The basic underpinning of Sutton’s “The Carribeanization of New York City and the Emergence of a Transnational Sociocultural System” is that there is “life” to New York City that is affected by both it’s economic and demographic components. The change in economic and demographic components by immigrants in recent times, specifically Caribbean immigrants (the subject of this piece), transforms and redefines the nature and boundaries of the city’s “life”.
This piece, an introduction to a larger work dealing with many subjects pertaining to the Afro-Caribbean community, seeks to preliminarily address many issues and dimensions within the Caribbean immigrant-New York City dynamic: How these immigrants fit in within the city’s larger socio-economic/racial/ethnic matrix, how Caribbean culture has transformed New York City culture and how New York City culture and attitudes has shaped Caribbean culture and self identity.
Most important to Sutton’s arguments is the idea that afro-Caribbean culture is a vastly layered and multi-dimensional entity that has been shaped by colonial, indigenous, and other forces. Therefore, it is incorrect to say that afro-Caribbean culture has brought a set of entirely new ideas to NYC because, after all, many of those ideas and cultural components were possible informed by NYC and American traditions themselves. As a result, Caribbean immigrants often find that they have to carefully shape and construct their identities upon living in America.
Sutton notes that the large part of the afro-Caribbean community defines themselves within the borders of the black-American/African American community, even though they have distinct historical and cultural backgrounds and despite the fact that Caribbean immigrants often encounter and work within socio-economic structures much differently than African Americans. Both groups have been shaped by colonial oppressions but it is also with out a doubt that both groups have distinct cultural heritages. Both groups also generally suffer from uneven economic growth in comparison to White majority groups but it can also be said that Caribbean groups have generally reached a higher socio-economic status as compared with black African Americans.
However, just as American tradition has affected Caribbean culture, so to has Caribbean culture widely impacted and transform New York City culture. In particular this change has been felt, as Sutton puts it, “on the streets”. This street-culture phenomenon has been found in trends with other immigrant groups. What is remarkable, although definitely not exclusively unique, to Caribbean immigration is that affect that afro-Caribbean culture has had on New York City’s “high culture” in addition to street culture. Caribbean culture has influenced the academic, artistic, and cultural institutions of New York City.
The city’s afro-Caribbean immigrant population has also had a huge influence on the city’s economic infrastructure and labor market dynamics. Caribbean immigrant populations have offered cheap and flexible labor that has not only stimulated stagnating economic sectors, but has also created/expanded new ones: particularly in health care and child care fields. While this has had a positive effect on employer’s labor markets and has benefited the Caribbean immigrant community in that it provides them with higher wages than they would have received at home, it has also created sharp socio-economic disparity.
