A Tale of Two Cities: Santo Domingo and New York after 1950

by Jesse Hoffnung-Garskof

In the second half of the twentieth century Dominicans became New York City's largest, and poorest, new immigrant group. They toiled in garment factories and small groceries, and as taxi drivers, janitors, hospital workers, and nannies. By 1990, one of every ten Dominicans lived in New York. A Tale of Two Cities tells the fascinating story of this emblematic migration from Latin America to the United States. Jesse Hoffnung-Garskof chronicles not only how New York itself was forever transformed by Dominican settlement but also how Dominicans' lives in New York profoundly affected life in the Dominican Republic.



A Tale of Two Cities is unique in offering a simultaneous, richly detailed social and cultural history of two cities bound intimately by migration. It explores how the history of burgeoning shantytowns in Santo Domingo--the capital of a rural country that had endured a century of intense U.S. intervention and was in the throes of a fitful modernization--evolved in an uneven dialogue with the culture and politics of New York's Dominican ethnic enclaves, and vice versa. In doing so it offers a new window on the lopsided history of U.S.-Latin American relations. What emerges is a unique fusion of Caribbean, Latin American, and U.S. history that very much reflects the complex global world we live in today.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Latinx

352 pages, Hardcover

First published October 29, 2007

About the author

Jesse Hoffnung-Garskof is professor of history, American culture, and Latina/o studies at the University of Michigan. He is the author of A Tale of Two Cities: Santo Domingo and New York after 1950 (Princeton).

Reviews

[Grace Chambers · Rating 4 out of 5]

I actually really liked this book even though I had to read it for my PSU Global City class. Its about transnationalism from Santo Domingo and their migration to New York after 1950. Dominicans have experienced forced assimilation, segregation, and discrimination especially when they migrated to New York. This book really is very educational and has taught me a lot about what transnationalism is. I also learned a lot about their culture and the struggles that their people have been through. I even had to write a paper about it and I choose to research the group of Arabs to Detroit from the 1800s all the way until present day.

[Douglas Reis · Rating 5 out of 5]

SO GOOD!

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

The best thing about this ambitious history is how it not only effectively narrates a history of migration between the Dominican Republic and Washington Heights, NYC, but offers a rich array of contemporary interpretations of each stage of that history. Hoffnung-Garskoff draws on a diverse archive and on field work in Santo Domingo and the Heights to bring out the complexities of urban/rural, class, and racial ideologies within the Dominican and Dominican-American communities, both in the DR and in America. Even amid competing narrative threads and interpretations, the main story still comes through consistently. The elegance and precision of Hoffnung-Garskoff's reading of the archive and writing of history is remarkable. His theoretical frames are likewise drawn both from standard American Studies norms (nationalism, capitalism) and from the Dominican concepts of progreso and cultura, both of which he explains very well in their origins and continuing transformation.

My only quibble: Like other academic histories, it has to forefront method from time to time. The later chapters suffer from naming and defending their archives rather than focus on telling the stories drawn from them.

As an uptown resident myself, I came to this book via Crossing Broadway's bibliography. For me, it served as a very good catch-up on Dominican history and politics as they cross into the neighborhood-- for instance, the periodically omnipresent election posters. The details of cultural history were likewise fascinating and useful: I hadn't known of the John Travolta craze (the Tipper Gore types would denounce travoltismo!), or of how the prominent outdoor party scene on summer weekends grew from the exclusiveness of Santo Domingo discos, or that bands and parties called "Calle" are named after avenues and neighborhoods.

Highly recommended for New Yorkers, and for anyone interested in how capitalism and migration alter cultural patterns for success and self-cultivation. I thought of Max Gladstone often in the earlier chapters, which is always an excellent sign.

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm happy I decided to read this in tandem with The Warmth of Other Suns, Isabel Wilkerson's excellent book about the Great Migration. Hoffnung-Garskof recounts the urbanization of the Dominican Republic that accelerated dramatically after the death of Trujillo in 1961, along with the near simultaneous acceleration of migration (primarily from Santo Domingo) to the United States (primarily New York City). Like Wilkerson, he will make you reconsider a lot of what has previously been reported about the Dominican experience in the US, and its effect on New York City.
I thought about taking away a star due to the occasional dryness of the author's somewhat academic style, but decided not to because his observations and analysis are so keen.

[Aura · Rating 4 out of 5]

A bit more about the relationship with Haiti and the labor patterns and relations in New York and it would have been great! Still a great read though.