My American Girls is about Ortiz’s family and the challenges they face as immigrants. Not having proper education, Mrs. Ortiz has to raise her three daughters with a couple of low paying jobs. She wants her daughters to work hard so that they don’t have to suffer like her. Although there are lots of complications and hardships, the Ortiz’s house is full of visitors and neighbors. These Dominicans are brought together because they face similar challenges. Because they understand each other, the neighbors have special relationships with each other.

The community and Ortiz family impact Mrs. Ortiz’s girls who were born in America. While Monica, the oldest sister, is the one with the least ties to her native heritage and she is the one who has the balance between her Dominican side and her American side. She gives up her dream of acting to make her parents proud and instead pursues a more stable job. The family’s expectation has shaped her educational and career path.

Aida, the second oldest sibling, represents a young teenage girl who seeks attention and independence. She begins working at McDonalds to help her parents, but in the end, it affects her grades negatively and gets fired for being late to work. She thinks she is grown up, but the reality shows that she still needs perseverance and patience. Finally, Mayra, the youngest out of the three sisters, is an example of an immigrant who is still tied to her homeland. She struggles in academics and hangs out with her neighborhood Dominican friends. Out of three sisters, she is the one who is most badly caught in between two different cultures. She wants to live a Dominican life, but the environment won’t let her

The documentary, My American Girls: A Dominican Story, sheds light onto the living situation of many immigrant families and first-generation Americans, particularly Latinos. This extended family spans the four floors of their home: struggling through school and low-wage jobs during the week, and celebrating the weekends as they dance and sing in Spanish in the backyard. In this sense, the Ortiz family was almost a community unto itself.

However, each of the three daughters, or “American girls,” reacted to this community differently. The eldest, Monica, almost completely rejects her Dominican roots, abandoning much of the culture and tradition to be “Americanized” in the most traditional sense (attending an Ivy League university, having a white boyfriend, living in Manhattan away from family, etc.). This is a stark contrast to her younger sisters. Mayra, the youngest, embraces Latino culture, but in a less traditional sense. A self-proclaimed “ghetto” kid, she identifies with other Latino children, and perhaps even Latino stereotypes, and is very limited in a geographical sense (only hanging out with “kids from the block,” so to speak). Aida, the middle child, is almost a melding of the two, having her own “American” ambitions while still trying to keep ties with her Dominican culture and family.

Monica represents the epitome of the “American dream:” coming from nothing, validating the sacrifies her parents made, finding her place in the big city. Mayra, however, represents another faces of “Americanness:” the notion that we are a country of immigrants. In self-identifying, she exemplifies this American tradition of “being from somewhere” and having a sense of culture. Personally, I see the most commonality between Aida and myself. Being a child of immigrants, albeit of different socioeconomic situations, I can understand Aida’s stance on trying to keep ties to your heritage while forging your own path, so to speak. All of these “American identities” stem from being first-generation Americans; these girls have the autonomy to create their own personas, regardless of who their parents are or where they come from. The variability comes from how much they want to maintain ties to their ethnic backgrounds and how far they are willing to go.

The documentary, My American Girls, focuses on the lives of the Ortiz family residing in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. It provides an insightful window into the lives of this family and the difficulties they face. This is a reflection of the lives of many immigrant families throughout New York City. The community and the environment play a vital role in the development of the children within the family.

The neighborhood and community supported the Ortiz family, but at times it also affected their lives negatively. The support the Ortiz family receives from their community is evident in their weekly barbeques and events where their friends and family congregate to celebrate and dance like they did back in their native home in Puerto Rico. Monica’s surprise graduation party is another example of the community’s support. The neighborhood the Ortiz family resides permits their children to be more in touch with their ethnic roots but because it is a less affluent part of the city, as Sandra complains one night while accompanying her daughter back home because of unsafe conditions, the police are less inclined to enforce the law there. This issue of safety is one that usually comes with living in a neighborhood with working-class immigrants.

Mayra and Aida were more inclined to participate in neighborhood events than focus on her studies. They represent the challenges children of immigrants face in America. They are more in touch with their Puerto Rican roots, but as a result are much more detached from the social standards in America. Monica is the most Americanized of the three daughters in terms of culture and social standards. She moves into the city and attempts to “draw a line” between her life and her family’s. However, we see that because she conforms to American social standards, she appears to be the most successful of the three daughters academically, socially, and financially. In terms of upward mobility, she moves to a much more affluent neighborhood of the city. So does this mean that assimilation to traditional American standards results in natural upward mobility for immigrants or children of immigrants?

In the video, the daughters in the Ortiz family lived in a house with their extended family. The basement, first floor, second floor, and the third floor are all partitioned to families within their family (i.e. the Ortiz family that was interviewed lives on the third floor). This is a characteristic of Sunset Park that Min Zhou describes in her writings, but instead of one family renting parts of the house out to others, the Ortiz family was large enough to all find work and pay for the house this way. Min Zhou’s writing focuses on the influx of Asian immigrants. She mentions how in 1990, the neighborhood was fifty-one percent Latino, but that an increasing number of Asian immigrants were moving into Sunset Park. However, this documentary was filmed in the late 1990s and depicted the image of a still prominent Latino community within the neighborhood.

My American Girls reflects the lives of many immigrants in New York City and the difficulties they face. In this film we see the importance of culture and we also see how American culture can clash with the culture of immigrants. Even within the ethnic neighborhoods immigrants reside in and seek comfort from, there are conflicts and safety issues. The difficulties immigrants face in a new country are endless, however as in the case of the Ortiz family, some are successful in achieving their dreams, but “do the ends justify the means”?

Having grown up in Sunset Park, I was easily able to identify the surroundings. The parks, the houses-all areas that I have, in some way or another, passed by. Yet, it was definitely a shock to see what Sunset Park was like on the big screen, to outsiders. Most of Sunset Park is not middle class or anywhere near that strata. Sunset Park and its residents are predominately working-class immigrants and their families. Therefore, Mrs. Ortiz and her three daughters are one family amongst many others, struggling to make a better life for themselves in a strange country.

I would argue that her three daughters: Monica, the eldest, Aida, the middle child, and Mayra, the youngest, have characteristics that all define the American experience. As the film goes to show, all three sisters are very different, and yet, the same.

Monica is the epitome of the American dream: she is from a poor family who studies and works very hard, graduating from one of the best institutions in the world. Yet, she originally wants to sacrifice her happiness-acting- for a steady job as a doctor for her parents’ happiness. Monica is also the one who pushes aside, willingly or involuntarily, her Dominican heritage. As she herself and her sisters said, she doesn’t have many Latino friends. She characterizes the immigrant who wants to adopt a new identity, someone who is more American. This is part of the American experience: an immigrant or the second generation immigrant is eager to discard their old identity in favor of conforming. Monica also describes herself as a “jack of all trades, master of none” which is something a lot of young adults face nowadays in an economy that demands multiple skills.

Aida says that according to her psychology textbook, she “is the typical middle child.” As we see, she fits that description perfectly. Much of the film doesn’t focus on her problems, but rather on Monica and on Mayra. Aida struggles to get attention from her parents, who are working long hours as custodians at the hospital and at the doctor’s office. She tries to find her own independence-like many of us- by getting a job at McDonald’s. It was supposed to be a way for her to not ask her parents for money, yet she ends up getting fired because she is late too frequently. Aida is the immigrant who tries to find her identity and the teenager who is growing up and trying to get independence through his/her own means.

Mayra is the youngest child, and she is the one who is closest to her Dominican heritage. She calls herself-or her sisters do-the “ghetto Dominican.” As we see in the film, Mayra struggles in school; she hangs out on the streets with her friends and family. Her mother, Mrs. Ortiz, tries to be more involved in Mayra’s activities in school. Mayra is the one who famously dubs her house as a “hotel in the Dominican Republic.” Mayra represents the experience of the immigrant who is yet unable to cut ties to her heritage. Unlike Monica, who has few connections to her Dominican background, Mayra is immersed in it.

All three of these sisters represent the American Dream and the American Experience in some way or another. All the sisters come from humble background, but all have their heads held high: they may struggle and toil as their parents are/were, but what they will realize is that despite the work that goes into achieving a better life in America, the result will be so worth it. Eight years after the film was created, in fact, the Ortiz family opened a hotel in the Dominican Republic, which is managed by Aida. All three sisters have higher education and families of their own now. Now, that is the American experience.

Ricourt and Dante’s Introduction: The Emergence of Latino Panethnicity talked about the population of latinos in Corona, as well as the change in population of other parts of the borough of Queens.  They started off by discussing the sense of unity Latinos of Corona found in their common language.  This was the first thing that stood out to me about this passage.  I found it interesting language was the most unifying factor of the Hispanic population.  It did make the most sense to me, though, because as different as various Hispanic cultures are, the language is the one thing that they have in common.  That is the one thing that they can depend on to communicate and connect with each other.  Since Spanish is what attracts Latinos to Corona, it makes it easier for more and more Hispanics to feel comfortable living in the area, interacting, and creating a community of their own.

As a child, I spent a lot of time in Corona and I remember looking around and thinking that my family was “the outsider” in this area.  Reading this passage made it seem like it was in fact the other way around, at least at one point.  Ricourt and Dante explain the growth of Latinos in Corona and how it was a result of “new immigration.”  However, before this Corona’s population was predominantly white and black.  Soon, more blacks would move into the area and whites would move out.  By the 1990’s, the area became multi-Latino.  Although the area became predominantly Hispanic, there were people moving in from various spanish countries, from Puerto Rico to Panama.  All of these cultures mixed into one area can be hard to believe.  There are bound to be separations and divisions, but as a whole, Latinos have made Corona their home.

Reading the essay about the development of Jackson Heights, Queens, I realized that no matter how hard one tries, one cannot always control the outcome of a neighborhood. There are too many outside factors that make this control difficult. MacDougall lost in his fight to create an upper middle class to upper class exclusive neighborhood, Jackson Heights. Building the neighborhood in a great economy, he banned certain groups of people, such as Jews and Blacks, from moving to Jackson Heights, but when the Great Depression hit, this all changed. People could no longer afford these homes, so some people moved out, and prices of all the homes dropped. The Great Depression did set up Jackson Heights for its new dynamic of being a diverse neighborhood, but it was not until decades after the Great Depression that immigrants, other than Jews or Catholics, moved to Jackson Heights. The outside factors were the introducing of two new acts that made opened the door for immigrants to come to the United States. Since Jackson Heights’ real estate market was still bad when these acts were put in place, Jackson Heights was the perfect place for immigrants to settle.

The essay describes Jackson Heights, specifically Roosevelt Avenue, as a place full of life. Every block has stores representing a different nationality. What became of Jackson Heights seems better than MacDougall’s original dream of creating a citadel-like neighborhood composed of only wealthy whites. The Jackson Heights that was created seems much more interesting and attractive. It is so attractive that people come from other states to shop in the area, similar to how people go to Flushing to do their shopping.

The topic of controlling who inhabits an area is intriguing to me because in my town that issue has recently been coming up. A developer wants to build new apartments in my town, but people are afraid that kids are going to settle there, and the schools are already crowded. The developer can try to make the apartments as unattractive to families with kids as it wants, but as we saw with MacDougall’s efforts to control, outside factors can change everything.

“From Exclusionary Covenant to Ethnic Hyperdiversity in Jackson Heights, Queens” by Ines M. Miyares mainly focused on Jackson Heights to demonstrate the dramatic change in its ethnic population from the past few decades. Jackson Heights was not meant to be diverse. It was supposed to be the getaway for high earning working people from the New York City. The houses were grand and the neighborhood was clean.

However, the stock market crash in 1929 and the stagnation of real estate 1930s became the spark to the change of Jackson Heights from a rich white town into a town of hyperdiversity. Because of these economical problems, apartments were very hard to sell. In 1950s, finally a new group of people started moving into Jackson heights. These groups of people were Latin Americans who had entrepreneurial experience and were in need to establish a stable business. Because these Latinos were experienced and educated, it was common for them to settle down in Jackson Heights’ “discounted” apartments (thanks to stock market crash).

However, even as late as 1970s, Jackson heights was called “a largely white, middle-class neighborhood”. So what factor impacted the diversity of Jackson Heights the most? The Immigration Reform Act of 1965 removed the quotas on immigrants and made immigration more advantageous. This new wave of immigrants was highly educated and they settled in neighborhoods with large and affordable housings, easily accessible public transportation, and available storefronts for new businesses (and Jackson Heights was a perfect match for Hispanic/Latino and Asian population). As shown in the article’s chart, in 2000, 63% of Jackson Heights’ residents were foreigners. It really is ironic to actually think that Jackson Heights was supposed to be for white rich Europeans. Coincidently, the conditions in Jackson Heights were perfect for the immigrants and this coincidence made Jackson Heights one of the most diverse city in the world.

Milagros Ricourt and Ruby Dante heavily focused on Corona in Introduction: The Emergence of Latino Panethnicity. The authors discussed that while Corona is now predominately filled with Latin American immigrants, it wasn’t always that way. Dating back to the 1950s, Corona was made up of almost 43,000 whites and 5,000 blacks. Each year, the number of whites drastically decreased while blacks increased (up until Latin Americans began to migrate to Corona, which at that time the number of blacks then decreased.) White flight clearly impacted the Corona neighborhood and molded it into the predominately Latino neighborhood it is today. But while Corona is majority Latino, there is no specific group of Latinos that dominate the area. Between Dominicans, Columbians, Puerto Ricans, Ecuadorians, Cubans, Mexicans, Peruvians, Salvadorians, Hondurans and Panamanians, not any of these ethnicities have an absolute majority. While there isn’t a perfect divide between the groups, each group has their own nook in the community.

While I was reading Introducing Corona, I was very intrigued reading the schedule that was laid out. There was a strong image of people from all different countries of the world standing on the same platform, waiting for the same 7 train. All of these people had their own stories, backgrounds and beliefs but in that moment, all of them had the same goal: to get to on the train and head into Manhattan for work. Reading this passage gave me an almost empty feeling because thinking that there are people who take the same trains for years, that will never actually interact. While they may see and recognize one another, they see that they are not the same ethnicity and therefore do not engage with each other. It is the same as the mothers who go and pick up their kids from school. While they wait with the same individuals everyday, the Latin Americans, Indians and Chinese women all stand separately. The divide between races go beyond the mother countries and translates even in Queens, New York.

Michael Jones-Correa opens his book, Between Two Nations: The Political Predicament of Latinos in New York City, with a chapter entitled, “Intimate Strangers: Immigration to Queens.” Right off the bat, the title introduces an interesting idea that Jones-Correa further develops. This notion of an “intimate stranger,” a paradoxical sentiment, lends itself to what Jones-Correa coins as “communities overlapping but not touching.” However, before he addresses that, he gives the historical and sociological context of this community shift.

According to his premise, the idea of a community being bound by arbitrarily drawn lines is one that can be debated, particularly with regards to Latino immigrants. Queens, having originally been farmland, is a relatively new place to live, in the grand scheme on New York City. Emphasis on the word live, because that is exactly what people in Queens do. This is not an area for tourists or people to simply pass through, but rather a place for people to carry out their daily lives. Therefore, much more emphasis is placed on this idea of a community.

Jones-Correa refers to the white population of these Queens neighborhoods as “white ethnic residents,” accrediting the fact that they were once too immigrants. However, they do not identify with recent immigrants. Jones-Correa introduces the concept of assimilation, without actually saying the word. He quotes a person saying he never spoke Italian to his friends, despite living in an Italian neighborhood as a child. This contrasts the American-born Latinos who still converse in Spanish with their peers. This thereby lends itself to the idea that perhaps, if Latino immigrants more consciously tried to “blend in” and abide by the social rules put in place by the community’s original residents, there would be no problems.

However, this often isn’t the case, bringing back the idea of an “intimate stranger.” The idea of “communities overlapping but not touching” refers to the reality of an “overlap,” in the sharing of a space, without “touching,” the interaction of the inhabitants. Jones-Correa addresses this in his opening, painting a picture of the 7 train as full of people, but still being a solitary endeavor. Therefore, the question is raised of 1) whether or not asking these people to assimilate is ethnocentric, and 2) how can we integrate these various enclaves, so to speak, into a single thriving community?

Coming to America, immigrants are immigrants, new to the land and to the American culture. However, when they settle in, they settle mostly in a community that consists more of them and more of their religion and their identity. Therefore, their “immigrant” label diminishes due to the fact that they basically integrate with the people around them. However, the continued interaction among each other as well as social events, they create their own identity. Throughout Dante’s piece, we see the factors that play a role in leaning immigrants to join with their “own” and become their own identity with them. Initially, there weren’t as many Latinos in the Corona but those factors and time greatly influenced the transformation of the background of the community. One factor was White flight that was effective in the transformation in which the number of blacks decreased.

As a son of Indian immigrants, I can compare what Dante says to my own parents. The initial action to reside is somewhere comfortable where you know the people and the culture so they don’t feel the “social force” acting upon them. Not only, but the nature of the growth of population also impacts the emergence of the Latino community. From two states to all 50 states, the population of Latino communities have increased, and within each city they gradually get higher.This article explains much of the demographics of the emergence of Latino Communities as well as that of Corona. With 44% being Latinos, it has been divided into three subareas, North Corona, Corona Plaza, and Corona Heights. Much of the emergence of Lationos has come about from social issues and the interaction with people surrounding them. That is what creates unity as well as a form of identity for themselves. Even though they all come from different nations and parts of the world, they become a group when they surround themselves with their own.

If you told Edward Archibald MacDougall that one day the neighborhood he founded and created, Jackson Heights, would someday be one of the most diverse places in the United States, he wouldn’t believe you. The intention of MacDougall was to create a neighborhood meant for rich white Protestants, one that would primarily exclude blacks, Jews, and Irish Catholics. It’s position offered middle to upper class Protestant whites to easily commute to Midtown Manhattan without having to live in the crowded confides of Manhattan. However, by the year 2000, the number of Hispanics residents outnumbered the number of white residents while the Asian population also began to quickly rise. What is the reason for this sudden change in the demographics in Jackson Heights? Ines Miyares outlines the main reasons for these changes as follows: the 1929 stock market crash, the subsequent real estate market collapse, or the change in immigration policies and patterns after the 1950s.

From its creation, Jackson Heights was a neighborhood filled with large apartments, in the forms of the Greystones, the Chateau apartments, and the Towers. When the Upper-Middle Class white Protestants began moving out of Jackson Heights due to the reasons listed above, the most logical group to move in were those of Hispanic origin. The large apartments were the perfect size to accommodate the large families of Hispanic groups including the Colombians and Cubans, two groups who have brought entrepreneurial experience and the capital needed to establish businesses. This was an unexpected turn of events given the way Jackson Heights was formed in the first place. Interestingly enough, in the year 2000 the number of foreign-born residents accounted for nearly 63 percent of it’s residents, compared to the 32 percent for the other four boroughs of New York City. Jackson Heights has an interesting history in regards to the fact that it started as mostly white Protestant Citadel and has transformed into a highly diverse area for New York City immigrants.

In “Immigration to Queens” the author Michael Jones-Correa discusses the concept of community and how it can be distinguished from other areas. From what I can tell, the author believes that immigrants and older residents live in separate communities because of cultural differences. He generalizes the older residents as “white ethnics” and describes their reaction to the influx of new immigrants in a largely negative light. His conclusion in this reading leaves me with the impression that the immigrants and “white ethnics” lead completely separate lives with rare overlaps and interactions because of the “white ethnics” unwillingness to accept the culture and language of the immigrants.

However, the writings of Ines Miyares, Milgaros Ricourt and Ruby Danto describe the lives of older residents and new immigrants overlapping and coexisting. This is a perspective I more strongly agree with. Though they do explain how within the neighborhood, even amongst immigrants, there is a sense of separation and aloofness from other ethnicities and groups. But it is not as extreme as how Jones-Correa describes it. In Miyares’ writing, she describes this overlapping seen in Churches and organizations in Jackson Heights that provide translations in various languages because of the many ethnicities that utilize these institutions. In the writings by Ricourt and Danto, they describe the conflicts between long-time Italian residents and the more recent Hispanic immigrants. Though these are conflicts, the fact that there are interracial conflicts demonstrates how the supposedly separate communities and people do in fact overlap with each other.

I believe that though the lives of new immigrants and long-time residents may differ, they are not completely separate. They coexist surprisingly well despite having drastically different cultures and values. The tendency for people who share similar values or cultures to congregate is natural, but they do not completely detach themselves from others.

“Intimate Strangers: Immigration to Queens” discusses a fascinating and puzzling paradox: while the borough of Queens is home to one of the most diverse immigrant population in the world, people rarely encounter and deal with a diversity of people within their personal lives. In other words, while a wide diversity of people occupy each other’s physical space, they do not occupy each other’s social space. The authors, Jones and Correa address immediately categorize this paradox as both widespread . In my opinion, this label is at best incomplete and at worst incorrect.

First off, both as a life long Queens resident and an objective reader, I can’t help but completely disagree with the authors’ assertion that the different ethnic populations of Queens do not interact with each other. The main problem with this argument is that the authors conflate geographical proximity with social proximity. They say that because ethnic groups live in distinct areas they do not interact socially with other ethnic groups. This idea is logically flawed. People’s social lives do not have to center around their homes, especially in an ever shrinking and technological world. Just because a person might live in a predominantly Afro-Caribbean area that does not mean that all the people they encounter in their workplace and social zones are Afro-Caribbean. Choice of residence can reflect a variety of cultural factors: dietary restrictions/ preferences, access to religious institutions, etc., but place of residence is by no means a fool proof indicator of the diversity of one’s social connections and preferences. Can geographic proximity predict social proximity? Possibly yes. But in this paper the authors do not make sufficient efforts  to clarify the connection between residence and social ties.

I do, however, find the authors proposal to initiate inter ethnic group contact and community involvement very interesting and effective. While at first it seemed strange that a groups  of strangers should be compelled to get to know each other seemed strange, it makes sense. The city is a big place, and its definitely possible to lose oneself within a small and limited group. The beauty of cities is that they connect not just people, but peoples ideas. If we want our city to succeed we need to create a nurturing environment for intellectual cross fertilization, and this starts by connecting people with one another.

For me, it is difficult to describe New York City is few words because there are just so many various characteristics that distinguish New York City from other major cities in the United States. In the first paragraph of the “Intimate Strangers: Immigration to Queens”, the authors use the elevated number 7 train to paint a picture of how diverse New York City actually is. I have taken the 7 trains multiple times but I never thought that the ride from Times Square to Flushing could actually depict the city as if it were “in transition”. The article notes such interesting details about a mere train route. From times square (a major commercial district), the 7 train goes through Northwestern Queens (the home to a large Central American, South American and Asian populations) and it finally ends in Flushing (a thriving immigrant enclave).

The article also points out that despite a decline in factory jobs (contributing to an increase in unemployment rate), the rate of immigration into NYC still increased because many immigrants were “swept” into low skilled labor. This influx of immigrants contributed to “white flight” and does not only occur when Latinos moved into Jackson Heights. As we have seen before, an increase in Asian immigration in Flushing also contributed greatly to the “white flight” in the region, thus proving that “white flight” generally occurs whenever minorities establish a significant foothold in a neighborhood.

Also, the conflict between the white residents and immigrants (in general) is not fairly new either. This brings up the question: should immigrants try harder to assimilate or should the native residents be accepting of the immigrants’ ways? In the article, the white residents of Jackson Heights associated large immigrant populations with increased in criminal activity and an increased detachment from their original community/neighborhood. Many white residents want these immigrants to behave in an “acceptable” manner, although different groups may consider different things to be acceptable. For example, the article states that the playing of loud music is common in Latino culture however, to white residents, this is not “acceptable”. This continuous tug of war between immigrants and native residents still continues today, as various ethnic groups are moving into largely white neighborhoods, thereby changing the racial and cultural demographics of the area. In the end of the article, the authors consider the lifestyles of the Latino and White residents to be to be “parallel” to one another even though they all share the same spatial area. Although there is some disagreement between the groups due to their differences, it is still very remarkable to see how these communities coexist in a relatively peaceful manner  and contribute to the Jackson Heights’ diversity.

In Introduction: The Emergence of Latino Panthecity the authors Milagros Ricourt and Ruby Dante discuss the various factors that encourage Latinos to unite under a common identity. The authors state that one of primary reasons that leads to Latino panathecity is the sharing of a common culture and language, a characteristic that sets Latin Americans apart from other ethnic groups.

Being a Latin American woman myself, I can relate to this article. One of the things that I find most fascinating about my ethnicity is the ability to relate to so many other Hispanics, even Hispanics that are not from my country. Sure, each Hispanic carries ties to their own country, a sense of pride that they carry within themselves, an urge to represent their country here in the United States. A tie to their country that the reading calls “trasnationalism”. However, each of us still carries that separate identity of being Costa Rican or Colombian or Dominican etc. and Latin American.  I often feel that this is overlooked by some people. While each of us speaks the same language and has faced similar types of discimination in the past, we each come from countries that have different slang, different politics, different accents and different histories.

However, despite this pride that we have of our country we each still share what the reading calls “simpatia”, a recognition of ourselves in others. I feel that this “simpatia” is made even stronger in here in America. For example, I know for a fact that in Costa Rica if a Costa Rican were to meet a Colombian immigrant for example, that same “joy” of meeting someone Hispanic will not be as present. On the other hand, in the United States, with its great diversity, meeting another Hispanic from a different country would instantly provide a feeling of bonding. Even if the Hispanic is from another country, we know that in this sea of so many people of different cultures, this Hispanic has a culture that is very similar to ours.

         Coincidentally before writing my Latino Urbanism paper, I was watching an annual music award show on tv called “Premio Lo Nuestro”. While watching this award show, I was thinking how amazing it is that in the audience of the show, and among all the Hispanic celebrities, there were people from completely distinct countries. However, they were all united to celebrate one common thing: how far the Latin American music has managed to make an impact in the United States. However, I feel that Hispanics still have a lot of work to do to overcome the various stereotypes that people place on them. The stereotypes that Hispanics will always work at low-paying jobs, never actually progressing and obtaining higher degrees of education. To be honest, I feel that some of these beliefs are right. While there are the occasional Hispanics that rise above these limitations, the majority are far behind and something must be done about this issue. Sure there are some factors that prevent Hispanics from progressing, factors such as the economy that are not under their control. But when it comes to making the effort to assimilate into the country and learn the language, as well making the effort to teach their children the importance of an education and performing well academically, those are factors that are completely in control of the Hispanic individual. I believe that the government should so what they can to help Hispanics succeed in the United States but I also believe that Hispanics should take advantage of all the opportunities they have before them.

Furthermore in the reading Intimate Strangers: Immigration to Queens by Michael Jones-Correa, the author elaborates on many of the issues the prevents the integration of Hispanics and people of other cultures, mainly Europeans. The authors states that that Hispanics and Whites have differing perception of what comprises a community. To Hispanics, a community is in their memory, a shared sense of home that is combines elements of their homeland and their new neighborhoods in America. To a European, a community is based on physical borders such as streets or familiar landmarks in the neighborhood. An issues that stems from this discrepancy in perceptions is the tendency of Whites to push Hispanics to the “margins” of the neighborhood, and thereafter avoiding those borders because of the association they have of Hispanics with violence, drugs and prostitution. Eventually, many of these Whites decide to leave these communities to live in places that have a lower concentration of Hispanics. It is vital to research these issues today in order to understand not only the future demography of our city but also to  facilitate Latinos in integrating into our communities and society so they can benefit themselves and our country.

Latinos, as well as Asians, are an increasing population in New York City. Many of these new and recent immigrants have been settling in Queens and Brooklyn, with a few exceptions in Washington Heights and lower Manhattan. Most notably, the Latino community has been growing rapidly in Corona and in Jackson Heights. Unlike the immigrants before them, who had filled manufacturing jobs and other blue-collar jobs, these immigrants are taking jobs that are primarily “low-skilled…low paying…” (Jones-Correa 19)

Based on some of the former readings, there is an understanding that most of New York City was originally white; this population has reportedly been on the decline as more minorities are moving in and settling in white neighborhoods. Amongst this immigrant wave are Latinos. For this week, the readings focused on Corona and Jackson Heights. Here is where two articles disagree with one another; whereas Miyares states that Jackson Heights has been increasingly diverse, Jones-Correa states that there is a strong Latino community there. Either way, the growing numbers contribute to Queens’ diversity.

As previously proven with the influx of Chinese immigrants who settled in previously suburban Flushing, white residents will only go so far to tolerate new immigrants. Likewise, there was also a backlash against immigrants moving to Corona and Jackson Heights. In one situation, a neighbor complained that the Latinos didn’t speak English. “They never consider this their home…these kids, they are talking…in Spanish and they were born here.” (Jones-Correa 27-28) This has been a reoccurring theme in the articles and in class: immigrants who refuse to learn and speak English. In another article by Ricourt & Dante, a particular situation had a group of young Italians in Corona use violence against the Latinos.

What seems to be the issue that affects both the Chinese and Latino community is that they are simply not “good guests.” This goes back to the metaphor used in Jones-Correa’s article. The initial residents (hosts) will allow foreigners (guests) into their midsts, because they believe that the guests have had a hard life before their arrival. Yet, the hosts will expect that the guests will learn the rules and toe the line. Immigrants in the 19th and early 20th century struggled to adapt to their new homes: willingly dropping their last names to new “American ones” and forsaking their cultures to become an “American.” That does not seem to be the case for these new immigrants, who instead of “assimilating,” (as that word is so often thrown around) choose to live in enclaves with people who are similar to them in ethnicity and culture and do not live by the rules. These immigrants, therefore, ignore the rules. As a result, they must “pay the price.”

Miyares’ “From Exclusionary Covenant to Ethnic Hyperdiversity in Jackson Heights, Queens” chronicles the transformation of Jackson Heights from its pre-Great Depression days to the place it is today. Originally, the area was intended for an elite, white suburban community for the upper-middle and middle class. Even the name “Heights” promoted it as a place that exuded prestige and that had an elevated ambience as Edward MacDougall envisioned. It was initially the “first garden apartment community,” characterized by its private gardens; its financial plan of the co-op was reminiscent of the more upscale co-ops on Fifth Avenue. Despite MacDougall’s clear vision, Jackson Heights soon transformed in a way that he would never have expected. It became clear that what happened was completely out of his control and there could have been no way for him to determine Jackson Heights’ future.

The metamorphosis from being a homogenous, upper crust neighborhood to a diverse, bustling one resulted from the Stock Crash in 1929. The people could no longer afford to live there, and consequently vacancies and price cuts ensued. Those living arrangement changes, combined with eased immigration restriction policies and the availability of transportation, resulted in an influx of new dwellers in this particular area. Large multi story apartments and two story row homes, originally intended for the wealthy were subsequently divided, yet were still spacious enough for the new households. The leisurely aspect soon disappeared as the heterogeneous population took over.

As a result of the deluge of immigrants, Jackson Heights became marked by its immense diversity. Queens has the highest percentage of diversity out of all the New York boroughs, but there is an even higher percentage specifically within the area of Jackson Heights. Other areas experienced ethnic and racial change as a result of waves of immigrants, but only Jackson Heights maintained the distinction of being the only hyperdiverse neighborhood with no dominant cultural group or language.

The part of Jackson Heights that epitomizes the neighborhood’s essence is Roosevelt Avenue. Having never been to Jackson Heights, I can only imagine this place; I imagine that it is a microcosm of the world, a small land segment in which all cultures are represented. The shops are, among others, Indian, Korean and Latino. I find it ironic that a place that was intended to be exclusive now bursts at the seams with cultural diversity.

An important point the author wishes to make is that it is beyond the control of any human to determine what the future of a place will be. MacDougall envisioned Jackson Heights as a suburban neighborhood for the wealthier whites, but evolution uprooted this plan in favor of enabling it to become a place that welcomes all different immigrants.

Michael Jones-Correa published “Intimate Strangers: Immigration to Queens” in his book Between Two Nations: The Political Predicament of Latinos in New York City in 1998, but today you can still note many of the same truths that he wrote about 15 years ago. Northwestern Queens still attracts thousands of new immigrants every year from all over the world, especially Asians and Hispanics. His opening description of people on the 7 train sounds like it could have been written yesterday.

In my hometown, Elmhurst, I see the same pattern of immigrants on top of immigrants on top of immigrants. On my block alone, that I know of, there are people of Irish, Chinese, Korean, Argentinian, Italian, Ecuadorian, Mexican, African-American, Polish, Filipino, and Japanese heritage. I listen as all of these people work to learn English, and I watch as their children become more and more a part of a world that they will never fully belong to. I have all of these neighbors, all of us so close to one another, but our neighborhood is pretty much the only thing that we all share. This raises the question: how truthful is the geographic idea of a community?

Jones-Correa offers two opposing views of what “community” means by focusing on Jackson Heights. To the older white residents, who he calls “white ethnics,” communities are well-defined areas enclosed by recognized borders. They assign certain characteristics and values to each neighborhood.

To Hispanic immigrants, community refers to the social community shared between them. Even though they come from different countries, they bond through their shared language and experiences. To them, the borders between neighborhoods are not so important.

Jones-Correa cites Roosevelt Ave. as a recognized border between Jackson Heights and Elmhurst. This street, which runs under the 7 line, is a highly concentrated strip of Hispanic stores and restaurants. He writes that the entire reason that this street developed the way it did was because the white ethnics pushed the new immigrants to the edges of town, and they avoided it because they associated it with crime.

Since then, Roosevelt Ave. has commercialized somewhat, and is not regarded as being so “dirty” as it used to be. It is still a main street in the area for Hispanics merchants and businesses. The concentration of Hispanics along this street eventually pushed into the rest of Elmhurst and Jackson Heights as more and more white people left. In Jackson Heights, they now make up the plurality of the population.

The year after Jones-Correa’s book was published, a section of Jackson Heights was granted historical status. In this chapter, he wrote about how it was an attempt for the whites to hold onto some power over land usage. The next year, they succeeded. How successful was this move, however? Though the buildings granted historical status are typically controlled by whites, Hispanics have moved further into all other parts of the neighborhood and their numbers are still on the rise.

Overall, I believe that some of the tension between the white ethnics and Hispanics has calmed. It may either be that there are too few whites left to protest, or that they recognize that they are outnumbered, but within the past 15 years, the Hispanic push into Jackson Heights has been relentless and mostly uncontested. This has been true of the region for several decades now, and the dynamics we see in these neighborhoods are changing everyday. At the same time, we can recognize this as the normal story of Queens, the immigrant’s landing spot. Some things just don’t change.

Michael Jones-Correa’s “Intimate Strangers: Immigration to Queens,” discusses the dichotomy between white ethnics and Latin Americans in Jackson Heights, Queens. Jones-Correra makes several points differentiating the mentalities and following actions of the disparate groups, but one specific point took hold of my attention: the idea of “community.”

The white ethics of Jackson Heights viewed community as a “neighborhood..with its boundaries…that are forever fixed, even as they feel ‘their’ neighborhoods changing.” The inhabitants of a true community personally know each other and interact on a regular basis. Further, the white ethics of Jackson Heights view community as an enclosure of space; they regard the “physical structure of the neighborhood…as the community.”

Latin-Americans, on the contrary, hold a different view of what a community encompasses. Jones-Correa uses the term “geography of memory” to explain the Latino’s relationship with the space in which they reside. It is almost as if Latin Americans have dual identities; one part of their identity resides in the community of their home countries, while another resides in the U.S. Simultaneously, it is their memory of the geography back home that shapes their experience of community in the U.S. Therefore, the identity of the Latin American is not inextricably linked to tangible space.

The two different definitions of “community” set out by the white ethics and Latin Americans of Jackson Heights prompted me to think about my own community, and, more specifically, my family. My parents are both immigrants, my mother from Guyana and my father from Turkey. We reside in College Point, Queens, which is not similar to Jackson Heights in terms of Latin American ethnic concentration. College Point, in the past few years, has increasingly become populated with Asian Americans, so my family is an outlier of sorts in the community in which we have lived in for nearly twenty years. Personally, I can relate to the Latin-American’s view of “community.” My parents have brought with them, from their home countries, ideas of their own communities. We cook food from both cultures, and shop at grocery stores that carry our specific brand of Chai   tea that isn’t available in any of the mainstream American grocery stores, or the recently opened Korean Supermarket that’s a five minute drive away. My family’s sense of community lies largely in where our culture is–be it Richmond Hill or Astoria; it is in these two areas that Guyanese and Turkish culture are largely concentrated in. Simply residing in an area (geography) does not create a sense of community, especially if there are not people of similar descent nearby. “Community,” to me, is where one’s culture is.