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From Diversity to Unity: Southern and Appalachian Migrants in Uptown Chicago, 1950-1970
From Diversity to Unity is a community study of settlement and adaptation of Southern and Appalachian migrants to the neighborhood of Uptown Chicago. Oral histories, community newspapers, and secondary sources reveal the human experience of urban migration. Following the postwar collapse of the coal industry, Appalachian migration to northern cities increased significantly. Guy examines this migration, placing particular emphasis on the role of women in the settlement of the migrants in a new place. From Diversity to Unity fills a valuable niche in urban and Appalachian history and is ideal for scholars and students of urban and Chicago history as well as Appalachian and ethnic studies.
- GenresNonfiction
140 pages, Hardcover
First published September 28, 2007
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
September 5, 2013
First, a disclaimer: I have lived in Uptown for over 30 years, know Roger well, and know virtually everyone Roger interviewed.
The story Roger tells is an important one: how white southerner a came north, founded a community in the Uptown neighborhood of Chicago, and battled against prejudice, deindustrialization, police harassment, and gentrification. So, I really wanted to like this book--but I didn't.
On the most basic level, this book desperately needed an editor. This was Roger's dissertation, so it wasn't written for the general public, and didn't go through the normal publishing house process. Nonetheless, the huge number of dropped words, incomplete sentences, and repetition of the same anecdote strongly suggests that someone needed to give this a good read through with a red pencil before the galleys were set.
But I could have ignored all that.,the real problem is that he never really came to grips with this neighborhood, and the people he was writing about. Roger suffered from the sociologists disease--projecting your world view on the people and social structures you are observing, rather than truly trying to understand the world from their perspective.
The people of Uptown did not face discrimination because they were culturally backward. They were not culturally backward; they were poor. they were hard workers--first in the mines, then in steel mills and factories. while it lasted, these were good jobs, paying a decent wage. but the mines mechanized, and the factories moved out of the cities. Southern white immigrants who ended up in Uptown, like millions of other immigrants, in Uptown, and across America, were victims of deindustrialization coupled with the rising political influence of finance and the decline of organized labor. This is why they were displaced from the south. This is why they were attacked in Uptown. In both cases, they were sitting on valuable land, and weren't needed as labor.
The people of Uptown did not develop a culture of organized resistance because of Clement Stone funding the Chicago Southern Center and adopting Stone's "Positive Mental Attitude" program. They did not develop a culture of resistance because the SDS came to the neighborhood. Their capacity for resistance was already there. They formed the backbone of organized labor in the country through the UMW in the coal mines. They built on this strong long history of organizing, coupled it with deep ties to family and friends, and made a stand in Uptown for life with dignity.
This story is buried in the interviews Roger did for this book. It comes through when he lets people speak for themselves. But this truth is buried under Roger's sociological overlay. Maybe this is what you need to do to get a PhD, but the true story of the battle for Uptown remains untold.
The story Roger tells is an important one: how white southerner a came north, founded a community in the Uptown neighborhood of Chicago, and battled against prejudice, deindustrialization, police harassment, and gentrification. So, I really wanted to like this book--but I didn't.
On the most basic level, this book desperately needed an editor. This was Roger's dissertation, so it wasn't written for the general public, and didn't go through the normal publishing house process. Nonetheless, the huge number of dropped words, incomplete sentences, and repetition of the same anecdote strongly suggests that someone needed to give this a good read through with a red pencil before the galleys were set.
But I could have ignored all that.,the real problem is that he never really came to grips with this neighborhood, and the people he was writing about. Roger suffered from the sociologists disease--projecting your world view on the people and social structures you are observing, rather than truly trying to understand the world from their perspective.
The people of Uptown did not face discrimination because they were culturally backward. They were not culturally backward; they were poor. they were hard workers--first in the mines, then in steel mills and factories. while it lasted, these were good jobs, paying a decent wage. but the mines mechanized, and the factories moved out of the cities. Southern white immigrants who ended up in Uptown, like millions of other immigrants, in Uptown, and across America, were victims of deindustrialization coupled with the rising political influence of finance and the decline of organized labor. This is why they were displaced from the south. This is why they were attacked in Uptown. In both cases, they were sitting on valuable land, and weren't needed as labor.
The people of Uptown did not develop a culture of organized resistance because of Clement Stone funding the Chicago Southern Center and adopting Stone's "Positive Mental Attitude" program. They did not develop a culture of resistance because the SDS came to the neighborhood. Their capacity for resistance was already there. They formed the backbone of organized labor in the country through the UMW in the coal mines. They built on this strong long history of organizing, coupled it with deep ties to family and friends, and made a stand in Uptown for life with dignity.
This story is buried in the interviews Roger did for this book. It comes through when he lets people speak for themselves. But this truth is buried under Roger's sociological overlay. Maybe this is what you need to do to get a PhD, but the true story of the battle for Uptown remains untold.
May 21, 2012
I am so happy that I found this book! My parents moved to Uptown from Eastern Kentucky during the time period that this book covers. I was born and raised in Chicago and know the neighborhood of Uptown very well. I can see that this author either lived in Uptown or spent a lot of time there. His descriptions of the people sound like my parents talking about the neighborhood to me. It is so accurate that I hope that someone will use this book as the basis of a movie someday.
September 27, 2013
I loved reading this book. The people in the book tell the story of my mom coming from West Virginia to Uptown. I remember her stories when I was young. I wish that she could have been in this book. I like how it begins in the South and shows life there, and then talks about the neighborhood and all that happened. Many of the interviews were with women. I liked that too. They did a lot to survive in Uptown and put up with a lot. It shows that really well. Bottom line, the book and the people are real. It is meant for those that lived the life then, and people who want to see what it was like.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews