Urban Villagers: Group and Class in the Life of Italian-Americans

I was pleased with the amount of information found in this informative book. I already knew about the Italian aspect of the Boston area, but I was surprised to read the extensive research in the "Urban" text. This is a great piece of work for all sociology courses. it is definitely a classic in the field of social development.

I enjoyed the beginning of this book but I got bored and never finished it

During the early 1970's, I lived Philadelphia. Working class communities in South Philadelphia were ethnically and religiously homogeneous, quite parochial places where "working class" had not yet become coterminous with "working poor." It was commonplace for close relatives to occupy row houses next to each other.I now live in West Virginia, where rural neighborhoods are commonplace. Frequently, such neighborhoods are organized around a collection of extended families. Distances among the homes which make up the neighborhood may be substantial, thereby making informal dropping-in less convenient than in a town or city. Nevertheless, even though contacts among like-minded West Virginian's may be comparatively infrequent, when they occur the are based on the accurate presumption that participants have lived similar lives, think alike, see the world in the same way, and can deftly and unself-consciously take the role of the other.Herbert Gans' classic The Urban Villagers provides another look at the concept neighborhood. Much as in South Philadelphia, the Urban Villagers were close-knit groups of Italian families who lived working class lives. In the case of the Urban Villagers, however, the large, unattractive buildings they occupied made it easy for an outsider to mistake a community for an impoverished ghetto. One consequence of this is that the Urban Village no longer exists: relegated by city and federal officials to the status of a slum, it fell victim to urban renewal, and was bulldozed to make room for upscale apartment buildings.The Urban Villagers is a fascinating book that shows how ethnography should be done. It also enables us to see that neighborhoods, from time to time and place to place, take many forms. Surely, a resident of Boston or Philadelphia driving down Route 10 in West Virginia would not recognize a neighborhood if he or she saw one. Proponents of urban renewal made the same mistake in Boston.

I love the book, it’s the quality of the book that’s disappointing.I owned a book back in the 70’s when going to college that puts this one to shameThis pictures are poor. They’re reproduced on plain cheap paper instead of glossy paper and extremely dark.

Excellent!

Gans's Urban Villagers: Group and Class in the Life of Italian-Americans is a no nonsense field study of the Italians of Boston's West End and conditions in which they lived.

Gefallen hat die systematische Darstellung von Milieu, Gruppenzugehörigkeit und Verhalten von Einwanderern. Erfahrensbereich ist das städtische Umfeld Bostons in den 50er-60er Jahren. Wir können dort Anhaltspunkte finden, für die Integration von Migranten in deutsche Städte heutzutage. Natürlich ist die Lage derzeit in Deutschland und Europa insgesamt nicht unmittelbar vergleichbar. Auch haben wir in Deutschland eigene Erfahrungen seit Beginn der Industrialisierung, Flüchlingszuzügen nach dem 2. Weltkrieg bis hin zu Gastarbeiterzuwanderung. Gleichwohl gibt es analog soziale Grunderfahrungen im Kollektiv und individuell. Diese gilt es zu erkennen und für die Gestaltung der Integration von Migranten in Gegenwart und Zukunft nutzbar zu machen. Insofern ist "The Urban Villagers" für den Erkenntnisprozess sehr wichtig.

This book was advertised as "used, good" by the seller. It was sent with the first 14 pages of the preface missing. Also missing were all introductory pages including publisher information. The cover had come completely away from the binding and the pages had split into three blocks making it impossible to read without loosening individual pages. 2 further pages had fallen out of the book. Further, the front cover was all but torn completely from the spine and back cover.The product description was completely dishonest and I will now have to repurchase the book for my reference library.