Washington Heights: What's Real

From Decoding New York

There is a danger that when immigrants develop a new frame of reference in a new they will loose their familial bonds. However, through the use of internet, cellphones and long distance phone service, modern immigrants have the choice to stay somwhat close and connected to their homeland.

What's Real:

A major question that occurs in studying an area like Washington Heights is, how can one put themselves into the perspective of members of a community with a different cultural frame of reference than one's own if there is a language barrier?

According to Susan Dicker, the issue of language barriers creating cultural gaps, is not just a difficult problem in our research, but a problem preventing the intermingling of new immigrant's and current resident's cultures as a whole. For example, Dicker notes that "53 % of the foreign-born population are from Latin America," which may be why there are a growing number Spanish speaking community's like Washington Heights, catering solely to the needs of their own small ethnic enclave, rather than worrying about how to adapt to "American" customs and language (Dicker 713). Dicker also believes that while it is important for new immigrant groups to Washington Heights like the Ojito Hispanics know a certain amount of English, she stresses that, "New Yorkers need to learn Spanish because Hispanic New Yorkers insist on using Spanish" (Dicker 715).

I found Susan Dicker's words to be true from a direct, personal experience of the area. After walking into six separate stores and restaurants with clip-boards asking local residents for interviews, and receiving blank stares because they were not able to speak English, I felt ignorant for expecting local residents that I was attempting to interview to speak my language, when I only have a weak knowledge their language.

This left us with the overriding idea that if one is an outsider trying to explore the heart of a foreign cultural enclave with no knowledge of their standard language, then a middle man, or translator is necessary to truly receive an insider's perspective.

I think that the cultural disconnect which we experienced upon entering a new area reflects our lack of progress toward true cultural communication, and understanding on a broader level. The media, despite all of its attention toward issues like globalization, and increased technology leading to higher rates of cultural exchange and international movement, fails to highlight as readily the disadvantages and discrimination faced by new immigrant populations.

For example, Stuart Duany expresses in his article, "Reconstructing Racial Identity: Ethnicity, Color, and Class among Dominicans in the United States and Puerto Rico," that despite all of the American pressure for immigrants to this country to suddenly find ways to adapt and become part of our economy and society, often because of a different framework for reality between cultures, this transition is impossible, "On the other hand, the racialization of Dominicans in the United States and Puerto Rico is part of a larger phenomenon affecting Caribbean communities in the diaspora. The prevailing definition of these migrants as black and colored tends to exclude them as biologically different from and culturally alien to the receiving societies (Basch, Schiller, and Szanton Blanc, 1994). To the extent that Caribbean migrants are racialized, their efforts to become integrated into the host countries face more obstacles than those of other ethnic groups that are not so labeled (Duany 149).

While some may think that becoming part of "American" culture is as easy as learning the English language and participating in our businesses, Duany further emphasizes that in many circumstances arriving Hispanic immigrants experience segregating factors which bar them from participation in "American" culture and society. For example, he writes that "the difficulty of acquiring English and other marketable skills work against full integration for many Dominicans. In addition, the adopted and the native homelands have come to represent different aspirations" (Duany 39).

There is also a difference in perception about what America means to newly arriving immigrants as opposed to previously established United States populations. For example, most citizens born in the United States most likely consider the United States to be their country of origin, which they associate with ideas of home, future, and family. In contrast, one of Duany's Washington Height's research participants observes that there is, "a clear dichotomy between aqui (‘‘here’’) and alla ́ (‘‘there’’). Here is where they can make and save money, advance economically, help their families, and secure a better future for their children.’ There is ‘my country,’ a place where one belongs, enjoys, rests, lives peacefully and happily’ (Duany 39)."

After studying the topic of immigration, one might imply that nothing is real. As basic a concept as racial identity is not concrete, but dependent upon cultural framework. Furthermore, even the composition of a location is transient, as was the case with the various change of hands in culture from the Irish population all the way up until the Hispanic population in Washington Heights.

This section on Washington Heights and Rego Park developed by Irina Mullokandova, Karina Fatova, Quinn Marston.