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1. Transformation of Small-Town America
- Temple University Press
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1 Transformation of Small-Town America Change there will be . . . For he who rejects change is the architect of decay. The only human institution which rejects progress is the cemetery. —British Prime Minister Harold Wilson D riving into Perry, Iowa, one finds a quintessential American small town. There are the nicely mowed lawns, picket fences, and turn-of-the-century homes, many of which have been recently restored. There is the high school at the edge of town, with its Friday night football games where one can get the local delicacy: pork chop on a stick.1 Heading into downtown Perry, the Carnegie library sits across the street from City Hall and a restored boutique hotel. Turning off the main drag on Willis Avenue and onto Second Street, one notices more small-town must-haves: a variety store, a locally owned bank, an old-fashioned ice cream shop, and a three-screen movie theater. At first glance, travelers would think they had been dropped into any typical small, Midwestern town—until, that is, they look a little closer. Across the street from the Benjamin Franklin variety store sits Restaurante El Buen Gusto, an authentic El Salvadoran pupuseria. A few blocks down, one can wander into the Panaderia Mexican bakery for pastries or a bottle of Jarritos strawberry soda, or stop in for lunch at Casa de Oro, a Mexican restaurant on the same block. Drive past St. Patrick’s church and it is hard to miss the sign listing three weekly services in English and two in Spanish. For those who grew up in small towns in the Midwest and South, this picture is incongruent with our childhood memories. Since the early 1990s Perry, a town with fewer than 10,000 people, has become home to many immigrants from Latin America. Along with dozens of other communities in the Midwest, this town has undergone a significant transformation in the last twenty years. Rural communities in the Midwest are no longer seas of white faces with German and Scandinavian surnames. First- and 12 Chapter 1 second-generation immigrants from Latin America and Southeast Asia have migrated to small towns, drawn by low-skill jobs and in search of new permanent homes for their families. Communities where “everyone knows your name” have had to adapt to newcomers who look and speak differently from those who have lived there for generations. These communities can be seen as microcosms of ethnic changes taking place in the United States as a whole. More important to the residents of the communities themselves, however, is that they are some of the few small towns in rural areas escaping the risk of becoming ghost towns. This study examines the effect of immigration into small towns in the Midwest—in particular, its effects on political socialization. How have rapidly changing demographics in formerly homogeneous communities affected the political attitudes and inclinations of young people? Are young people “architects of decay,” angry about the changes in their communities and prejudiced toward their new neighbors? Or are they generally accepting, even welcoming, of this transformation? This chapter examines the demographic changes in rural America and the initial changes in Perry and Storm Lake, Iowa. Immigration in Rural America For most of the twentieth century, immigrant gateways were in urban areas. In fact, from 1971 to 1993, nearly half of all immigrants went to five U.S. cities: New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, and Miami.2 Starting in the late 1980s, but picking up dramatically in the 1990s, immigrants began to head toward entirely new destinations, including the rural Midwest. Scholars argue that both “push” and “pull” factors are responsible for this migration.3 On the push side of things, several factors converged to precipitate movement to new gateways, including a profound economic crisis in Mexico, pushing out many of those who were not too poor to afford to leave.4 Similar economic and political crises in other parts of the world have served to push immigrants and refugees to seek a better life in the United States. Within the United States, other forces shaped where these immigrants would end up. Sociologists refer to the “context of reception” as determining migration flows and immigrant incorporation in the host country. The context of reception includes the interaction of the following elements: (1) the condition of the host labor market; (2) government policies (both national and local); (3) the resources of the existing co-ethnic community; and (4) the response of the native...