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Urbanization and Immigration · Saberian History Lectures

0:00
So, today we're getting into society and politics
0:04
in the Gilded Age. Now, as we had talked about
0:12
earlier, the period of 1865 into 1900 and even
0:19
into 1920, you have abrupt and decisive... technological
0:24
change that results in societal upheaval. And
0:30
many people, both futurists and sociologists,
0:34
like to compare the reforms and the technological
0:40
improvements from the period of about 1880 to
0:42
1922 now with the dawn of the internet. And sort
0:47
of going back to that... what I call the regulatory
0:52
cycle. Remember, you had an innovation which
0:57
produces a period of chaos. That period of chaos
1:04
has winners and losers. And then you have a regulation
1:12
that tries to stabilize or ameliorate the outcomes.
1:17
Yes, we remember this? Okay, so, Let's get to
1:22
the slides. So we're going to talk about the
1:26
effects of urban growth and the problem it created
1:28
and how the immigrants were viewed by society.
1:31
We are going to get into the leisure stuff, but
1:34
probably not today. So one of the things that
1:38
the text gets into is modern cities exist because
1:44
they became possible. Let me say that again.
1:49
A lot of things exist because they can. And so
1:53
when we think about the hallmarks of a modern
1:56
city, what comes to mind? I say this to you who
2:00
do not live in a city per se, but you live in
2:03
the wider area of a city, yes? So what are the
2:07
hallmarks of a city? Not looking at the slideshow,
2:10
but just in your own experience. What's the first
2:12
thing? You know you're in San Antonio because
2:14
of what? Tall buildings, okay? What else? How
2:22
else do you know you're in a city? People. But
2:26
tons of people crammed in. Yes, packed in like
2:28
sardines. People densely populated. Yes? I'm
2:34
saying people. Okay, I'm just going to say dense
2:36
people. Not that the people are intellectually
2:37
dense, but that they're all stuck together. Yes?
2:41
A little bit of both, but anyway. Okay, now.
2:46
Another hallmark of a city is that you have,
2:51
not only people are concentrated in complete
2:54
generality, but also people are grouped by what?
3:02
Have you noticed that there are certain parts,
3:06
that there's stratification, that there are layers,
3:09
there are levels, yes? And so when I look at
3:12
people, are people grouped by income? You have
3:17
the poorer section of town, you have the reishi
3:19
section of town, yes. So you have people grouped
3:22
by income or social class. We'll say social class.
3:32
Embedded in that concept of social class are
3:35
people actually living in the cities in some
3:39
ways also organized by Ethnolinguistic tendencies.
3:46
Are there enclaves in San Antonio? Can you walk
3:52
whole blocks in San Antonio without hearing a
3:54
word of English? Yes. And that was even before,
3:58
you know, digital television revolution. So,
4:01
you know, you've got enclaves. Now, is San Antonio
4:05
unique in having ethnic enclaves where you can
4:08
walk for blocks and blocks and not hear a word
4:10
of English? No, not at all. Are there parts of
4:15
Houston where you can walk blocks and blocks
4:18
and blocks and not hear a word of English and
4:20
not hear a word of Spanish either? In Houston,
4:25
there is a large Vietnamese community. So there
4:28
is a part of Houston that is a Spanish -speaking
4:33
enclave. There is a part of Houston that is a
4:36
Vietnamese enclave. You go to Los Angeles. You
4:41
have Chinatown. You have... There is a Spanish
4:46
-speaking enclave. There's also an enclave in
4:49
Los Angeles where they've got two Persian TV
4:51
stations. It's called Little Tehran. You actually
4:54
walk down the street and you have people talking
4:57
to each other in Farsi or Dori. Which is kind
5:02
of fun and interesting. Also, you see some of
5:04
those people in San Jose, California. I know
5:06
those are some of my cousins. But anyway. And
5:10
they're nice people. I mean, they've assimilated
5:12
and learned English well enough. But when my
5:16
aunt came to visit the family over in San Jose
5:22
area, she was able to get around decently while
5:24
not barely knowing English. Because so many people
5:29
in the enclave spoke Persian. And there are things
5:32
like that all over the place. Now, we don't see
5:36
it as much around here. What was the dominant
5:39
non -English language around here? German. Ballots
5:46
were printed in English, Spanish, and German
5:48
in the Texan state for the longest time. That
5:50
didn't change until 1917. We'll get to that in
5:54
a moment, the loss of the German identity. And
5:57
so, enclaves is part of a city. Even further
6:04
out, one of the things of the modern city is,
6:07
and you're living in one, the suburbs. What is
6:11
a suburb if you think about it? It's a community
6:17
that is tied to the city, but not in the city.
6:22
How many of you, your family members work in
6:25
the city? Many of you, yes. They have you living
6:30
out here in the suburb because they need to work
6:33
in the city, but they not necessarily are willing
6:36
to live there. So many of the outlines of the
6:41
modern cities, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles,
6:46
San Francisco, a lot of these outlines get started
6:48
here. Now, let's get into sort of the technology.
6:52
Prior to the dawn of the automobile, Suburbs
6:55
were not possible because prior to the automobile
6:57
and prior to the cable car, how did you come
7:00
and go? Walk or horse or carriage, yes? And do
7:07
they go fast? Not necessarily. I mean, you can
7:12
get a horse to go decently fast for a while,
7:14
but not for an extended distance or duration.
7:17
And so you have cities growing up. because of
7:22
a number of technologies that come into place.
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Now, I don't want you to think of Texan cities
7:26
where it's always hot. I want you to think of
7:29
the cities that come to mind that are really,
7:31
really high up there. Let's think New York. Let's
7:34
think Boston. Let's think Chicago. In order for
7:37
a city to grow up, in order for tall buildings
7:40
to happen, what are tall buildings made of? Steel.
7:47
Was cheap steel steel a thing before Bessemer.
7:52
So Bessemer makes possible not only the road
7:57
of steel, Carnegie steel didn't just make the
8:00
railroad possible, it also makes the skyscraper
8:03
possible. So, tall buildings of steel. Now, in
8:07
addition to having tall buildings of steel, you
8:10
might need another technology, especially if
8:12
you had to make your way to the top. The elevator.
8:15
Or as they call it in England, the lift. Because,
8:21
let's think about this for a moment. I mean,
8:23
yes, theoretically, if you have to go to the
8:25
top of a 20 -story building, you could take the
8:27
stairs, but it might take you a while. And good
8:30
luck if you have to move anything heavy, yes?
8:33
So your first electric elevator is actually 1889.
8:43
Now, in order... For people in these tall buildings
8:47
to actually keep warm, especially in the colder
8:50
climes of Chicago and New York, what was previously
8:55
the source of heat? Fire. Fire in tall buildings.
9:00
That's totally going to end well, yes? How do
9:03
people heat? Now again, in modern America, we
9:07
use one of two systems. Actually, in some ways,
9:10
we still use a very primitive system here in
9:13
this physical building. So in most of your homes,
9:17
you have a furnace that burns. It's either an
9:22
electric furnace or a heat pump where it is blowing
9:24
hot air into your living space. In some of your
9:29
homes, those of you who are on gas, you have
9:31
a furnace that is creating hot air that the air
9:34
conditioner actually blows hot air to your living
9:36
space. In the late 19th, early 20th century,
9:41
that hasn't happened yet. So you actually have
9:47
as your major heat source the radiator. Now,
9:51
I know when I say radiator, many of you are thinking
9:53
of the thing that cools your car. I'm not talking
9:55
about that. So for those of you who have dealt
10:00
with a radiator, the way it works is, and actually
10:02
we have a radiative heat system around here to
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a degree. So you have... Hot water in a boiler
10:11
that is being circulated throughout the building
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and then the heat from the pipes radiates into
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the living space. That's how a radiator works.
10:22
You have hot water going through unencased pipe
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and the heat emanates from that and it radiates
10:28
into the living space. Now, how is that remarkably
10:31
efficient? Well, you have piping already, yes?
10:38
And it emanates heat, but think about the temperature
10:42
difference between fire and boiling water. Because
10:48
how hot can you get the water? Boiling, you get
10:52
it to steam, to 12, maybe a little bit above.
10:55
That's a lot. I mean, that's great. I mean, you
10:59
don't want to be up close and personal with it,
11:00
but versus how hot does fire burn? Much, much
11:04
hotter than the boiling point of water. And so
11:07
it gets enough heat out there that you don't
11:08
have to worry about endangering the structural
11:10
integrity of the building. And you can pipe it
11:14
in directions according to your will. Moving
11:17
air around is not quite as easy as piping water.
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Does that make sense? And so you have tall buildings
11:23
being made possible by Bessemer steel, by elevators,
11:27
by radiators. So now we can actually heat and
11:29
cool people in moving them up. You also have
11:32
now the transportation mechanisms that allow
11:35
people to travel in the cities. These being,
11:37
of course, the cable cars, the subways. And the
11:41
cable cars actually make possible the suburbs.
11:44
The cable cars are the mode of transportation.
11:46
prior to the automobile. So you have bedroom
11:50
communities surrounding the city for your upper
11:53
class, and they now have an entry point into
11:55
the city. Again, typically you still see these
11:59
in older cities where people take commuter trains.
12:02
Around here, do we actually have, oh, I don't
12:04
know, a commuter train from Spring Branch into
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San Antonio? No. Okay. So moving on. Now, you've
12:13
got people now that are being able to be crammed
12:15
into the cities, but what very often happens
12:18
is people are building the cities, you have people
12:21
in the cities before the infrastructure is there.
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And so I talked about this to a degree. So you've
12:26
got people packed into these tenement houses,
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like sardines, and so while you may have heat,
12:34
you wouldn't necessarily have running water.
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What could possibly go wrong? disease, especially
12:41
airborne and fecal -borne diseases. Okay? And
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so, you know, if you've got like a chamber pot
12:49
and people are emptying their feces out in the
12:50
street, all of a sudden your streets just become
12:52
cesspools, yes? Now, also, when you think about
12:57
it, if cities expand, cities usually expand into
13:00
where? Oh, come on now, it's not that far away,
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is it? Cities expand into what type of areas
13:09
that were previously around cities. Before there
13:12
were suburbs, it was typically rural, right?
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And you all see some of this right now. How many
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of you are in subdivisions that are near rural
13:21
properties? And there are still people who are
13:25
engaged in livestock agriculture in those rural
13:28
properties. Now, think about this. You've got
13:30
a city like Chicago in the middle of the Midwest.
13:32
You don't think that the city might have grown
13:34
to the point that it might have surrounded somebody's
13:37
farm or two? And so, you have people bringing
13:41
animals into the city, both as a food supply,
13:44
but also because their property had been surrounded.
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Domesticated animals... in cities with poor sanitation,
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what else could possibly go wrong? Oh, by the
13:53
way, do we share diseases with domestic animals?
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So you have airborne fecal -borne diseases transmitted
14:00
human to human. You also have animals being either
14:05
raised or slaughtered in the cities. Again, airborne,
14:09
fecal -borne, blood -borne diseases being transferred
14:13
human to human because also, again, In a rural
14:17
community, how do you get your water? In a rural
14:22
community, where do you get your water? You have
14:25
a well. And as these cities are encompassing
14:29
on what used to be rural communities before public
14:33
water systems, where did people get their water?
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Wells and also to a lesser extent rivers. Now
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if you have... Densely packed human and animal
14:44
populations, where do all that feces go? Into
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the rivers, but also does it contaminate your
14:53
groundwater? So now you have airborne, fecal
14:59
-borne diseases. They're not only surrounding
15:03
you, creating a stench, it's also contaminating
15:06
your water supply and what could possibly go
15:08
wrong. When you have a contaminated water supply,
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what could possibly go wrong? Everything. You
15:15
get the idea. And so you have poor sanitation.
15:19
You have people living in tenements. You're talking
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60 % infant mortality. Three out of five kids
15:25
born in the cities do not make it to five. Now
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that sounds horrible for us, and it is. But also
15:33
we say this in an era of low fertility. Most
15:37
of you can count your siblings on one hand or
15:40
one finger, yes? Whereas into 19th century America,
15:45
even in the cities, you have women over the course
15:50
of their breeding life actually have more children
15:52
than we do now. And so it's sort of the American,
15:56
or not even the American ethos, the human ethos
15:58
is kind of like the old Doritos commercial, crunch
16:01
all you want, we'll make more. Too crass? Too
16:05
crass? Or y 'all just don't remember the Doritos
16:06
commercial? Well, it was before your time. Jay
16:10
Leno, before he did the Tonight Show, he was
16:12
a spokesperson for Doritos. This was back when
16:15
Johnny Carson was doing the Tonight Show, and
16:17
I know I'm showing my age. But, you know, y 'all
16:19
missed out on some great comedy. Now, I mean,
16:21
Leno was a funny guy. Who took over after him?
16:24
I forgot. Fallon. But it was supposed to be Conan,
16:28
and then it was Fallon, and then, okay, now I
16:30
remember. All right. So, where do you notice,
16:34
okay, so here are the cities in the 1880s, where
16:37
do you notice most of them on the map? The east
16:42
coast, and into what we now call the Midwest,
16:48
yes? And so, the sort of westernmost cities are
16:53
Chicago and St. Louis and Milwaukee, and then
16:56
you've got San Francisco all by itself, yes?
17:00
And, of course, San Francisco is a major port,
17:02
had been a major port going back to the time
17:05
of, prior to, or back when it was part of Mexico.
17:09
And then, of course, as we fast forward 40 years
17:12
to the 1920s, you do have more coastal cities,
17:15
Seattle, Portland, Los Angeles, but you have
17:18
additional cities in Texas. You have additional
17:23
cities in the Great Plains. You have, of course,
17:27
Salt Lake, Denver. And then you have Omaha, Kansas
17:31
City, etc. And then you have more dense population
17:34
of cities here. And again, these are populations
17:37
with the city over 100 ,000. Okay, and so what
17:49
is driving, what would possess people to want
17:53
to move to these fecal infested heck holes? Jobs.
17:57
Because if I am a landless peasant, if I am a
18:04
agricultural worker, not a farm owner, if I am
18:11
a dispossessed agricultural worker, I move to
18:13
the city or I have no job. And if I have no job
18:17
in the world before the modern social welfare
18:19
state, what happens to me? Starvation. Privation,
18:23
starvation, yes, death. Okay? So, you'll be amazed
18:31
what hunger can drive you to do. Starvation,
18:37
or the fear thereof, drove immigrants from Western
18:40
Europe to the New World. Starvation compelled
18:44
the native peoples to abandon their migratory
18:47
hunting. because the buffalo were annihilated
18:51
and to accept reservation. Starvation drove landless
18:56
peasants into the cities and starvation also
19:00
drove the new wave of immigrants from China and
19:06
from southern and eastern Europe to abandon their
19:08
homelands and move to these United States. Starvation
19:12
is a very powerful driving force. And now let's
19:19
talk about the immigrants. 1860 to 1920, you
19:24
have a surge in immigration from southern and
19:28
eastern Europe. Now, a couple of things I kind
19:30
of want to get into. So, southern and eastern
19:39
Europe, and I'm going to go to the board on this
19:42
one because it gives me a bit more room to work.
19:45
Southern and eastern Europe. So if I'm looking
19:54
at the world, or if I'm looking at Europe, and
19:57
again, you want to define these terms, and the
19:59
way you define these terms is very often ethno
20:01
-linguistically. So if I'm talking Western Europe,
20:05
I am talking about whom? If I'm talking about
20:15
Western Europe, who's Western Europe? England.
20:22
England, Ireland, Scotland. Well, we'll just
20:27
say England, Ireland, Scotland. Also, the Germanys
20:32
to an extent. Germany is kind of where Eastern
20:35
Europe meets, is where East meets West. Also,
20:40
the Dutch. France is part of Western Europe.
20:48
physically, culturally, linguistically, not entirely.
20:51
So you've got the French. Spain is actually usually
20:54
typified as being part of Southern Europe. It
20:56
is the westernmost part of Europe, but it's usually
20:58
associated with Southern Europe linguistically,
21:02
culturally. So then when I talk about Southern
21:05
Europe, I am talking about Spain, Italy, Mediterranean
21:21
basin. Culturally, linguistically, if I start
21:27
thinking of Southern Europe as the Mediterranean,
21:29
also this includes Croatia. Although some people
21:39
would categorize Croatia as part of Eastern Europe.
21:41
Croatia, Catholic, Yugoslavia. faces the Adriatic,
21:47
so in that regard it's culturally linked to Italy,
21:50
whereas Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia
21:57
is culturally linked to Russia, and then of course
22:00
Bosnia, Herzegovina, Albania, Macedonia, those
22:04
tend to be actually linked to the Ottoman Empire.
22:07
So this one could be Eastern Europe. Now, Eastern
22:09
Europe... Basically Slavs, so you're talking
22:21
Russians, Czechs, Slovaks, Poles, Romanians,
22:36
Serbians. Of course, the thing that always throws
22:47
me for a loop is when I start looking at these
22:49
ethnic groups and these linguistic groups, I
22:51
also start seeing ancient Roman maps. Because
22:55
I have some degree of classical training. And
22:58
so what's kind of funny is the area that we now
23:01
call Croatia was originally called Dalmatia.
23:04
And this is where we get the term Dalmatian.
23:06
So now you're picturing spotted puppies. Just
23:09
as a force of habit. I'm going to put the Irish
23:17
here with kind of a question mark because were
23:22
the nativists very fond of the Irish? No. Okay,
23:25
so let's go down the lane for a sec. If I'm English,
23:28
German, or Dutch, what am I probably? Protestant.
23:32
Although Germany, depending on which German state,
23:35
might have been Catholic, might have been Protestant.
23:37
Okay, so Protestant. And Germanic. They use the
23:43
term Anglo -Saxon. Anglo -Saxon is a race. Anglo
23:45
-Saxon is also a language group. The term Anglo
23:51
-Saxon, actually Saxony is a province in the
23:54
Germanys closer to Denmark. Angeln is actually
23:59
in modern -day Denmark, and then, of course,
24:01
there's Jutland. And so the actual original English
24:04
were what we call the English. You have the Britons
24:08
who were in Britannia prior to the Romans. Then
24:11
you have occupied Britannia by the Romans. And
24:14
then, of course, you have the people of Angeln,
24:18
Saxony, and Jutland. sail on the ships and invade
24:21
the country. Then you got the Normans showing
24:23
up and life's always fun. This is why I always
24:25
wanted to teach either a British history or a
24:27
Western Civ, but they said no. I'll have to teach
24:31
that at the college because they won't let me
24:33
teach it on this campus. Sad face. Alright, now,
24:37
so, Protestant, they speak a type of, so English
24:42
is a Germanic language, so, you know, English,
24:45
Germanic English, and many of these people had
24:47
come to what, I mean, they had been in this country
24:51
since the 18th century or since the 17th century,
24:53
they've been here, they were part of the foundation
24:56
of the republic they had assimilated. And so
24:58
that's your English, German -speaking peoples,
25:00
the Dutch, and some French. Because where were
25:04
the French even as far back as the Revolution?
25:09
Louisiana. Right? I mean, you go to Louisiana
25:14
now. You can cross into enclaves where you won't
25:17
hear a word of English because they'll be speaking
25:19
the Creole dialect of French. And we have certain
25:24
loan words that we've taken with us, like joie
25:26
de vivre. Anyway, all right. Now, the Irish,
25:29
what was fun about the Irish? They spoke English,
25:31
but how were these people kind of the odd man
25:34
out, especially in the American cities? They
25:36
were Catholic. Okay. Southern Europe. Catholic
25:47
-Catholic, although we didn't see a very large
25:50
Spanish influx, you did see an influx of Italians.
25:55
Italy in the mid -19th century is going through
25:57
some convulsions as the various principalities
26:01
are forming the modern Italian state. Really,
26:03
the modern Italian state is not a thing until
26:05
the early 20th century, and then, you know, one
26:09
world war later, off to fascism they go. That's
26:14
okay. We'll get to Mussolini in a bit. I mean,
26:16
okay, we'll get to Mussolini in a few chapters.
26:19
Alright, moving on. Okay, Greece. What are they?
26:25
Eastern Orthodox. Croats are actually Catholic,
26:36
but they are religiously Catholic. They are linguistically
26:40
Slavic. So they speak a dialect of, they speak
26:44
a Slavic dialect. By the way, if you've never
26:47
heard any type of Slavic language, it sounds
26:49
like nothing you've ever heard before in your
26:51
life. It's at least Indo -European, which is,
26:55
you know, a bit more fun than Turkish, which
26:57
is actually related to Chinese linguistically.
27:00
That one's fun. Russians, they're Orthodox, and
27:05
by the way, does it sound at all familiar to
27:08
a Germanic? No. Czechs. Czechs are Catholic,
27:14
yes? I want to say that the Czechs, they're Slavic
27:19
speaking, but they're Catholic. Slovaks, Slavic
27:22
speaking, not Catholic. Romanians. Romanian is
27:29
actually a Romance language, but again, Serbians,
27:33
Orthodox, Slavs. Poles. They're not necessarily,
27:44
I don't want to say it's a Slavic language group,
27:46
I'm not sure, but they are Catholic. Okay. So
27:53
that's fun. Also, as I look at these people,
28:02
what's different about them? However, they're
28:09
not just religiously different, they're not just
28:11
linguistically different, is where are they moving
28:17
to? When the immigrants of southern and eastern
28:23
Europe move to these United States, where are
28:29
they moving to? The cities. They're moving all
28:35
together, aren't they? And they're coalescing
28:38
into ethnic enclaves. Now, whereas, what was
28:46
the last great migration wave that you, I mean,
28:48
I know your 1301 instructor was a pain, but he
28:51
did teach you about the great migration wave
28:53
of the Germans and the Irish. Where did the Germans
28:56
go? The Midwest. And they did not go into cities.
29:03
Where did the Germans go? They moved into rural
29:09
communities in the Midwest. Now think about this
29:11
for a moment. If you're a German -speaking people
29:14
and you've made a community of your own in the
29:16
Midwest, or in Texas like New Braunfels, is anyone
29:23
going to say boo? Is anyone going to be annoyed
29:27
by your presence? Do you have to interact really
29:30
with the other? But if you're in the city, What
29:35
do you have to do? You have to deal with everyone,
29:39
don't you? Now, a couple of other things that's
29:43
kind of interesting, and this keys into cultural
29:49
mores. A couple of things going on. Okay, if
29:57
you are an Anglo -Saxon Protestant, there are
30:03
some things that are expected of you. What is
30:06
the hallmark of Protestantism? What is the one
30:12
thing that separated Protestantism from Catholicism
30:16
going all the way back to Martin Luther? What?
30:21
Y 'all don't remember. Katie. You do not need
30:29
an intercessor. In the Catholic tradition, you
30:33
go to a priest, you confess your sins, you pay
30:35
a penance, and so the priest absolves you, and
30:39
the priest is the interlocutor between you and
30:42
the divine. In the Catholic tradition, into the
30:45
20th century, the Bible was in Latin, and so
30:49
if you didn't know Latin, who read the Bible
30:51
to you? The priest. And so, you see this, where
30:55
the priest would read the text, he would... expositorily
30:58
explain the text, and you would have to take
31:00
his word as gospel. What does Protestantism demand?
31:04
You have to read the Bible for yourself. Now,
31:06
if you have to read the Bible for yourself, what
31:07
do you have to be able to do in order to read
31:09
the Bible for yourself? You have to be able to
31:11
read. And so the Western Europeans had higher
31:16
literacy rates than the other immigrant groups.
31:20
Now, again... The Orthodox churches also had
31:26
a priest elite that you deferred to, so you have
31:28
lower levels of educational attainment, lower
31:30
levels of literacy among these immigrant populations,
31:34
even in their own language. Because, by the way...
31:41
If I'm a Russian, a Czech, or a Polish immigrant
31:43
coming to the United States, I'm not here to
31:46
make a business investment and build a company.
31:48
What am I probably heading over to do? Either
31:50
to work in the factory, and I'm probably what
31:53
in my own country? Starving. I'm probably a disaffected
31:58
agricultural worker. I'm not a landowner. I'm
32:03
probably a landless peasant who's being pushed
32:05
off my land due to agricultural improvements.
32:08
Because the same process of agricultural improvement
32:10
that was occurring in the United States was also
32:14
occurring elsewhere in the world. And so you
32:17
have convulsions there, and so people are fleeing
32:20
the old country to places where they can find
32:22
work, where they can find subsistence. Now, some
32:24
of that was encouraged by the American government.
32:27
There was actually a Contract Labor Act in 1864.
32:34
The other thing, kind of interesting, let's also
32:37
keep going. I'm going to stay here for a moment.
32:39
So if I am, and I'm just going to say if I'm
32:41
a WASP, white Anglo -Saxon Protestant, I have
32:45
a better shot of being literate because I take
32:48
it as a religious obligation that I should read
32:51
the Bible for myself. Because I've been in country,
32:54
I probably have some capital buildup. I mean,
32:57
I may not be exorbitantly wealthy, but I may
32:59
have some capital, either assets in the form
33:01
of land, assets in the form of machinery, something
33:04
like that. Also, if I am a wasp, I am a creature
33:10
of the second great awakening. What were the
33:15
three main tenets of the second great awakening?
33:19
One was abolition, that already happened. Prohibition,
33:23
not prohibition, they called it at the time.
33:27
And so I am a believer in temperance and I may
33:31
even be a believer in the gospel of wealth. And
33:47
I am probably still coming off that agricultural
33:53
ethos. And what I mean by that agricultural ethos,
33:57
I am talking about that cult of the yeoman farmer,
34:01
that American dream of owning land and deriving
34:04
wealth and prosperity from the land. Now, as
34:07
I look at these other people, I'm deliberately
34:12
doing this near and not that I despise Slavs
34:14
or anything like that. This is a vocal effect.
34:17
I say that to you and I say that to the... our
34:21
friends on the interwebs. I'm not that politically
34:23
incorrect. But as I look at these other people,
34:26
what do we notice? Well, first of all, alright,
34:38
I'm just going to say it. Are any of these people
34:41
big believers in temperance? If I look at Russians,
34:46
Czechs, Poles, Slovaks, I mean, the people who
34:48
came up with vodka were not big believers in
34:51
temperance. And again, if I am a Catholic or
34:56
an Eastern Orthodox person, in addition to temperance,
34:59
am I believing and reading a Bible for myself?
35:02
Am I schooled in a tradition of self -government?
35:09
No. When you're in Russia, Or when you're in
35:15
Poland. Or even if you're in Italy. You do what
35:19
the Duke tells you to do. Whereas, in America,
35:26
there was a quasi -democratic tradition that
35:30
went all the way back to the English parliamentary
35:32
system, yes? And so they're looking at these
35:36
people and they're like, oh my god, these people
35:37
are drunkards, they're illiterate, and they don't
35:40
know how to govern themselves, and they're living
35:42
in our filthy cities and they're taking our country
35:45
on a short route to hell. And then, add insult
35:48
to injury, who else is in the city besides the
35:51
immigrant because they need a job too? Well,
35:55
African Americans and disaffected whites who
36:00
speak English. Nativists. Are there poor whites
36:05
working in the factories? And do they want these
36:08
strange and unusual people showing up? No, because
36:12
what do the immigrants do? They drive down jobs.
36:17
And so you have... the progressive critique of
36:21
the immigrant because they're alcoholics, because
36:24
they're illiterate, because they aren't assimilating,
36:26
because they are foreign to our customs and mores.
36:29
But then you have the very much baser critique
36:33
of the immigrant as espoused by the working class
36:37
nativist whites who are like, here are these
36:39
immigrants taking our jobs. No, I haven't heard
36:43
that line before. Now, here's the other thing
36:48
that you've got going on. If you're a factory
36:49
manager, you know you've got a boatload of workers
36:52
coming in. You greet the people at the dock and
36:53
say, I've got a job for you. Now, do they know
36:55
they're being exploited and being underpaid?
36:58
No. Because they don't even speak the language.
37:02
I mean, unless you're Irish. Alright. So, you
37:09
have a series of nativist acts. One of the things
37:14
that also happens is the immigrants get tied
37:16
into the political apparatus. They become part
37:21
of the machine politics because can immigrants
37:24
vote? Yes. You do not have this idea of defined
37:29
citizenship, of legal or illegal entry in the
37:32
United States. You have a say in the state because
37:34
you exist in the state. You don't have that really
37:37
until, I want to say 1950s, 1960s. So, the nativists
37:46
rise up, they have their allies in Congress,
37:48
and so you have a series of immigration acts,
37:51
one of which, of course, is the Chinese Exclusion
37:56
Act of 1882. It was passed by Congress. President
38:04
Arthur vetoes it. It's overridden. And so, this
38:08
actually has the United States, for the first
38:10
time, regulating who's coming in and out of the
38:13
country on the basis of race, on the basis of
38:16
intelligence. And so, closes the door of Chinese
38:22
people being entered into the United States for
38:25
a period of ten years. Now, I do leisure. So,
38:29
you got these people coming in. They're working
38:33
in the factories. They're working their tails
38:35
off. And so let's get into the leisure effects.
38:42
Because one of the things that you've got going
38:44
on is you have, with densely populated areas,
38:48
you have more avenues for entertainment and leisure.
38:52
Not only do you have labor -saving devices, but
38:55
you begin to have the development of what we
38:56
call high and low culture. And to some extent,
39:03
we still have it. All right. All right, so let's
39:14
think about this for a moment. And I say this
39:18
with no degree of irony. When we talk about high
39:22
culture, what do the cultured people do for their
39:29
recreation? Well, polo, again, I wouldn't recommend
39:36
that in a city. Polo is sort of a country gentleman's
39:41
leisure. What else? If you're... You have galas,
39:47
yes, but you also have... Okay, think about this
39:51
for a moment. You have... A person of culture
39:57
would go to the theater. Yes? You have the theater,
40:03
and you have to spell it correctly. You have
40:06
to use the French spelling. Theatrie. Or, as
40:11
you might say in Tennessee, the theater. The
40:19
theater. Alright. Was I close with the accent?
40:25
No. Alright. So, high culture, you have the theater.
40:30
The museum. What else are the... Oh, and the
40:38
symphony and the opera. Yes? The symphony and
40:42
the opera. Actually, I remember, and it's kind
40:48
of a weird thing in life when you start going
40:52
through the effects of your ancestors. My late
40:58
grandmother and grandfather, my grandmother and
41:03
grandfather frequented the opera, and my grandmother
41:07
was a Dallas socialite of no small scale. And
41:11
so one of the things that they had actually done
41:13
is they had paved over the backyard so they could
41:16
host parties out there. And so you're going through
41:20
and you're like, why do we have like a hundred
41:22
lawn chairs? And it's like, well, they throw
41:24
parties out in the backyard. Now, this was before
41:27
I was born. I mean, this was, oh, my grandfather
41:30
and grandmother lived in Dallas from about 1964
41:33
until my grandfather passed in 1999. My grandmother
41:39
passed 2011. But, you know, in their heyday when
41:44
they were people of means, they hosted fancy
41:46
parties. I mean, not galas, but, you know, middle
41:49
to high end. But yeah, they frequented the symphony
41:52
and the opera. My grandfather found it positively
41:54
boring. My grandfather was a recreational hunter.
42:00
But, I mean, it was sort of a thing. But of course,
42:03
you know, theater, museum, symphony, opera. What
42:07
are the marks of low culture? No, I mean, what
42:14
do... the masses do for their own entertainment?
42:21
Well, you have pugilism. You have... Now, there's
42:35
the theater, and then there's the show. So vaudeville
42:40
comedy was... It was considered... Something
42:46
for the hoi polloi. Into the 1920s, and this
42:53
is something y 'all don't have a schema for.
42:55
I mean, you have a word for it, but it's not
42:56
entirely... But the word is a euphemism. So...
43:03
You know, you go to a show, you're eating, you're
43:06
drinking, and you have an entertainer on the
43:08
stage who interacts with the audience. Now, for
43:10
those of you who are in theater, normally does,
43:12
in a formal play, do the players interact with
43:16
the audience? No. But there is a style of performance
43:19
where you do interact with the audience, and
43:21
I'm not just talking about Mr. Siberian's 1302
43:24
class. And we kind of have turned it into a dirty
43:28
word, and that's the term cabaret. Now, cabaret
43:32
is a euphemism for another type of entertainment.
43:37
Just going to leave that one alone. But again,
43:40
the style of entertainment actually was, I mean,
43:45
it's the one where the performer interacts with
43:47
the audience. Many stand -up comedians, actually,
43:50
it's a cabaret -style venue. It's just, again,
43:54
where it's not that the stage area is sequestered.
43:56
It's where the performers do interact with the
43:58
crowd. And sometimes getting very up close and
44:01
personal. But anyway. All right. So vaudeville
44:05
is considered sort of your lowbrow. Now, you
44:15
also have the saloon. Now, a saloon manifests
44:22
a number of things. Now, normally we associate
44:25
a saloon with what? Drinking. Now, what a saloon
44:31
is, and this might, for those of you who don't
44:34
know French, what is saloon from? Salon. Now,
44:39
salon has come to mean place where you gather
44:42
to get your hair done. That's not what salon
44:45
originally was. And so in saloon, it is combination
44:50
pub and social club. Now, one of the things,
44:54
and we don't really have this anymore, is for
44:57
the most part, A pub in England, you can actually
45:01
get a three -course meal there. I mean, it's
45:03
drinks, but it's also food. Whereas, again, a
45:07
lot of people, when they go to the bar now, they're
45:08
just going for drinks, yes? And so we'll get
45:11
more into saloon culture. But again, this offends
45:15
the sensitivities of creatures of the Second
45:18
Great Awakening, creatures of the high culture.
45:20
You get the idea. And so coexisting in the same
45:23
space, and now they have to coexist because there
45:25
is no frontier. is your two cultures and in many
45:33
ways you have these coalitions formed as these
45:36
different groups try to negotiate a common existence
45:39
in a common space. Questions, problems, concerns?
45:43
Alright, thank you.