African American Culture Essay

Chapter 3 discusses the background of the Italians who came to the United States. Italy had free elections in the South, but the corruption from criminal organizations and nobles influenced politics. Southern Italy had a large part of the population until the late twentieth century and peasants worked in agriculture. The central government was weak and ineffective. Italians had strong family bonds and children started working in fields at very young ages. Family is one of the key defining aspects of the Italians with household that usually had a father or husband. When they came to the United States they migrated largely within New York and a large percentage were men. Typically residing in Little Italy neighborhoods, and having low

Alessandro Rago gazed off into the horizon, on his rural farm in the mountains of southern Italy, which had been untouched by the new industrious technologies. These changes had not yet climbed their way into these treacherous mountains, a season of failed crops would likely kill off many of the village, for the people were already impoverish. However, there was hope of a new life, a land of unknown, but growing opportunity, America. Alessandro moved to Chicago, where he made a new life for himself and his family. Starting with a farmer looking for a chance in the new world, the generations that have come before me have shaped a family history that I can be proud of continuing.

This story is about diversity of an Italian American family from New Jersey in the 1950s during a time when adults were fearful of catching Polio and the prejudices against Italian Americans that affected their lifestyle. Holm’s inspiration was based on her Italian American upbringing with her mother being the character of Penny, capturing the time period of real things her family encountered. Readers will be drawn in to vivid characters and will understand why Penny longs for her families to mend their broken bond. The historical detail within the book helps readers visualize what the world was going through after World War Two and the challenges that Italian American encountered. Readers will learn that united love will conquer in the end

Commentary: In order to develop ideas for this paper, I first analyzed the time of the Depression and what Italian Immigrants lives were like typically living in America. Using this background knowledge, I was able to analyze the lifestyles of the working class in each of the stories. Even though the background story of each of the family’s lives differed, they all had a common basis in that they were Italian Immigrant families working a hard lifestyle in order to support the family during economic hardship. I revised this paper by looking to see if my ideas were clearly expressed. I ran into an obstacle of trying to figure out which ideas to express, since the novels

In the novel, The Madonna of 115th Street: Faith and Community in Italian Harlem , the author, Robert A. Orsi highlights the daily lives of the men and women who reside within the Italian Harlem. In particular, Orsi examines how the annual festa of the Madonna of 115th Street influenced and reflected the lives of the celebrants. This novel provides a new understanding of the religion practiced within the Italian Harlem and further examines the aspects of Harlem involving its experience with immigration and community formation. This novel raises numerous question, such as, what topics of the course does it illumine? Orsi’s novel and the film, The Godfather, Part Two , share numerous similarities that shed light on each other. These similarities highlight and demonstrate the lifestyle within the Italian Harlem.

The padrone system faded out as family networks grew. The relationships of their family were essentially the only connection they had. They did not rely on politics or get involved in public office. They tended to only associate with family or fellow Italians in the area. For this reason, mafias emerged in America because of the strong devotion to family and eventually family business. The Italians were mostly Catholic with the belief that “priests were agents of the pope and bishops” (Daniels, p. 197). As more Italians arrived, they began to form distinct enclaves in neighborhoods first settled by earlier immigrants. Interestingly the issue of diet among immigrant workers received attention during this time. Italian Laborers, Padrones, and Pernicious Pasta reads, “In the process, Italian foods were redefined as a "problem" for the fitness, health, and future prosperity of the Italian worker and therefore a threat to workplace efficiency and productivity” (Slideshow 7: Additional Links). The padrone system became concerned with the foods their workers ate because it could affect the way they worked and essentially the way the padroni was paid. In 1890, Jacob Riis, a Danish immigrant and police reporter published How the Other Half Lives where he wrote about a mixed impression from the Italian immigrants in New York City. In the excerpt regarding Italians, Riis judged them on their unsanitary living conditions and

Stage 4: Structural Reform occurs when a school can provide new materials, and perspectives, seamlessly with the knowledge to provide new levels of understanding from a more complete and accurate curriculum. According to Gorski, Stage 4 is where a teacher dedicates her- or himself to continuously expanding her or his knowledge base through the exploration of various sources from various perspectives, and sharing that knowledge with her or his students. Students learn to view events, concepts, and facts through various perspectives. When teaching American History, the teacher would be able to include African American History, Women 's History, Asian American History, Latino American History, etc. As a result, students are getting the multicultural education they disserve through education of all perspectives. One can only hope all schools reach beyond stage 3 and have the privilege to be in Stage 5.

The church plays a major role in the culture of Italian Harlem and it makes it a matriarchal society. Without the influence over her household, a culturally entrapped woman has no power in the outside world. “Her power faded as her community disappeared; as the Italians left Harlem and as later generations believed they were moving out into the mainstream of American economic and social life, the intimate connection between la Madonna and the place, a place made sacred by her presence, was snapped.” With disappearance of her

In a discussion in class, we talked about how we would investigate why certain groups of people or located in certain sections of the city. As a class we made city maps, my map shared many sections of the city. However, what I noticed is that my map was empty in certain places that I do not identify with. One section in particular was South Philadelphia, as Italian and Irish people mainly live there. I hardly visit that part of the city and had my first steak this year. This intrigued my interest to investigate Italians in Philadelphia. I will investigate the history of how the Italian immigrants made it to my city.

Ever since I was a little boy, the Italian culture and heritage flourished in my household and me. I was raised in Yonkers, New York, in a city that is filled predominately with Italian - Americans. Every street has an Italian family, an Italian delicatessen, and an Italian based pizzeria. I can just say that I lived in a Little Italia. As an Italian, being able to embrace my culture was my passion. I would have flags from Italy in my room, Italian style music playing on my phone and computer, and every Sunday my entire family and I would have a traditional Sunday dinner, which always featured pasta. Being Italian, I always felt that I needed to make my ancestors proud, I always did everything to the best of my ability because I know that’s

The amazing era of the Black Arts Movement developed the concept of an influential and artistic blackness that created controversial but significant organizations such as the Black Panther Party. The Black Arts Movement called for "an explicit connection between art and politics" (Smith). This movement created the most prevalent era in black art history by taking stereotypes and racism and turning it into artistic value.

According to the gentleman in “Our Contributions: The Italians in America” Italians thought they had better food than other cultures. “Americans went to the supermarket to buy their food” he proclaimed, noting that a bread man, fruit man, and fish man came around the neighborhood with fresh food every day. Italians loved to “romance” foods. They had vast gardens filled with tomatoes, squash, and basil, unlike Americans who strayed away from vegetable gardens for the home kitchen. Grandmothers took good care of these gardens, and played a significant role in the Italian American family. Meals would typically last from noon to 4 or 5 in the evening, and all the extended family would sit together in harmony. Everyone was very proud of one

Italy, in the beginning, was a tradition feudal system and in the feudal system there were three social classes the top level is all the religious leaders to teach bottom layer right and wrong, the middle layer is the nobles and nights they protected the land and found people to work the land, And the bottom layer is the peasants that worked the land for the nobles and nights. This started to change when merchants started to come up more, once looked down upon, now communities where built around their trading route. With merchants, this opened up new jobs and started to move people out of the feudal system. The rise of merchants was not all good because with all this trade especially overseas brought over rats that carried the Plague and the

Accordingly, major generational conflicts erupted within the Italian-American community during the earlier portion of interwar years. The children of the immigrant generation were socialized under “genuinely dual cultural pressures.” They were raised in the home of their

nationalities brought with them their cultural practice’s , traditions and religious belief’s, which could be