to different destinations abroad. Baily examines the adjustment of Italians in the two cities, comparing such factors as employment opportunities, skill levels, pace of migration, degree of prejudice, and development of the Italian community. Of the two destinations, Buenos Aires offered Italians more extensive opportunities, and those who elected to move there tended to have the appropriate education or training to succeed. These immigrants, who adjusted more rapidly than their North American counterparts, adopted a long-term strategy of investing savings in their New World home. In New York, in contrast, the immigrants found fewer skilled and white-collar jobs, more competition from previous immigrant groups, greater discrimination, and a less supportive Italian enclave. As a result, rather than put down roots, many sought to earn money as rapidly as possible and send their earnings back to family in Italy. Baily views the migration process as a global phenomenon. Building on his richly documented case studies, the author briefly examines Italian communities in San Francisco, Toronto, and Sao Paulo. He establishes a continuum of immigrant adjustment in urban settings, creating a landmark study in both immigration and comparative history.

Between 1880 and 1915, thirteen million Italians left their homeland, launching the largest emigration from any country in recorded world history. As the young Italian state struggled to adapt to the exodus, it pioneered the establishment of a “global nation”—an Italy abroad cemented by ties of culture, religion, ethnicity, and economics. In this wide-ranging work, Mark Choate examines the relationship between the Italian emigrants, their new communities, and their home country. The state maintained that emigrants were linked to Italy and to one another through a shared culture. Officials established a variety of programs to coordinate Italian communities worldwide. They fostered identity through schools, athletic groups, the Dante Alighieri Society, the Italian Geographic Society, the Catholic Church, Chambers of Commerce, and special banks to handle emigrant remittances. But the projects aimed at binding Italians together also raised intense debates over priorities and the emigrants’ best interests. Did encouraging loyalty to Italy make the emigrants less successful at integrating? Were funds better spent on supporting the home nation rather than sustaining overseas connections? In its probing discussion of immigrant culture, transnational identities, and international politics, this fascinating book not only narrates the grand story of Italian emigration but also provides important background to immigration debates that continue to this day.

Excerpt from The Italian Emigration, of Our Times A world engrossed as never before with defining the rights and obligations of nationalities and with mitigating the causes of national and international discord cannot afford to ignore the fertile field for study presented by the great migrations of our day. Among these the Italian easily ranks first in importance, and it is typical in many aspects of the rest. The problems it exhibits are fundamental, and they stand forth in such sharpness of relief and such largeness of dimension that there can be no mistaking their nature. One's interest, however, easily goes further. So embracing has been this emigration that a chronicle of its development must constitute an indispensable chapter in the history of the Italian people, whose gifts to civilization and whose qualities in human intercourse have attached them to men everywhere. So memorable likewise have been the contributions of the emigrants in a number of lands that chapters setting forth their fortunes there must always hold a place in the histories of the several countries themselves. Inevitably such chapters must lack a certain dramatic element possible to narrative or political or biographical writing. For emigration is first of all, and chiefly, a scattering. The steerage of the Atlantic vessel has farmers without lands, builders without bricks, doctors without patients, and the marks that distinguish the dramatis personae at every step have to be obliterated in order that the collective experience may be understood. On the other hand, just the fact that a myriad of wills are in question, and the homely types among men - the diggers and hewers, at the best the artisans - brings us nearer to certain great human experiences, to the "still, sad music of humanity," than a study of protagonists could do. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from The Italian Emigration, of Our Times A world engrossed as never before with defining the rights and Obligations of nationalities and with mitigating the causes of national and international discord cannot afford to ignore the fer tile field for study presented by the great migrations of our day. Among these the Italian easily ranks first in importance, and it is typical in many respects Of the rest. The problems it exhibits are fundamental, and they stand forth in such sharpness of relief and such largeness of dimension that there can be no mistaking their nature. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.