According to census data from 2010, when its total population was 37,479 Kew Gardens Hills was 53.9% White. But, what does “White” really encompass? Does it take into account the Russian, Polish, Bukharian, Italian, or German immigrants who live here? Or is it easier to group these separate and distinct cultures into one big blob of “White” based on the color of their skin?

“I realize that I have given up my language, my culture, because I am a man of Russian culture and even perhaps my orientation of antagonism to the Soviets which spurred my writing”

-Alexander Sukornik, Jewish Russian immigrant writer who moved to Kew Gardens Hills from the Soviet Union in the early 1970s (quote from a NY times archive)

One of the most prominent groups of people who live in this community are Russian Jews. Many of these Jews immigrated to America from the Soviet Union due to poor living conditions or religious persecution in their original country. They came here in hope of chasing “The American Dream”–a better life with more opportunities and less totalitarian control. When moving to areas of New York, such as Kew Gardens Hills, many Russian Jewish Immigrants who were looking for work had to improve their English and adapt to American ways of life if they wanted to be included in society.

This topic is important to me because I come from a family who immigrated to the United States from the Soviet Union–more specifically–from Ukraine. My dad and his family came to American in 1976 from Kiev and my mom arrived with her family almost a decade later in 1986 from Donetsk. They are both Russian Jews who were oppressed in Ukraine for being Jewish. My mom recounts a story of the time when she was bullied in school after a few of her classmates found out that she was Jewish. She exclaims “They would always say stuff like ‘Go back to Israel‘ or ‘You’re a really good person, it’s too bad you’re a Jew.'”

This degradation of their Jewish identity is what caused my parents to suppress this part of themselves growing up and to not actively practice their religion. As a direct result, I was not raised in a religious household. I believe that the anti-Semitism that they experienced when they were growing up is what influenced my upbringing. Presently, I personally feel like I identify more with my American identity as opposed to my Russian or Jewish identity. When I tell people that I am Jewish, most of the time they are surprised and tell me that I don’t look Jewish. This remark always leaves me puzzled–what is Jewish supposed to look like?

I decided to interview my grandmother about what it was like adjusting to life in New York. She told me that compared to life back in the Soviet Union, “it was worth the assimilation.” However, she doesn’t like to think of the adaption of American culture as a loss of her Russian identity, but rather as a gain of her new identity–“her American identity.”

“Italian, Polish, and Jewish immigrants may not have identified with, or been accepted into, white society when they first arrived in the United States. But they, or more often their children, assimilated by becoming “white” and experienced upward mobility as they melded into the white majority.”

-Aviva Chomsky, They Take Our Jobs! And 20 Other Myths About Immigration

I tried to get a better idea of the truth to this issue in my neighborhood of Kew Gardens Hills, so I decided to conduct a small survey. For this survey, I took a stroll down Main Street between 73rd Avenue and Jewel Avenue and ask a few “White” pedestrians, store owners, and customers how they would describe their race or ethnicity–intentionally leaving the question open-ended. Based on the data I collected from 30 random people, I was able to verify that the majority of younger respondents answered “White” or “American,” while the older immigrant respondents tended to give more detailed answers–including their nationality and country of origin. I know that this small sample is obviously not representative of everyone within the population, but it does help me prove my point which is why I am choosing to include it.

“If you are of Irish decent, or Italian decent, you’re not officially white. The Polish race? They weren’t white. Greeks were not white. Hungarians were not white. Slowly but slowly, they became white. So, that whole movement along the line of ‘what is white’ it’s not fixed at all. What it does is, it provides something, again, that you need to look up, something called ‘white privilege’; the privilege of having white skin. Which a lot of people say, ‘ehh, I don’t believe it’ but again, if you’ve never heard of it, there’s a tendency to doubt it, to dispute it, and say ‘that’s not true’. I encourage you, if you heard anything that I said that you doubt, you can ask me about it. There’s a new world coming. In fact, it’s already here”

–Transcription of professor James Harrison’s speech

Conformity goes hand in hand with erasure. Due to the institutionalized discrimination in the United States, many White immigrants and their children took on this “White identity” that allowed for them to move to a higher social level within society. By assimilating into the norm of American Whiteness, many of these immigrants experienced a loss of their ethnic, cultural, and religious identities. It was easier to “blend in” than be an outsider.

This topic of White assimilation is especially prominent in today’s political atmosphere. The “White” majority of Americans who claim that they don’t want immigrants coming into the country seem to forget that their ancestors were also once immigrants in the United States. In recent years, there has been a shift in political views as to which immigrants are more worthy than others to enter and reside in this country. This brings us back to the issues of institutionalized racism and White privilege. Immigrants from European countries have the color of their skin to thank for their warm welcome into American society, while nonwhite immigrants are pushed to the side due to bias ideals which many US citizens hold to be true.

“Why are we having all these people from shithole countries come here?” 

–Donald Trump, current president of America circa 2018

When the leader of the country makes such a remark, many of his followers blindly support his views which creates divides amongst the nation. Racist ideals are further escalated and even encouraged. When making this remark about keeping out “undesirable” immigrants, Trump was referring to nonwhite immigrants. Again, this type of hatred and discrimination makes it impossible for there to be one standard for all immigrants.

Works Cited

Chomsky, Aviva. “Assimilation Is a Double-Edged Sword for Immigrants.” NYMBP, 2015, www.nymbp.org/assimilation-is-a-double-edged-sword-for-immigrants.html.

Copquin, Claudia Gryvatz. “Kew Gardens Hills.” The Neighborhoods of Queens, by Claudia Gryvatz Copquin, Yale University Press, 2009, pp. 118–120.

Dawsey, Josh. “Trump Derides Protections for Immigrants from ‘Shithole’ Countries.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 12 Jan. 2018, www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-attacks-protections-for-immigrants-from-shithole-countries-in-oval-office-meeting/2018/01/11/bfc0725c-f711-11e7-91af-31ac729add94_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.1d91b8be76c4.

Kaufman, Michael T. “Soviet Jews Are Discovering Difficulties in Adjusting to Life Here.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 9 Mar. 1975, www.nytimes.com/1975/03/09/archives/soviet-jews-are-discovering-difficulties-in-adjusting-to-life-here.html?searchResultPosition=42.

“Kew Gardens Hills, Queens.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 6 May 2019, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kew_Gardens_Hills,_Queens#Demographics.

LaughingAtLiberals, director. Irish, Italian, Polish, Greek, & Hungarians “Became” White For Privilege. YouTube, YouTube, 23 Apr. 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPGCpA1FWn4.