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In a book destined to become a classic, Stephan and Abigail Thernstrom present important new information about the positive changes that have been achieved and the measurable improvement in the lives of the majority of African-Americans. Supporting their conclusions with statistics on education, earnings, and housing, they argue that the perception of serious racial divisions in this country is outdated -- and dangerous.
This happy combination of literary essay and exceptionally
well-written history, providing insights into a past still
important in the twentieth century, will quickly take an honored
place on the shelves of Harvardiana. Bernard Bailyn writes on the
origins of Harvard and the foundations of Harvard's persistent
character, structure, and style of governance, and contributes
another chapter on the unhappy ending to the administration of the
beloved President Kirkland (x8xo-i8z8), who presided over but could
not control a period of profound change. Oscar Handlin describes
the shifting relationships and power struggles among faculty,
administration, and students over the years (Making Men of the
Boys) and Harvard's evolution from an ingrown community of teachers
and students into a large, complex institution with worldwide
prestige. Donald Fleming has chapters on the presidency of Charles
William Eliot (the greatest man in the history of Harvard) and the
colorful personalities of Harvard (not only Copey and Santayana and
Charles Eliot Norton, but also Old Sophy, who kept a pet chicken in
his room in Holworthy). Stephan Thernstrom examines the growing
diversity of the student body as to finances, geography, religion,
and racial background from the eighteenth century to the 1980s. The
subjects are of continuing interest not only to members of the
Harvard community, who will treasure this memento of Harvard's
350th anniversary, but also to historians of higher education and
ordinary readers, who will enjoy the new information, original
personalities, and thoughtful perspectives the book offers.
From Acadians to Zoroastrians-Asians, American Indians, East
Indians, West Indians, Europeans, Latin Americans, Afro-Americans,
and Mexican Americans-the Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic
Groups provides the first comprehensive and systematic review of
the many peoples of this country. It should excite all Americans
about their nation. Informative and entertaining, this volume is an
indispensable reference work for home, library and office. It
establishes a foundation for the burgeoning field of ethnic
studies; it will satisfy and stimulate the popular interest in
ancestry and heritage. It is a guide to the history, culture, and
distinctive characteristics of the more than 100 ethnic groups who
live in the United States. Each ethnic group is described in
detail. The origins, history and present situation of the familiar
as well as the virtually unknown are presented succinctly and
objectively. Not only the immigrants and refugees who came
voluntarily but also those already in the New World when the first
Europeans arrived, those whose ancestors came involuntarily as
slaves, and those who became part of the American population as a
result of conquest or purchase and subsequent annexation figure in
these pages. The English and the Estonians, the Germans and the
Gypsies, the Swedes and the Serbs are interestingly juxtaposed.
Even entries about relatively well-known groups offer new material
and fresh interpretations. The articles on less well-known groups
are the product of intensive research in primary sources; many
provide the first scholarly discussion to appear in English. One
hundred and twenty American and European contributors have been
involved in this effort, writing either on individual groups or on
broad themes relating to many. The group entries are at the heart
of the book, but it contains, in addition, a series of thematic
essays that illuminate the key facets of ethnicity. Some of these
are comparative; some philosophical; some historical; others focus
on current policy issues or relate ethnicity to major subjects such
as education, religion, and literature. American identity and
Americanization, immigration policy and experience, and prejudice
and discrimination in U.S. history are discussed at length. Several
essays probe the complex interplay between assimilation and
pluralism-perhaps the central theme in American history-and the
complications of race and religion. Numerous cross-references and
brief identifications will aid the reader with unfamiliar terms and
alternative group names. Eighty-seven maps, especially
commissioned, show where different groups have originated.
Annotated bibliographies contain suggestions for further reading
and research. Appendix I, on methods of estimating the size of
groups, leads the reader through a maze of conflicting statistics.
Appendix II reproduces, in facsimile, hard-to-locate census and
immigration materials, beginning with the first published report on
the nativities of the population in 1850.
Research on the frontiers of urban studies was the subject of a
conference on nineteenth-century cities held in November 1968 at
Yale University. These papers from the conference attempt to define
what is coming to be known as the "new urban history." The cities
studied range from small communities - such as Springfield,
Massachusetts, and Poughkeepsie, New York - to giants like
Philadelphia, Chicago, and Boston. While the majority of the
contributions deal with American cities, four essays examine cities
in Canada, England, France, and Colombia. The studies focus on the
dimensions of mobility and stability in the social structure of
nineteenth-century cities. Within this general frame, the essays
explore such areas as urban patterns of class stratification,
changing rates of occupational and residential mobility, social
origins of particular elite groups, the relations between political
control and social class, differences in opportunities for various
ethnic groups, and the relationships between family structure and
city life. In all these fields, the authors relate sociological
theory to the historical materials; a complex yet readable,
interdisciplinary portrait of the origins of modern city life is
the result.
Twenty-five essays covering a range of areas from religion and
immigration to family structure and crime examine America's
changing racial and ethnic scene. They clearly show that old civil
rights strategies will not solve today's problems and offer a bold
new civil rights agenda based on today's realities.
Embedded in the consciousness of Americans throughout much of the
country's history has been the American Dream: that every citizen,
no matter how humble his beginnings, is free to climb to the top of
the social and economic ladder. Poverty and Progress assesses the
claims of the American Dream against the actual structure of
economic and social opportunities in a typical nineteenth century
industrial community-Newburyport, Massachusetts. Here is local
history. With the aid of newspapers, census reports, and local tax,
school, and savings bank records Stephan Thernstrom constructs a
detailed and vivid portrait of working class life in Newburyport
from 1850 to 1880, the critical years in which this old New England
town was transformed into a booming industrial city. To determine
how many self-made men there really were in the community, he
traces the career patterns of hundreds of obscure laborers and
their sons over this thirty year period, exploring in depth the
differing mobility patterns of native-born and Irish immigrant
workmen. Out of this analysis emerges the conclusion that
opportunities for occupational mobility were distinctly limited.
Common laborers and their sons were rarely able to attain middle
class status, although many rose from unskilled to semiskilled or
skilled occupations. But another kind of mobility was widespread.
Men who remained in lowly laboring jobs were often strikingly
successful in accumulating savings and purchasing homes and a plot
of land. As a result, the working class was more easily integrated
into the community; a new basis for social stability was produced
which offset the disruptive influences that accompanied the first
shock of urbanization and industrialization. Since Newburyport
underwent changes common to other American cities, Thernstrom
argues, his findings help to illuminate the social history of
nineteenth century America and provide a new point of departure for
gauging mobility trends in our society today. Correlating the
Newburyport evidence with comparable studies of twentieth century
cities, he refutes the popular belief that it is now more difficult
to rise from the bottom of the social ladder than it was in the
idyllic past. The "blocked mobility" theory was proposed by Lloyd
Warner in his famous "Yankee City" studies of Newburyport;
Thernstrom provides a thorough critique of the "Yankee City"
volumes and of the ahistorical style of social research which they
embody.
Twenty-five essays covering a range of areas from religion and
immigration to family structure and crime examine America's
changing racial and ethnic scene. They clearly show that old civil
rights strategies will not solve today's problems and offer a bold
new civil rights agenda based on today's realities.
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