On For Bread with Butter

Woof, this is a tough read. I came to it expecting history, but it’s more (historical) sociology than historical research. Morawska makes two larger claims that work on two levels. First, the intermixture of tradition and modernity allowed “peasant-immigrants” to transition to American industrial society. Second, in the process, these immigrants were “proletarianized,” setting the stage for the formation of the 20th century’s American working class. Thankfully, Morawska rejects the material by earlier scholars that argue that the European peasantry was a static class with centuries-old traditions. She recognizes that the peasantry was in tradition, but it still was a peasantry.

As part of their transition to industrial society, the East Central European peasant-immigrants domesticated their environment to fit their own purposes. Rather than to “make it” in objective terms, their ultimate goals were to maintain the well-being of their family and home, as well as earn some sort of respect within their own ethnic community (rather than Johnstown at large). Instead of becoming rich, labor was seen as a way to accomplish these two goals. Nevertheless, life in Johnstown was difficult for peasant-immigrants.

To Morawska, Johnstown was “autocratic”—it was inflexible for those entering the town. For one, there were few structural opportunities granted to immigrants, the best they could do was often to work in the mines. Second, there was an “ascriptive-based normative system;” although I do not fully understand this bit, I think Morawska is trying to say that status is based around descent, and having non-American ethnic backgrounds made it difficult for East Central Europeans to fit it. Finally, immigrants brought little in the way of skills that could help them—they did not arrive speaking English, they mostly worked in agriculture when in Europe, and they did not have strong connections with the people of Johnstown (with the exception of some who shared their ethnicity).

Naturally, “East Central European” is a big category, consisting of Poles to Romanians and Serbs and everything in between. Notably, however, Jews are not included. They are instead the subject of Morawska’s second book, Insecure Prosperity: Small-Town Jews in Industrial America, 1890-1940. That said, I find she does a good job of navigating ethnic divisions and gives a fair image of “life-worldds” (Lebenswelten) as experienced by peasant-immigrants.