There is an old joke in the USA that is well known in many inner city circles (well, inner city circles of old, of course) that talks about social class and ethnicity and marriage. The way it goes is this... "What is an Italian girl who marries a Pole?" The joke response: "A social climber!"
I can remember finding it online some years ago and thinking it was rather comical, and of course also knowing it was true, becuase I had personal experience with it, due to the fact that an aunt of mine, an Italian girl, married a Polish fellow, back in the early 70s or 80s, and not long after that, she took off from the "inner city" neighborhood of what was then a Little Italy, and fled for the boonie hills -- about a forty minute drive from here (the rest of us still live in Little Italy). The stories in the family, of course, abound about how "disgusted" my grandfather (an Italian, and my aunts older brother by many years) was with the matrimony. Him and his two brothers simply could not believe that she would marry a Pole. It had never happened in our family before, that someone would go outside of the Italian circle. She, the only girl, was the first one, and strangely enough, she was also basically the only one in the entire family who moved that far out into the hills, that early on. Hence, you see, from a wholly American angle, my Aunt (let's call her Anna) did indeed do a social climb. When I would drive out to see my aunts house and my cousins, my friends from this neighborhood (Italians, Spaniards, half blacks) would often be in absolute awe. She was living the real American dream. We were just still back there in the furnace. So, again, there was a clear sense of "social climb" that had happened, and it did indeed seem to be because of the fact that she married a Pole....
Some people, of course, might be a little "confused" as to why a Polish-American is, or at least was, of a higher social status in the USA rather than an Italian, all those years ago. There are a few reasons and most of them revolve around the fact that, when it came to the assimilation process, I am of the belief that the Poles were, first of all, far happier to assimilate to the American way (I'll explain why shortly) and they were also, in addition to this, and this must never be plowed over, not people who had, in the 30s and 40s, been allied against the United States in a very dreadfully serious World War.
On the one hand, the Poles were below a group like the Irish, because Poles did not arrive speaking English (like the Irish did); but they were also, at the very least, above the Italians, because they did not declare a war against the United States. If anything, they helped, in what little way they could, during that war. As a result, the Polock became a somewhat pitiable figure in the American imagination of the time, rather than a condemned one. Don't forget that Poland was the literal origin point of the entire WW2 fiasco: Hitler had gone to invade and the Polocks didn't know what was going on. They were unable to defend themselves, though the idea is that they "desperately wanted to". They hated Hitler, et cetera (so the official story goes). As a result, England, whom America later allied with, told Hitler it was time for war, in order to, initially, defend the Poles. So Poland played a very different role, and henceforth the Poles here in the States, whom I can assure you were effected by all of this, became people to be pitied, as I said, by whoever the strongest people here were (i.e. the employment opportunities).
The Italian was instead to be wholly condemned. He was already on rocky ground having arrived with no language, and then through the 1920s he had gone against the American government and sold illegal beer and wine... and now, my God, now his old country had just declared a deadly war against the United States government! Benito Mussolini became the most famous Italian in the world, and he was running around in Europe, sieg hieling with Hitler. This was all very bad, and this was all taking place when my great grandmother Maria Louisa, the mother of my Aunt Anna, would have been the age I am now: middle 20's. It was all a world away, but it haunted . And still haunts.
Many people, for example, often try to draw parallels between the Irish and the Italian struggle to assimilate here. The Irish, after all, unlike the Poles, are somewhat heavily remembered, and so it seems like there must be something similar between the two groups. In truth, though, there are no parallels. No strong ones, at least. Italians and Irish people are literally as different as can be, adn the only reason the Irish are remembered is because they arrived speaking English and their old country still speaks it to this day. The bridge is easy to cross, and the old songs still easy to sing. In addition to this, I have often made the "joke" that one could even say the United States was God's great gift to the Irish and the Scottish. You could see it like a sort of reimbursement in their long historical tale: Here we have two countries of people whom the English had whipped and beaten into submission, and then forced English down their throat, and sudenly the next thing you know, there is this entire country (practically half a continent!) where people speaking English have broken off from the exact royal lineage and King that plagued them so .
And so they of course came here in mass numbers and loved it and went on, for all of time, to sing the story of how absolutely fantastical this place was, et cetera. Many an Irish song is to this day is still a noted feature in the American songbook. As a folksinger , I have sung many Irish songs.So have Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, and Bruce Springsteen and onwards. U2 is from Ireland; they might as well be American. As one can imagine, I do not really get to sing popular Italian songs, of course, because there are none. They aren't in ENglish, after all. Therefore they do not exist, and when they do get sung, they seem like songs from a truly foreign place. They do not seem like "Danny Boy" or "When Johnny Comes Marching Home", which really might as well be American songs by this point.
At any rate, the reason I want to express all of this is really because all of our little "social climbing jokes" Stateside, where Poles and Irish people get to enjoy a better spot than Italians, and now Spanish speakers, have actually served to rather muddy our world view of what was going on historically , and even still today, in the Old World. From an American point of view, you see, one would take a look at the Old World and assume, quite naturally, that things are perhaps just like they are here. After all, if Poles and Irishman are superior and higher social beings here, then how on Earth could it not be exactly the asme everywhere, right? Except it is not the same, literally at all. It's actually the exact opposite: Poland is literally a nearly insignificant country in the history of Western Civilization, and as for Ireland and Scotland, the story is also exactly the same. The irony here is that their insigificance in the Old World is precisely what led to their higher placement in this one, because they came here in droves, and also because they were far happier to forget the memories of the Old World (since it was awful for them) and thus assimilate, joyously and gratefully, to this one.
Being Italian is a very unique thing in the US country, I feel, because Italy itself is just...well, a very memorable country. Unlike Poland and Ireland, Italy actually has a very long, and mostly innovative, history that is studied and researched the world over, by people of all cultures, and in addition to that history, modern Italy is also still, as I said, a rather memorable place, once you head above Rome, where no immigrants left from. Modern Italy is a cherished vacation spot, a very important fashion spot, an incredible wine making spot, and it is also considered one of the best food diets in the world. Also before I forget ...it is the center of the Catholic Church.
This might seem insigificant in a larger discussion about social groups in the States, where we are told history has been re-written with a bold point pen, but the reason that this is actually a problem for Italian-Americans, is because it , I believe, has left us with a sort of divided allegiance, when it comes to wanting to assimilate. It's almost as though Italians don't really know why they left in comparison to the other groups. Italy still seems pretty relevant and cool. It still seems chic. The others instead just seem out of the way...there's no doubt that they were good to flee. I'll never forget when I was around 17, I had a good friend who was actually half Irish who went to visit Italy with his Italian born father. He came home a different person: he started collecting Italian designer fashion, dressing "chic", wearing Dolce and Gabbana sunglasses , supporting the Italian soccer team, et cetera. He saw Milano, after having lived in this rather dilapidated areao f the States we live in, and I really think his mind was "blown". His father was an immigrant, and he had probably associated him with the other immigrants in our neighborhood, who come from El Salvador and Mexico, and so he had probably imagined that going to see Italy would be like going to see a third world place. Instead, there he is in Milano, and he is seeing a world that looked better than the one he had just left. It became a strange sort of "...but why woul you leave this?" .
Which is why I say: this is a problem from a certain lens, because the culture of modern Italy almst seems ...well, superior to this American one. It seems cleaner, friendlier, more posh, elegant , an so on....
Notice that you almost never hear someone talking of Polish-Americans, but Italian-Americans , even now 100 years later, still come up time and time again, even though they have no language bridge to connect them to Italy anymore. They have their own films, they have movie actors, they have Lady Gagas, et cetera. They are not as cut off as the Afro-Americans are, or the Puerto Ricans et cetera, but they're still a pretty notable group, particularly for people who you can't tell apart at first glance, who didn't arrive here speaking English, and who have been here for 100 years now. Italians, for all intents and purposes, should have lost any sense of identity like the Poles did, the second they no longer spoke Polish. But this did not happen. Not at all.
And this is all because of just how memorable Italy is, in comparison to Poland or Ireland. I really can't stress it enough: Even when I do not want to remember Italy, I am still eventually forced down some other lane where it manages to pop up and flash itself in my face. Italy is there in the magazines, Madonna goes and does photoshoots there , and everyone who is rich, including even the President of the USA, Donald Trump, probably has at least one or two articles of Italian fashion in their closet. Trump's trademark suit with the red tie, is said to be an Italian suit, Brioni, and recently Ivanka was in the headlines for allegedly having stolen some sort of high heel design .... from - who else/ -- but an Italian designer. They are apparently going to go to court over this. The Italians, after all, take fashion very seriously.
So, having said all of this now, here's what I will tell my reader as the pseudo historian I am (that's probably what my polish cousins by Aunt Anna, who don't like me much, would call me) about the entire tale : I think the American country is different for every group, and quite frankly, when it comes to the Italian group, I'm just not totally convinced, and I don't think I ever will be, that it was the best country to come to. However, I do think it's important that I make it very clear that, for the Irish, the Scottish, the Poles, and the other groups here now , I do suppose it was Gods gift to them, but for the Italians I don't think it was the best place to come, and I feel it's very important to write this because I do not like how people just try to blindly group the Italian immigrant story in with all these other ones , when it was and is nothing like those other ones. I really wouldn't be at all hesitant to even go so far as to call the Italian immigration here the biggest mistake any Italian of those far off time periods could have ever possibly made. My family would probably be better off, and better educated, had we remained in Italy, especially had the immigrant just simply headed some miles north to Rome, instead of the desperate and very dumb move he made....
Some places just aren't good for certain people, and in my opinion, the United States just wasn't very good for the Italians.
No comments:
Post a Comment