Social and Religious Life of Italians in America

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Christopher Publishing House, 1918 - History - 149 pages
 

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Page 50 - Americanate," meaning the quintessence of foolishness. A sensational divorce case, a scandal at the City Hall, Dowie or Billy Sunday, anything and everything is used as a pretext for a long philippic against America. I have seen Italian newspapers with laudatory articles on America written in English, which no Italian would read, and with an article in Italian in the same issue, that the American would not understand, painting America in the blackest colors.
Page 43 - ... relatives at a lower rental, is another manifestation of the localizing effects of Italian kinship values. Departure from the North End generally signifies some degree of repudiation of the community's values. One Italian writes of an emigrant from the North End: I still remember with regret the vain smile of superiority that appeared on his face when I told him that I lived at the North End of Boston, "lo non vado fra quella plebaglia.
Page 19 - I have been down to America today,' meaning that they have gone a few blocks outside the district of the Italian colony.
Page 96 - ... crushed by the foreign arms of Charles V, and the deceit of the Popes, and we began to lose our national character, and to live as if we were Spaniards, Germans, and French. Then our learned men began to play the buffoon to princes, and to stimulate their listless patrons by laughing at everybody and everything. Then our priests, seeing that any application of religious truth was impossible, began to traffic in holy things, and to think of themselves, not of the people whom they ought to have...
Page 65 - If you will go to the public school building nearest where you live the teacher will tell you what nights you can go to school and the best school for you to go to. You will not be put in a class with boys and girls, but with grown people.
Page 45 - I said, was a certificate of efficiency. Whoever has lived in America knows that high ideals, moral and religious, have the first place over there. Whoever has studied American literature and philosophy knows that the American soul is impregnated with idealism and even with mysticism. Whoever has studied American history knows that abstract and general thoughts of morality and justice have always held first place. It is upon pure ideals and pure thoughts that the American nation was built, and it...
Page 45 - America is a country of idealism, it is the land of the ideal." Because Americans have had to clear a new continent, to struggle for their existence, we have come to believe that they were men with selfish interests, occupied before all with material interests. What a mistake! He who has lived in America realizes that there is no country in the world where money means less. It is only necessary to see how they spend it, how they give it, and for what they earn it. They earn it and they seek for it...
Page 71 - ... food." Enrico Sartorio wrote in The Social and Religious Life of Italians in America: The children of foreign extraction learn English and, as very little is done in school to make them keep up the language of their parents, they soon forget it, with the result that their home life is destroyed. . . . It is sad to notice...
Page 65 - ... congregations, who by their example initiate them into the ways of American life. A campaign to enlighten the immigrant as to his duties towards his new country should be started on a somewhat different basis from those already tried. The immigrant is often made to feel how great the material advantage is for him in becoming an American citizen and thus is trained to enter into American public and political life in a mercenary spirit. When I applied for citizenship papers, I received this letter...
Page 65 - ... sending this letter to you, as it desires to show you how you can become an American citizen. It also wants to help you get a better position that pays you more money for your work. In order to help you to learn of the many advantages which will come to you from being a citizen of the United States, and to help you better yourself, it has sent your name to the public schools in your city, and the superintendent of these schools has promised to teach you the things which you should know to help...

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