Italian Immigration Research Paper

In the world we live in today, many centuries ago a huge movement started to erupt in the United States, which caused a sustainable increase in population through out time and still continues on this very day. That big movement was the immigration to the United States of America. In case anyone did not know the exact definition of immigration, it is the movement of a big group amount of people into another country or area to which they are not imprinted or inherited originally to. Out of all the millions of people who immigrated to the United States the majority of the newcomers came from specifically north and Western Europe.
During the time era of people immigrating to the United States many different ethnic groups immigrated to New
York. There were many different types of groups of ethnicity; one specific ethnic group that has brought my interest was the groups of Italians emigrating from Italy. During the peak year of 1890 Italian immigrants became a main generation of what was known as “new immigration”. They became the third largest set of people that emigrated from Europe, which consisted of Slavs, Jews and Italians. The “new immigration” became a huge transformation from the “old immigration” generation, which mainly consisted of Germans, Irish, British, and Scandinavians.
In the United States, out of all the European groups that immigrated to the U.S were the Italians.
Within the time period of 1900 to 1915, that’s when the immigration of Italians to United States reached one of its highest populations from immigrating. About over 3 million Italian immigrants immigrated to the United States specifically in the year of 1913, with that being said that population value of Italian immigrants became the largest nationality of “new immigrants”. During the time period of 1876 and 1930, about 5 million Italian immigrants immigrated to the United States. With that being said 4/5th of the immigrants were southern Italian. The 5 main groups that were out of the 4/5th of Italians were in the regions of Calabria, Campania, Abruzzi, Molise, and
Sicily.
Of course there is a probable reason as to why majority of the immigrants from Italy immigrated to the United States. Like any other country that immigrated to the United States Italy faced unconditional problems which caused them to migrate out of their homeland. One specific reason was mainly poverty. Many Italians wanted to retrieve land in their homeland of Italy. Therefore, they moved to America to work and earn money, then repatriated. Another common factor as to why Italians moved out of their homeland were some other political hardships. In the starting point of the 1870s the government took degree to inhibit political views such as anarchy and socialism. In general, Italians came to the United States to escape political policies.
Although Italian immigrants had problematic issues in their homeland, it didn’t get any easier as they migrated to New York.
Italian immigrants faced many things such as learning the language English, the economy, and also their culture limited the participation of new immigrants in testing. Another struggle they faced were finding jobs, it wasn’t easy for families to get started in the economy, that’s why families didn't have a lot of money to support children.
As the Italians started to work and struggle in the survival of living in New York they had to specifically settle in somewhere. Most of the Italians that immigrated to New York lived on 1st Ave in New York. During the 1900’s and this very day it is still known to be known as little Italy of New York. The people that lived their were known to be little italies. During the time when the Italians first immigrated to New York, little Italy was a highly polluted area. The sidewalks were barely clean and there were dirt and must everywhere. There were also people walking on roads and streets were highly
dangerous.
In today’s world, as you can see we live in a much more organized manner when in taking immigrants to the United States. The immigration system today and the immigration system from 1800s can be compared to be very different. One strict difference within the immigrant experience from the 1800s and in todays century is the processing center to live in America. During the 1800’s and early 1900s immigrants would have to go through processing in a place known as Ellis Island. Whereas in today’s world immigrants would have to consult with the government face to face strictly in order to live and become a citizen in America.
The United States of America had made many historical wonders happen when immigration occurred specifically in New York. Italian immigrants have made their special mark in helping America create the world we live in today especially in New York. As more and more Italian immigrants came to New York, all the Italians settled in a specific spot in 1st avenue, also known as little Italy. During the 1800s towards early 1900s immigration changed immigration to America started to erupt and immigrants took over the United States. Compared to todays immigration system immigrants have made a big impact in New York Specifically Italian Americans.

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