Ethnic history
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Ethnic history is a branch of social history that studies ethnic groups and immigrants. Barkan (2007) argues that the field allows historians to use alternate models of interpretation, unite qualitative and quantitative data, apply sociological models to historical patterns, examine more deeply macro-level policies and decisions, and, especially, empathize with the ethnic groups under study.


Defining the field

Ethnic history is especially important in the U.S. and Canada.
Oscar Handlin Oscar Handlin (1915–2011) was an American historian. As a professor of history at Harvard University for over 50 years, he directed 80 PhD dissertations and helped promote social and ethnic history, virtually inventing the field of immigration ...
(b. 1915), the director of scores of PhD dissertations at Harvard University was an important pioneer and sponsor of ethnic historiography. Handlin's Pulitzer-prize-winning interpretation, ''
The Uprooted ''The Uprooted: The Epic Story of the Great Migrations That Made the American People'' is book about European migrations into the United States by Oscar Handlin. It won the Pulitzer Prize for History The Pulitzer Prize for History, administered ...
'' (1951) was highly influential. Major encyclopedias have helped define the field; Handlin sponsored one published by Harvard University Press in 1980 that received wide media attention because it tied in with an American interest in their roots. Perin (1983) looks at the historiography of Canadian ethnic history and finds two alternative methodologies. One is more static and emphasizes how closely immigrant cultures replicate the Old World. This approach tends to be filiopietistic. The alternative approach has been influenced by the recent historiography on labor, urban, and family history. It sees the immigrant community as an essentially North American phenomenon and integrates it into the mainstream of Canadian culture. McDonald (2007) identifies five main areas of interest for scholarship on U.S. ethnic history: the origins and meaning of ethnicity, particularly the issue of whether it is inherited or invented; the origins of ethnic diversity (such as conquest, immigration, involuntary migration); models of ethnic adaptation (especially the Melting Pot,
mosaic A mosaic is a pattern or image made of small regular or irregular pieces of colored stone, glass or ceramic, held in place by plaster/mortar, and covering a surface. Mosaics are often used as floor and wall decoration, and were particularly pop ...
,
salad bowl A salad bowl is a serving dish for salad. It can also refer to: * Salad bowl (cultural idea), a cultural idea referring to the United States * Salad Bowl (game), a defunct, annual, post-season college football bowl game * Salad Bowl strike, a seri ...
and kaleidoscope metaphors); ethnic incorporation into the social, economic, and political fabric of the receiving country; and minority group survival strategies, including responses to competing forms of allegiance like class and gender. Much research is done by reading the letters immigrants wrote to relatives back home, often comparing the advantages and disadvantages of their new lives. A significant trend has been to integrate ethnic history with other new historiographical tendencies, such as
Atlantic history Atlantic history is a specialty field in history that studies the Atlantic World in the early modern period. The Atlantic World was created by the discovery of a new land by Europeans, and Atlantic History is the study of that world. It is p ...
,
labor history Labor history or labour history is a sub-discipline of social history which specialises on the history of the working classes and the labor movement. Labor historians may concern themselves with issues of gender, race, ethnicity, and other fac ...
or
women's history Women's history is the study of the role that women have played in history and the methods required to do so. It includes the study of the history of the growth of woman's rights throughout recorded history, personal achievement over a period of ...
.


Organizations

The Immigration and Ethnic History Society was formed in 1965 and publishes a journal for libraries and its 829 members. *The American Conference for Irish Studies, founded in 1960, has 1,700 members and has occasional publications but no journal. * The American Italian Historical Association was founded in 1966 and has 400 members; it does not publish a journal *The
American Jewish Historical Society The American Jewish Historical Society (AJHS) was founded in 1892 with the mission to foster awareness and appreciation of American Jewish history and to serve as a national scholarly resource for research through the collection, preservation an ...
is the oldest ethnic society, founded in 1892; it has 3,300 members and publishes ''American Jewish History'' * The Polish American Historical Association was founded in 1942, and publishes a newsletter and ''Polish American Studies,'' an interdisciplinary, refereed scholarly journal twice each year. * H-ETHNIC is a daily discussion list founded in 1993 with 1400 members; it covers topics of ethnicity and migration globally.se
H-ETHNIC website
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See also

*
Emigration from Europe European emigration is the successive emigration waves from the European continent to other continents. The origins of the various European diasporas can be traced to the people who left the European nation states or stateless ethnic communities ...
** European American **
White Latin American White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White on ...
*
Ethnic groups in the Middle East The ethnic groups in the Middle East in the transcontinental region commonly known with its geopolitical term; the Middle East. The region has historically been a crossroad of different cultures and languages. Since the 1960s, the changes in poli ...
*
Historical immigration to Great Britain The historical immigration to Great Britain concerns the movement of people, cultural and ethnic groups to the British Isles before Irish independence in 1922. Immigration after Irish independence is dealt with by the article Immigration to the ...
**
Immigration to the United Kingdom since 1922 Since 1945, immigration to the United Kingdom, controlled by British immigration law and to an extent by British nationality law, has been significant, in particular from the Republic of Ireland and from the former British Empire, especially ...
*
Immigration to Argentina Immigration to Argentina began in several millennia BCE with the arrival of different populations from Asia to the Americas through Beringia, according to the most accepted theories, and were slowly populating the Americas. Upon arrival of ...
*
Immigration to Australia The Australian continent was first settled when ancestors of Indigenous Australians arrived via the islands of Maritime Southeast Asia and New Guinea over 50,000 years ago. European colonisation began in 1788 with the establishment of a ...
*
Immigration to Brazil Immigration to Brazil is the movement to Brazil of foreign peoples to reside permanently. It should not be confused with the colonization of the country by the Portuguese, or with the forcible bringing of people from Africa as slaves. Latin ...
*
Immigration to Canada According to the 2021 Canadian census, immigrants in Canada number 8.3 million persons and make up approximately 23 percent of Canada's total population. This represents the eighth-largest immigrant population in the world, while the proport ...
*
Immigration to Europe Immigration to Europe has a long history, but increased substantially in the later 20th century. Western Europe countries, especially, saw high growth in immigration after World War II and many European nations today (particularly those of the EU- ...
*
Immigration to the United States Immigration has been a major source of population growth and cultural change throughout much of the history of the United States. In absolute numbers, the United States has a larger immigrant population than any other country in the worl ...
* Languages of Europe * List of ethnic groups * Carl Frederick Wittke *
Oscar Handlin Oscar Handlin (1915–2011) was an American historian. As a professor of history at Harvard University for over 50 years, he directed 80 PhD dissertations and helped promote social and ethnic history, virtually inventing the field of immigration ...
* Theodore C. Blegen


Notes


Bibliography

* Barkan, Elliott R. "Changing Borders, Moving Boundaries: Lessons from Thirty-five Years of Interdisciplinary and Multi-ethnic Research," ''Journal of American Ethnic History,'' Jan 2007, Vol. 26 Issue 2, pp 85–99 * Gabaccia, Donna R. and Ruiz, Vicki L., eds. '' American Dreaming, Global Realities: Rethinking U.S. Immigration History'' (2006) * Glazier, Michael, ed. ''The Encyclopedia of the Irish in America'' (1999), articles by over 200 experts, covering both Catholics and Protestants. * Hoerder, Dirk. "Ethnic studies in Canada from the 1880s to 1962: A historiographical perspective and critique," ''Canadian Ethnic Studies,'' 1994, Vol. 26 Issue 1, pp 1–18 * Levinson, David. ''Ethnic Groups Worldwide: A Ready Reference Handbook,'' (1998), * McDonald, Jason. ''American Ethnic History: Themes and Perspectives''. (2007)

* Magocsi, Paul Robert, ed. ''Encyclopedia of Canada's Peoples'' (1999), comprehensive scholarly guide to nearly all ethnic groups * Minahan, James. ''One Europe, many nations: a historical dictionary of European national groups'' (2000), * Øverland, Orm, ed. ''Not English Only: Redefining “American” in American Studies'' (Amsterdam: VU University Press, 2001). 202 pp. * Palmer, Howard. "Canadian Immigration and Ethnic History in the 1970s and 1980s," ''International Migration Review,'' Fall 1981, Vol. 15 Issue 3, pp 471–501 * Stephan Thernstrom, Thernstrom, Stephan; Orlov, Ann; Handlin, Oscar, eds.
Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups''
Harvard University Press. {{isbn, 0674375122. Social history Fields of history