The Southern Diaspora Analysis

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The Southern Diaspora was one of the largest American population movements among the white and black population. From 1900 to 1970 more than 28 million southerners left their home regions in search of better jobs in the cities and suburbs of the North and the West making “the size of the diaspora is the first revelation” (pg. 13). “The Southern Diaspora: How the Great Migrations of Black and White Southerners Transformed America” by James N. Gregory shows the migration of black southerners and whites together to see the connections and differences. Gregory’s main argument is that the southern diaspora greatly influenced contributions to religion, music and politics that shaped America. The reoccurring theme that Gregory covers throughout …show more content…

There were many factors driving people out of the South including a lack of employment, people seeking higher wages, better farmland, or some other economic improvement. As a result of this mass migration of people the rest of the country outside of the southern states suddenly became immersed in cultures and representation that they had never seen before. The start of the movement focused on African Americans who were motivated by the newspapers because “articles about labor recruiters encouraging African Americans to head north for jobs in steel mills, coal mines, or packinghouses began to appear in the summer of 1916.” (pg. 45) Gregory addresses the hardships faced by both black and white southerners who move north and west and the variations in their struggles for success in the cities. Many times whites were able to find employment and decent living within a short period of time of …show more content…

As black and white southerners moved west and north it was most frequent that they would settle down into a community made up of their own race. Even white northerners had social differences than the white southerners who may have moved in next to them as most neighborhoods in the industrial north held second-generation immigrants of European descendants. As Gregory phrased it “residential dispersion meant that for most white migrants, the resettlement experience would be an exercise in integration.” (pg.164) As religion started to build on black empowerment the people started to back the civil rights movement more. They started to make political powers in the North that were not accessible in the South and had a high “rate of electoral activity given the poverty and recent arrival of most of the population.” (pg.241) The civil rights era marked a huge turning point for African American’s rights and political involvement because they were able to influence the country into making a change that otherwise would leave us with a very different America

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