The Latino City

The Latino City: Examining What Makes a City Uniquely Latino

By Carly Berke

On Thursday, September 27th, the Initiative on Cities and the Boston University Center for Latin American Studies co-sponsored a discussion on the emergence of Latino communities in American cities. The conversation was moderated by BU Assistant Professor Jonathan Calvillo, who teaches Sociology of Religion. The event featured Dr. Llana Barber and Erualdo González, who each spoke of their respective research on the development of Latino communities in Lawrence, Massachusetts, and Santa Ana, California.

Dr. Llana Barber, a professor at the State University of New York at Old Westbury, published her book Latino City: Immigration and Urban Crisis in Lawrence, Massachusetts, 1945–2000 in 2017. The book explores the transformation of Lawrence into New England’s first Latino-majority city and how the development of its Latino population is connected with the city’s economic decline and revival. González, a professor of Chicano Studies at California State University, Fullerton, studies gentrification and city planning in Santa Ana, California. His book, entitled Latino City: Urban Planning, Politics, and the Grassroots, studies the impact that urbanization and revitalization of cities have on the working class, ethnic communities that comprise them. Although the two presented developmental studies that occurred on separate coasts, pertaining to communities that exist thousands of miles apart, they contained remarkable similarities that stood testament to the plight of the Latino working class in America.

Dr. Barber’s research examines how Lawrence, a city nestled in northern Massachusetts, became an imperative settlement site for Puerto Rican and Dominican immigrants. Moreover, she studies how the Latinization of Lawrence is tied to the city’s economic decline and urban crisis that occurred in the 1960s and 70s.

The roots of its economic crisis can be traced to the post-WWII era, when the region experienced massive suburbanization and deindustrialization, a trend that was occurring across the country. Aided by federal government programs and private contractors, suburbs in Andover and North Andover drew capital and wealth out of Lawrence. The rapid suburbanization of the region rendered Lawrence incredibly weak and devoid of economic activity.  

Latino immigrants were targeted as the scapegoat for the economic decline of Lawrence, a trend that occurred to multiple ethnic minorities in cities across the country. But Barber argues that the influx of Latinos came primarily in the ‘80s and ‘90s, after the peak of Lawrence’s economic decline.

“As a historian, it was important for me to unpack the origins of Lawrence’s economic crisis, plight, disinvestment, and crime.” said Barber. “But the roots of Lawrence’s economic crisis profoundly proceeded the settlement of Puerto Ricans and Dominicans in the city.”

Despite the life and economic activity that the growing Latino population brought back to Lawrence, white residents still blamed the influx of Latinos as the root of Lawrence’s economic decline. Rather than welcoming Latino immigrants, white residents took up discriminatory and even violent measures against their Latino neighbors.

As a result, Latinos actually shouldered the weight of the urban crisis at the time, as they faced heightened racial segregation, concentrated urban poverty, disinvestment, and decreased public funding. Many had come searching for the American Dream, but economic and social hardship left them frustrated and upset.

Despite the setbacks that Puerto Ricans and Dominicans faced, they formed activist networks, organizations, and grassroots movements in order to unify and seek the resources and change that they needed. They developed a strong community that enabled them to make a home out of Lawrence.

Although it is located on a different coast and exists over 3,000 miles away, the city of Santa Ana, California shares remarkable similarities with Lawrence. González, a native of Santa Ana, has spent his career analyzing how city planning and the revitalization of Santa Ana are tied to its gentrification, which affects its largely working class Latino population.

The current population of Santa Ana has reached 380,000, of whom nearly 80% are Latino. This is an incredible demographic to cite, considering that the city housed 100,000 residents in 1960, of whom 15% were Latino.

To trace the history of the Latino community in Santa Ana, González had to start back in the first half of the 20th century, when Santa Ana was a lively hub of culture and entertainment. Similar to Lawrence, however, the post-war period brought rapid suburbanization, which drew capital and wealth out of Santa Ana and left the city a ghost town.

“I start to uncover how, in the ‘60s and ‘70s, you see the city starting to wrestle with the downtown’s identity,” said González. “What are their narratives about downtown?”

After studying urban plans, city records, and public articles from the second half of the 20th century, González found that city officials in Santa Ana made a concentrated effort to vilify its Latino communities through the revitalization of the downtown area.

At the same time, González himself was a boy growing up in the heart of Santa Ana, surrounded by a community of Mexican immigrants like his own mother and father.

“I was a participant observer of research [that came] several years later,” says González of his childhood in a working class Latino family. “I was an urban sociologist without knowing it at the time.”

Throughout the 80s, 90s, and 2000s, González cites the numerous projects that Santa Ana city council undertook in an attempt to reinvigorate the city. But its urban planning neglected its growing Latino community, and it used community development to try to attract a more “first class” resident in order to push Latinos out.

By the 2000s, the city had experimented with multiple projects in an attempt to, in the words of González, “engineer gentrification”. These projects included a new metrorail system that demolished properties in Latino neighborhoods, investment in the arts to attract whiter, wealthier residents, and attention to detail of the aesthetic look of the city. The city unveiled a project entitled the Renaissance Plan in 2007, which recognized its highly Mexican community but detailed its goal to “integrate into the greater Orange County community” and “diversify”.

But despite the discrimination its faced, the Latino community responded in Santa Ana similar to the community in Lawrence. It witnessed the emergence of incredible support networks and organizations in response to the struggles Latinos face. Santa Ana became the first city to boast an all-Latino council, which is why it is often cited as an example of the emergence of the Latino City.

An important takeaway from the discussion is our skewed perception of immigrants, who, in the words of Dr. Barber, are actually “imperial migrants”. What many fail to recognize is that immigrants from Latin America are often seeking refuge from danger, discrimination, or poverty in their home countries — but the unstable nature of their communities at home is often a result of U.S. intervention or policies. In the post-war period, the U.S. played an incredibly influential role in the development of Caribbean nations. When analyzing the cause and effect of the influx of Latino immigrants, it is imperative to consider the history of American imperialism and the profound impact the U.S. had across the Americas.

In recounting their research, both González and Barber also repeatedly referenced the importance of activism in their communities. They both heavily cited support groups and networks that emerged in response to the policies implemented against Latinos, and they stressed the importance of collaboration and collective dissent in the face of hate and discrimination. The celebration of Latino history, culture, and community have become central initiatives in these communities and enable residents to celebrate their Latino cities in all their glory.