East Village and Bay Ridge

From Decoding New York

East Village. Mural on Avenue C, Loisaida area. Photo by Julian Joiris

"The East Village is one of the hippest and edgiest areas in the city, full of bohemians, starving artists, hippies, musicians and other creative types."
-Straits Times, Singapore

"Ethnically, Bay Ridge has an unusual diversity. It's a small enclave of old-school republican conservatism in one of America's most liberal cities, which also means that it's conspicuously Caucasian (for NYC). At the same time it's one of the most diverse neighborhoods in the city, most recently with a heavy influx of middle class Arabs, Russians and Asians."
-"What's Bay Ridge?" at www.brooklynrowhouse.com

The East Village and Bay Ridge offer excellent examples of the myriad forces that shape New York's diverse neighborhoods. Both show the impact of the great waves of immigration of the 19th century, notably the Germans, Irish, Italians, and Eastern European Jews. Both have seen successive ethnic groups assimilate into the larger "American" New York culture, leaving behind traces in the form of ethnic stores, restaurants, and religious institutions; they have, however, played different roles to New York's immigrant community at different points in history. Toward the turn of the 20th century, the East Village was part of the working-class Lower East Side, and Bay Ridge was a resort community for more affluent New Yorkers; now, the East Village is one of the trendiest neighborhoods in the city, while Bay Ridge is holding out as a largely working-class polyethnic enclave.

Both neighborhoods, in short, are a testament to the incredible variation within New York's famed diversity- examples not only of the huge variety of ethnic groups, cultural institutions, and trans-national histories that make up this city, but of how differently all these factors can interact in different areas.

The section on the East Village and Bay Ridge was developed by Sasha Fahme, Julian Joiris, Tahra Seplowin and Alena Svyatova.