Walking back to 116th and Lexington after LuLu LoLo’s speech, I had an interesting conversation with Carl and Andrew. I was able to sympathize with many of LuLu’s stories, having heard similar stories about childhood communities from my parents, but those stories were newer to them. They both have parents who are immigrants, rather than parents who are the grandchildren of immigrants. We came to the conclusion that they will be the ones telling these stories, the stories of the shops and restaurants of their neighborhoods.
The intra-city migration of different groups is what makes New York City so extraordinary. The nostalgia for the drives the stories that are passed down generationally, and the migration of peoples allows for the parallelism of the city’s history. Soon we will be telling the stories about how our childhood neighborhoods have changed.
[Note: Much of this prediction is supported by several of the readings]
Interesting insight. Reminds me of part of our reading, from Allen Salkin’s article, “Fading into History”: ”If it were still a poor neighborhood of Jews selling cheap clothes and other things and struggling to survive, it wouldn’t be iconic, it would be a problem. … It’s only with the moving on, with the passage of time, that that sort of stuff can be viewed as sweet and lovely.” LuLu LoLo had little to say about the squalor of the tenements in the Italian neighborhood of East Harlem–rather, she presented her stories as beautiful memories. Maybe the same thing will happen with us. With the passage of time, the ugly parts of our childhood neighborhoods will soften and vanish, leaving only a rosy memory. Maybe we will truly treasure these neighborhoods only once they begin to change and disappear.
Thank you, Paulina and Sasha. Very insightful thoughts from both of you and thanks for helping make our site so yeasty.
When I’ve been reading all your papers, and in much writing about the immigrant experience, I’ve been realizing that it’s a considerable challenge to write about the subject in a dry-eyed manner. I think you’re right, Sasha, that the stories will get softer and rosier over time — maybe that’s just human nature. And I also think there’s a great impetus out there to paint the NYC immigrant experience as quite wonderful all around — the gorgeous mosaic, etc., especially in this city. In many ways it is. But that’s not to say that there are dark patches.
Please, seminar members, chime in. Do you think aspects of the immigrant experience get air-brushed out over time? And is that necessarily a bad thing?
cr