From the Other Side: Women, Gender, and Immigrant Life in the U.S., 1820-1990

by Donna R. Gabaccia

"An impressive achievement by a scholar well-versed in the field." ―Virginia Yans-McLaughlin

"Sweeping in scope and prodigious in research, Gabaccia is able to make insightful comparisons between these female newcomers in both the past and the present and between the experiences of the foreign-born and other minorities in American society." ―John Bodnar

This long-needed study of women "from the other side" examines the experience of women immigrants as they came to the United Stated from all corners of the earth. Donna Gabaccia traces continuities that characterize women of both the nineteenth-century European and Asian migrations and the present-day Third World migrations. Foreign-born women, even more than men, experienced sharp tensions between communal, familial traditions and U.S. expectations of individualism and voluntarism. She also discovers strong parallels between the lives of foreign-born women and the women of America's native-born racial minorities.

Genres: Nonfiction

216 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

Reviews

[Katie katiek-is-booked · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gabaccia’s 1995 book From the Other Side: Women, Gender, & Immigrant Life in the U.S. 1820-1990 highlights the connections of many groups of women to globalization and transformation, and suggests migration has historically challenged American notions of biological differences in race and sex. Gabaccia argues that until their book, women have largely been left out of the immigration debate and narratives, though they make up half of the immigrant population. Presented is a social history in three parts, beginning with coming to the U.S. and changing locations, to comparing 19th and 20th century immigrant women and American women, to finally how class and cultural changes and shifts have redefined the lives of immigrant women and their female descendants. Readers will experience the book through three great waves of migration, first 1830 to 1860, then 1880 to 1920, and finally 1965 to 1990. Gabaccia, while not focusing on refugees, does include them in her writing as a distinct pattern of migration and specifically women refugees as well represented in this group. Also part of the patterns of migration presented are family migration, with its own two distinct patterns of married couples migrating together, and that of wives following husbands. The fourth pattern of migration readers are presented with is single women who migrate without a nuclear family for economic opportunities of their own.

While restrictive national origins laws and quotas made migration a complicated and difficult process, the capitalist world economy continued to promote migration to men and women alike. In part one of The Other Side we read primarily of the capitalist world economy, trade, investment, as well as nation-building and colonialism. Gabaccia compares both the experiences of men and women to point out the differences in treatment and experiences based on gender, as well as the differences cross-culturally between women and girls based on countries of origin. In this presentation Gabaccia challenges stereotypes and myths of immigrant women, and also reveals the social and economic contributions immigrant women and their daughters made to the United States and their local communities.

In the second part of Gabaccia’s book, readers will see that women “of the other side” were always accustomed to hard work, whether paid though and often as unpaid laborers inside the home. Women participated in family wage economies, contributing to households through their agricultural work and managing households and resources. Still, many women went to work in domestic service for families and more so when laws against child labor were passed and children could no longer contribute financially to a family. Kinship and chain migration were key to immigrant women’s migration and success. Mutual aid and fictive kinship networks were at times essential to group survival and progress, and through factory work immigrant women were able to build extensive and multi-cultural networks. Unlike factory workers though, immigrant women in domestic service often only knew their employers, limiting their opportunities and access to different ethnic groups. Still, family and community were resources for immigrant women to utilize as needed, and to find the emotional support to fight against common feelings of depression and isolation.

In part three of Gabaccia’s book readers learn more of changing patterns of community, class, and cultural norms, including those of experiences based on gender. While immigrant women and mothers remained primary transmitters of homeland culture, though refugees specifically received access to (and often required) educational programs of American domesticity. Daughters of immigrants often experienced and adopted more American middle-class ideas of feminine domesticity, as well as using these ideas to challenge ethnically gendered upbringings and limitations. Gabaccia gives readers a brief overview of the ever changing culture of immigrants, and how immigrants change culture in America as well. Not only does gender, the primary focus of the book, impact these changes but also class, race, and religion, though gender remains the most significant indicator for the naturalization of outsiders during the periods presented.

The Other Side provides both broad generalizations regarding migration, kinship, and gender, but also gives readers variations within those patterns based on class, race, and religion. Each of these variations is a presentation of the other side metaphorically, and provides readers with an analytical framework to utilize moving forward and for exploring immigration and gender. Gabaccia wants the history of immigration to be explored and viewed in tandem with histories of racial minorities and expanding the U.S. empire, and through The Other Side encouraged scholars to research and write more monographs on immigrant women. If Gabaccia’s goals are achieved it will allow for a greater understanding of not just immigration and gender, but of each of our larger social worlds.

[Mat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good content. I read it for a class I was taking in college. I was not a fan of the tons of example characters, rather than sticking to one or two people and doing a deeper case study.