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Reviewed by:
  • New Faces at the Crossroads: The World in Central Indiana
  • Cathy Cade
New Faces at the Crossroads: The World in Central Indiana. By John Sherman. Photographs and interviews by Jeffrey A. Wolin. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007. 93 pp. Hardbound, $29.95.

With issues of immigration threatening to become the community and individual moral challenge that civil rights and Black Freedom were in the 1960s, New Faces at the Crossroads could not be more timely.

At first glance, a large format "coffee-table" book, New Faces uses visuals and text to present a great deal of information and to open up the mind of readers to the big picture of immigration. From the haunting endpapers of a world map in shadowy black with countries of origin in red to the thirty beautifully reproduced, full-page portraits, to the small map with each portrait, visual images pull the reader in and expand the reader's consciousness. The great diversity of images by race, ethnic group, country of origin, sex, age, and job/profession open the reader's mind.

Though published by the Indiana University Press, this is not an academic book. Funded by the Indianapolis Foundation, the Arts Council of Indianapolis, Eli Lilly, and Citizens Gas, New Faces presents the positive impact of immigration. Brian Payne of the Central Indiana Community Foundation, in the forward section of the book writes of, "The energy and innovation that come from different ethnic experiences" (vi). John Sherman writes of the social and economic impact of recent immigration states, "the increase in sales, income, and Social Security taxes, even from those who are undocumented immigrants …" (9).

In a sidebar listing the "Major International Needs for Indianapolis", listed first is "Acclimation of immigrants into American Culture" followed by "Awareness … that we are part of a global economy." In regard to the former, the reader learns of a grassroots program where immigrants are supported to in turn provide support to new arrivals from their home country (13).

Sherman includes an extended description of the various immigrant ethnic communities. Referring to the earlier immigration history of Indiana, he reminds us that most of us have an immigration history in our background whether we know much about it or not. He also includes an interesting description of the increase and return of Native Americans to Indiana, countering the myth that all Native Americans are long gone.

But the heart and soul of the book is in the oral history interviews accompanying each portrait and done by the photographer Jeffery A. Wolin. We hear the stories [End Page 208] of why they left their homes and how they came to Indiana. We meet Nguntin Tiel, a twenty-two-year-old immigrant from Burma whose father, a member of the Burmese parliament and threatened by the military takeover, became a factory worker in Indiana. We learn of the continuing class variations of her life as she works as a computer drafter, loses her job after September 11, and her current job as operations supervisor at La Quinta Inn.

Yaba Friday Harris, born in Liberia in 1972, is photographed sitting on his shoeshine stand, reminiscent of a 1970s Black Panther's image. But when we read his story of living in the Ivory Coast and being arrested for harboring Liberian rebels we hear him tell himself: "You shouldn't be afraid. I know I don't have any evil in me." His piece ends with him living in Indianapolis "waiting for the immigration people to tell me if they'll accept my family. My wife and five kids are still in the Ivory Coast, waiting" (23). Edita Ubartaite is a Project Manager for Indiana Economic Development Corporation, an immigrant from Lithuania. She speaks, as do many, of finding the balance of keeping her sense of self and blending in.

The oral history interviews are powerful, amazingly so given their brevity. However, there is no information as to how Wolin collected the interviews, what questions he asked, only that they were done by the photographer. I imagine that there were few and simple questions: "Tell me about your life in your home country and how you came to Indiana." But as...

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