Islands in the City: West Indian Migration to New York

Introduction. West Indian Migration to New York: An Overview

INTRODUCTION West Indian Migration to New York An Overview Nancy Foner The past four decades have witnessed a massive West Indian migration to New York. The influx—the largest emigration flow in West Indian history— has had enormous consequences for the lives of individual migrants as well as for the societies they have left behind and the city they have entered. This collection of original essays explores the effects of West Indian migration, puts forward analytic frameworks to aid in understanding it, and points to areas for further research. The focus of the book is on migrants from the nations of the former British Caribbean, who share a heritage of British colonialism, Creole culture, and linguistic background. The location is New York—the most significant destination, by far, for Caribbean immigrants in the United States. Since 1965 more than half a million West Indians have moved to New York City—about twice the size of the population of the island of Barbados and five times the size of Grenada. If one puts together all the migrants from the Anglophone Caribbean, West Indians are the largest immigrant group in New York City. More and more, New York’s black population is becoming Caribbeanized. By 1998, according to Current Population Survey estimates, almost a third of New York City’s black population was foreign born, the vast majority West Indian. Adding the second generation , census estimates suggest that roughly two-fifths of the city’s black residents trace their origins to the West Indies. The dense concentrations of West Indians in certain sections of the city have created neighborhoods with a distinct Caribbean flavor. As Milton Vickerman has recently noted, West Indian New Yorkers are more likely to go to Flatbush Avenue to develop a sense of West Indian ethnicity than to Kingston or Port of Spain.1 In the context of the near record-breaking immigration to the United States, West Indians represent a particularly fascinating case. Because they  are, in American racial terms, overwhelmingly black, West Indians bring to the fore the critical role of race in the U.S. immigrant experience. Because many West Indian migrants remain closely tied to their home societies, they highlight the role of transnational processes and practices. And because West Indian migration to New York has a long history, analysis of the city’s West Indian community is able to shed light on what is new about contemporary patterns. In providing a broad view of West Indian migration to New York, the chapters in Islands in the City draw on a variety of theoretical perspectives, empirical data, and methodologies. Sociologists studying West Indian migration have generally focused on immigrant incorporation and issues of identity, historians have often looked at relations between black Americans and West Indians, and anthropologists have been primarily concerned with transnational processes and cultural shifts in the United States. This volume—with authors from the fields of anthropology, history, political science, and sociology—brings together the different approaches. It includes studies of the past as well as the present, analyses of transnational connections as well as modes of immigrant incorporation, comparisons of the first and second generations, and discussions of political socialization as well as economic integration. A wide variety of methods are involved, including archival research, participant observation and in-depth interviews, and quantitative analyses of census materials. A central question is how West Indian arrivals have been transforming New York as they settle and form communities in the city. West Indians are also changing, and being changed by, New York’s system of race and ethnic relations. In the contemporary era, what kinds of racial and ethnic identities have emerged among the first generation—and are developing among the second generation? Are members of the second generation assimilating into the African American population? Is the presence of hundreds of thousands of West Indians playing a role in altering American racial conceptions? Also at issue is the question of transnational practices. What kinds of ties do West Indians maintain to their home societies? What consequences do transnational links have for West Indians at home and abroad? And how should we conceptualize the ties between New York West Indians and their compatriots in other receiving societies such as Britain and Canada? As the chapters explore the West Indian migrant experience, they shed new light on a number of broad cultural and social processes. Among them are the nature and impact of transnational connections, the dynamics of segmented assimilation , the...