“Every man lives in his neighborhood, and beyond his home and his job. To most men, except in the largest cities, the municipality is interpreted in terms of his neighborhood. Few men get beyond this except through occasional excursions into the larger world. America is a country of parallel neighborhoods; the native American in one section and the immigrant in another. Americanization is the elimination of the parallel line. So long as the American thinks that a house in his street is too good for his immigrant neighbor and tolerates discriminations in sanitation, housing, and enforcement of municipal laws, he can serve on all Americanization Committees that exist and still fail in his efforts.”

— Frances Kellor

What is Americanization? (1919)
Context: Every man lives in his neighborhood, and beyond his home and his job. To most men, except in the largest cities, the municipality is interpreted in terms of his neighborhood. Few men get beyond this except through occasional excursions into the larger world. America is a country of parallel neighborhoods; the native American in one section and the immigrant in another. Americanization is the elimination of the parallel line. So long as the American thinks that a house in his street is too good for his immigrant neighbor and tolerates discriminations in sanitation, housing, and enforcement of municipal laws, he can serve on all Americanization Committees that exist and still fail in his efforts. The immigrant neighborhood is often made up of people who have come from one province in the old country. Inevitably the culture of that neighborhood will be that of the old country; its language will persist and its traditions will flourish. It is not that we undervalue these, or desire to discredit them. But separated from the land and surroundings that gave them birth, from the history that cherishes them, they do not remain the strong, beautiful things they were on the other side. These aliens may retain some of the form of culture of the land of their birth long after its spirit has departed or has lost its savor in a new atmosphere. New opportunities, strange conditions, unforeseen adjustments, necessary sacrifices, and forces unseen and not understood affect the immigrant and his life here, and unless this culture is connected and fused with that of the new world, it loses its vitality or becomes corrupt.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Every man lives in his neighborhood, and beyond his home and his job. To most men, except in the largest cities, the mu…" by Frances Kellor?

Frances Kellor 37

American sociologist 1873–1952

Related quotes

“For this reason neighborhoods should be American and a combination of the best of all the races that live in them. It is here that the school can become the conference center and the council chamber. It is the one American institution to be found in every town free, neutral, and powerful. During the daytime it has the children who can interpret it; during the evening it may have the parents who need it for their community expression. From the schoolhouse come the beliefs that living conditions should be decent, that laws should be enforced for all alike, that there should be no racial discriminations. From participation in neighborhood activities and in governing their own communities, the immigrant will grow into the larger responsibilities of State and nation. In order that American political ideals should be understood by him, they must be lived within his consciousness, in the small radius of his neighborhood, and in that way he must see exemplified whatever American literature, art, music, and science have to give.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

“Americanization, finally, is not any one of these things alone. There may be a home stake, and in the absence of identity of economic interest, it may fail. All other elements may be present, but if the court fails, the immigrant turns away. Americanization is the bringing to bear in the life of every stranger who enters the country, the sum total of American ideals in his home, in the shop, in the neighborhood, and in the legislatures and courts. The native-born American is the keeper of these ideals. His is the spirit that will maintain the free and strong institutions of America. His reception of the immigrant and the contacts he makes with him in large measure determine the immigrant's understanding of America and his reaction towards it. It is here that we enter the field of the science of racial relations. No effective program can be made until we set our own house in order, until we attain the right attitude individually, and until we equip ourselves with the necessary information to give us the right approach to the many races who are among us but not of us, whose faces, regardless of the high wages, the luxuries, and the freedom of America, are set towards the east.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

“In my Cabinet at the time there were men of English and French, German, Irish, and Dutch blood, men born on this side and men born in Germany and Scotland; but they were all Americans and nothing else; and every one of them was incapable of thinking of himself or of his fellow-countrymen, excepting in terms of American citizenship.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

1910s, Address to the Knights of Columbus (1915)
Context: In my Cabinet at the time there were men of English and French, German, Irish, and Dutch blood, men born on this side and men born in Germany and Scotland; but they were all Americans and nothing else; and every one of them was incapable of thinking of himself or of his fellow-countrymen, excepting in terms of American citizenship. If any one of them had anything in the nature of a dual or divided allegiance in his soul, he never would have been appointed to serve under me, and he would have been instantly removed when the discovery was made. There wasn't one of them who was capable of desiring that the policy of the United States should be shaped with reference to the interests of any foreign country or with consideration for anything, outside of the general welfare of humanity, save the honor and interest of the United States, and each was incapable of making any discrimination whatsoever among the citizens of the country he served, of our common country, save discrimination based on conduct and on conduct alone.

“Americanization is the process, then, of guaranteeing these fundamental requisites to each man, native and foreign-born alike, and just in proportion as the English language and citizenship interpret these requisites, they are Americanization agencies. The failure of Americanization in the past years is identical with the failure of these guarantees. It is in the home, the shop, the neighborhood, the church, and the court that Americanization is wrought, and the mutual relations of races in America as expressed in them will give the eternal principles of race assimilation that we seek.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

Today these basic points are disregarded and it is thought that committees and community councils piled high upon one another will do the work. The chief value of most of such organizations is in educating the native-born American; there is abundant evidence that the foreign-born adult is not greatly drawn to this country as a result of them.
What is Americanization? (1919)

“The immigrant looks to us to exemplify our Constitution and our ideals, and in his heart he respects us less for not maintaining our own standards for all people alike. So long as we fail to realize that the desire for education, for the opportunity to worship, for fellowship, and for community service are big factors in men's lives, we shall not reach the basis of Americanization, especially in the small industrial towns now coming into new life throughout the country by the rearrangement of industries through government contracts. Neighborhood Americanization means the opportunity of each individual citizen to establish personal sympathetic relations. It is mutual cooperation in neighborhood affairs. It is the development of the school. as a community center. It is the neutral ground upon which men meet in recreation, in social relationships, and in intellectual debate.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

“Between the lines it must have hurt
To see the neighborhood go down,
Your neighbor in his undershirt
At dusk come out to mow his lawn.”

Donald Justice (1925–2004) Poet, teacher

To the Unknown Lady Who Wrote the Letters Found In the Hatbox
Night Light (1967)

“The most moving appeal from the greatest of orators, the most beautifully written declaration of rights, the finest interpretation of American ideals by any living American finds the immigrant unresponsive if he has suffered injustice, if he has been denied a hearing, or if he has failed to see realized in the land of his dreams the things for which he left his native land. He forgives the man who has wronged him; he never forgets the government that has failed him. The law which was passed in one of the States prohibiting an alien from owning a dog, the enforcement of which resulted in deception and lying, has done much to imperil the immigrant's faith in the justice of American ideals. It reached his heart and his home, and he has never understood a country whose highest authority the court sanctioned such discriminations.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

“Santiago is the today and tomorrow of Latin American Art. His exquisite line and masterful talent are a great asset for his native Colombia.”

Santiago Martínez Delgado (1906–1954) Colombian Muralist, Painter and Illstrator

Edgar Kaufmann conversation, letter to Edgar Kaufmann Jr, 1932, Wis.
About Martinez

“There is but one way to Americanize for each and every American to understand the ideals of America and to be able to interpret them in every act of his daily life. But this alone is not enough. Groups of men, from the humblest unit to the greatest political entity in the country, must be able to do this in combination; and there must be agreement. There are certain things that men go all over the world to find. Where those things exist men stay; when they fail men leave. These things are basic. They are opportunities to better conditions, to be equal to other men, to have the right to be heard, freedom of thought, worship, and speech, and to enjoy life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is for this that men desert their home countries, and it is for this that they may desert America if their native lands in Europe offer the same great adventure and reward.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

“I am an American; free born and free bred, where I acknowledge no man as my superior, except for his own worth, or as my inferior, except for his own demerit.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Frances Kellor 37

Related quotes

Related topics