Assimilation and split labor market dynamics are core foci in research on immigration, race/ethnicity, and inequality. Little work, however, systematically analyzes how assimilation and group-level power dynamics within labor markets intersect relative to employment trajectories and rewards. In this article, we do so by offering integrated analyses of racial/ethnic inequalities for an important case, New York City from 1910 to 1930. Our multi-method analyses draw from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS) and content-coded coverage from the New York Times for the period. Quantitative and qualitative results demonstrate a clear racial/ethnic hierarchy as well as group-level variations in opportunity relative to industrial concentration, segregation, and discrimination. Assimilative attributes and generational status mattered, yet certain inequalities were more firmly entrenched. Most pronounced, as seen in our qualitative analyses, were processes of social closure, discrimination, and related exclusionary constraints—constraints encountered and eventually alleviated, to some degree, for new white ethnics but not for African Americans. We conclude by discussing the theoretical and empirical utility of considering the embedded nature of assimilation within broader contexts of racial/ethnic closure in labor market opportunities and also relative to historical and contemporary eras.
AlbaRichard D.1985. Italian Americans: Into the Twilight of Ethnicity. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
2.
AlbaRichard D.1995. “Assimilation’s Quiet Tide.” The Public Interest119:1–18.
3.
AlbaRichard D.NeeVictor. 2003. Remaking the American Mainstream: Assimilation and Contemporary Immigration. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
4.
AlexanderJ. Tent. 1998. “The Great Migration in Comparative Perspective.” Social Science History22:349–76.
5.
BennettDavid H.1988. The Party of Fear: From Nativist Movements to the New Right in American History. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press.
6.
BonacichEdna. 1972. “A Theory of Ethnic Antagonism: The Split Labor Market.” American Sociological Review37:547–59.
7.
BonacichEdna. 1976. “Advanced Capitalism and Black/White Relations in the United States: A Split Labor Market Interpretation.” American Sociological Review41:34–51.
8.
BoswellTerry. 1986. “A Split Labor Market Interpretation of Discrimination against Chinese Immigrants, 1850–1882.” American Sociological Review51:352–71.
9.
BoswellTerryBrownCliffBrueggemannJohnPetersT. RalphJr.2006. Racial Competition and Class Solidarity. Albany: SUNY Press.
10.
BrownCliff. 2000. “The Role of Employers in Split Labor Markets: An Event Structure Analysis of Racial Conflict and AFL Organizing, 1917–1919.” Social Forces79:653–81.
11.
BrownCliffBoswellTerry. 1995. “Strikebreaking or Solidarity in the Great Steel Strike of 1919: A Split Labor Market, Game-Theoretic, and QCA Analysis.” American Journal of Sociology100:1479–1519.
12.
BrownCliffBrueggemannJohn. 1997. “Mobilizing Interracial Solidarity: A Comparison of the 1919 and 1937 Steel Industry Labor Organizing Drives.” Mobilization2:47–70.
13.
BrownSusan L.Van HookJenniferGlickJennifer E.2008. “Cohabitation among Immigrants Versus Natives in the U.S.” Population Research and Policy Review27:531–50.
14.
ChildIrving L.1943. Italian or American? The Second Generation in Conflict. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
15.
Du BoisW.E.B.[1940] 1997. Dusk of Dawn: An Essay toward an Autobiography of a Race Concept. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers.
16.
GordonMilton M.1964. Assimilation in American Life. New York: Oxford University Press.
17.
GrossNeil. 2009. “A Pragmatist Theory of Social Mechanisms.” American Sociological Review74:358–79.
18.
HershbergTheodoreBursteinAlan N.EricksenEugene P.GreenbergStephanieYanceyWilliam L.1979. “A Tale of Three Cities: Blacks and Immigrants in Philadelphia: 1850–1880, 1930 and 1970.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science441:55–81.
JiménezTomás R.2010. Replenished Ethnicity: Mexican Americans, Immigration and Identity. Berkeley: University of California Press.
21.
KornrichSabino. 2009. “Combining Preferences and Processes: An Integrated Approach to Black-White Labor Market Inequality.” American Journal of Sociology115:1–38.
22.
LiebersonStanley. 1980. A Piece of the Pie: Blacks and White Immigrants Since 1880. Berkeley: University of California Press.
23.
LiebersonStanleyWatersMary C.1988. From Many Strands: Ethnic and Racial Groups in Contemporary America. New York: Russell Sage.
24.
LiebersonStanleyWilkinsonChristy A.1976. “A Comparison between Northern and Southern Blacks Residing in the North.” Demography13:199–224.
25.
MarksCarole C.1981. “Split Labor Markets and Black-White Relations, 1865–1920.” Phylon43:293–308.
26.
MarshallEdward. 1912. “Four Famous Experts Discuss Crime Conditions Here.” New York Times, June30, p. SM1.
27.
MarshallEdward. 1913. “Tough Little Boys, Reformed, Save a Neighborhood.” New York Times, May4, p. SM12.
28.
McBrierDebra BranchWilsonGeorge. 2004. “Going Down? Race and Downward Occupational Mobility for White-Collar Workers in the 1990s.” Work and Occupations31:283–322.
29.
MellottLeanna M.SasslerSharon L.2007. “Growing Up with Single Mothers: Occupational Attainment of Daughters in the Early Twentieth Century.” Research in Social Stratification and Mobility25:73–88.
30.
MorganDavid L.2007. “Paradigms Lost and Pragmatism Regained: Methodological Implications of Combining Qualitative and Quantitative Methods.” Journal of Mixed Methods Research1:48–76.
31.
MyrdalGunnar. 1944. An American Dilemma. New York: Harper and Row.
32.
New York Times. 1905. “Salvation Meals Gladden Cherry Hill.” February5, p. 8.
33.
New York Times. 1906. “Most Interesting Educational Experiment in New York.” March11, p. SM3.
34.
New York Times. 1907a. “Coastwise Lines Strike Settled.” May10, p. 5.
35.
New York Times. 1907b. “All-Day Riots End Longshore Strike.” June15, p. 3.
36.
New York Times. 1909. “Lawless Italians Rouse West Point.” March16, p. 1.
37.
New York Times. 1913a. “Dreadnoughts Best Means of Protecting Emigrants.” January12, p. SM8.
38.
New York Times. 1913b. “Bomb for Strikebreakers.” February27, p. 1.
39.
New York Times. 1914. “Hotel Manager’s Apology.” August30, p. 9.
40.
New York Times. 1915a. “Asserts Immigrant Is School Problem.” July11, p. S5.
41.
New York Times. 1915b. “Find City Schools Cold to Negroes.” April30, p. 9.
42.
New York Times. 1924. “Youthful Outlaws.” May22, p. 16.
43.
New York Times. 1926a. “Wants Negro Youth Sent to Churches.” February5, p. 2.
44.
New York Times. 1926b. “Accuse Garment Strikers.” August4, p. 40.
45.
New York Times. 1927a. “3 Jewish Interns Hazed in Hospital; Six Doctors Held.” June21, p. 1.
46.
New York Times. 1927b. “Long Mistreatment of Jewish Patients in Hospital Charged.” June23, p. 1.
47.
New York Times. 1927c. “Accused Internes Face Hearing Today.” June28, p. 12.
48.
New York Times. 1930. “Employment Curb on Aliens Scored.” December28, p. N3.
49.
New York Times. 1932. “Plead for End of ‘Bias’ on Jewish Workers.” March21, p. 20.
50.
New York Times. 1935a. “Job Bias Charged at Harlem Inquiry.” April14, p. 15.
51.
New York Times. 1935b. “Mahoney in Clash with Gen. Sherrill.” October24, p. 8.
52.
OppenheimerMartin. 1974. “The Sub-Proletariat: Dark Skins and Dirty Work.” Critical Sociology4:7–20.
53.
PacygaDominic A.2003. Polish Immigrants and Industrial Chicago: Workers on the South Side, 1880–1922. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
54.
ParkRobert E.BurgessErnest W.1921. Introduction to the Science of Sociology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
55.
PearceLisa D.2012. “Mixed Methods Inquiry in Sociology.” American Behavioral Scientist56:829–48.
56.
PerlmannJoel. 2005. Italians Then, Mexicans Now: Immigrant Origins and Second Generation Progress, 1890–2000. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
57.
PortesAlejandroFernandez-KellyPatriciaHallerWilliam J.2005. “Segmented Assimilation on the Ground: The New Second Generation in Early Adulthood.” Ethnic and Racial Studies28:1000–1040.
58.
PortesAlejandroRumbautRubén G.2001. Legacies: The Story of the Immigrant Second Generation. Berkeley: University of California Press.
59.
PortesAlejandroRumbautRubén G.2006. Immigrant America: A Portrait. Berkeley: University of California Press.
60.
PortesAlejandroZhouMin. 1993. “The New Second Generation: Segmented Assimilation and Its Variants.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science530:74–96.
61.
QianZhenchaoLichterDaniel T.2007. “Social Boundaries and Marital Assimilation: Interpreting Trends in Racial and Ethnic Intermarriage.” American Sociological Review72:68–94.
62.
ReskinBarbara F.1991. “Labor Markets as Queues: A Structural Approach to Changing Occupational Sex Composition.” Pp. 170–92 in Macro-Micro Interrelationships in Sociology, edited by HuberJ.Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
63.
ReskinBarbara F.2003. “Including Mechanisms in Our Models of Ascriptive Inequality.” American Sociological Review68:1–21.
64.
RoscignoVincent J.2007. The Face of Discrimination: How Race and Gender Impact Work and Home Lives. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
65.
RossMary. 1925. “Negro City in Harlem is a Race Capital.” New York Times, March1, p. XX6.
66.
RugglesStevenSobekMatthewAlexanderJ. TrentFitchCatherine A.GoekenRonaldHallPatricia KellyKingMiriam L.RonnanderChad. 2008. Integrated Public Use Microdata Series: Version 4.0 [Machine-readable database]. Minneapolis, MN: Minnesota Population Center [producer and distributor] (http://usa.ipums.org/usa/).
67.
SandersJimy M.NeeVictor. 1996. “Immigrant Self-Employment: The Family as Social Capital and the Value of Human Capital.” American Sociological Review61:231–49.
68.
SasslerSharon L.2006. “School Participation among Immigrant Youths: The Case of Segmented Assimilation in the Early 20th Century.” Sociology of Education79:1–24.
69.
SasslerSharon L.QianZhenchao. 2003. “Marital Timing and Marital Assimilation: Variation and Change among European Americans between 1910 and 1980.” Historical Methods36:131–48.
70.
SasslerSharon L.WhiteMichael J.1997. “Ethnicity, Gender, and Social Mobility in 1910.” Social Science History21:321–57.
71.
SmallMario Luis. 2011. “How to Conduct a Mixed Method Study: Recent Trends in a Rapidly Growing Literature.” Annual Review of Sociology37:55–84
72.
SperoSterling D.HarrisAbram L.1931. The Black Worker: The Negro and the Labor Movement. New York: Columbia University Press.
73.
StainbackKevinTomaskovic-DeveyDonald. 2012. Documenting Desegregation: Racial and Gender Segregation in Private-Sector Employment Since the Civil Rights Act. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
74.
SteinbergStephen. 2004. “The Melting Pot and the Color Line.” Pp. 235–47 in Reinventing the Melting Pot: The New Immigrants and What it Means to be American, edited by JacobyT.New York: Basic Books.
75.
TolnayStewart E.1998. “Educational Selection in the Migration of Southern Blacks, 1880–1990.” Social Forces77:487–514.
76.
TolnayStewart E.2001. “The Great Migration Gets Underway: A Comparison of Black Southern Migrants and Non-migrants in the North, 1920.” Social Science Quarterly82:235–52.
77.
TolnayStewart E.2004. “The Living Arrangement of African American and Immigrant Children, 1880–2000.” Journal of Family History29:421–45.
78.
TolnayStewart E.CrowderKyle D.1999. “Regional Origin and Family Stability in Northern Cities: The Role of Context.” American Sociological Review64:97–112.
79.
Tomaskovic-DeveyDonaldRoscignoVincent J.1996. “Racial Economic Subordination and White Gain in the U.S. South.” American Sociological Review61:565–89.
80.
WaldingerRoger. 1996. Still the Promised City: African-Americans and New Immigrants in Postindustrial New York. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
81.
WardDavid. 1971. Cities and Immigrants: A Geography of Chance in Nineteenth-Century America. New York: Oxford University Press.
82.
WarnerW. LloydSroleLeo. 1945. The Social Systems of American Ethnic Groups. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
83.
WatersMary C.1990. Ethnic Options: Choosing Identities in America. Berkeley: University of California Press.
84.
WojtkiewiczRoger A.DonatoKatharine M.1995. “Hispanic Educational Attainment: The Effects of Family Background and Nativity.” Social Forces74:559–74.
85.
ZhouMin. 1997a. “Segmented Assimilation: Issues, Controversies, and Recent Research on the New Second Generation.” International Migration Review31:825–58.
86.
ZhouMin. 1997b. “Growing Up American: The Challenge Confronting Immigrant Children and Children of Immigrants.” Annual Review of Sociology23:63–95.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
