On Thursday, September 27, the BU Center for Latin American Studies and the Initiative on Cities co-sponsored a discussion on the emergence and development of Latino communities in the heart of American cities. Jonathan Calvillo, Assistant Professor at Boston University, moderated the panel featuring Dr. Llana Barber, Professor at SUNY Old Westbury, and Erualdo González, Professor at California State University, Fullerton.
Dr. Barber’s book, Latino City: Immigration and Urban Crisis in Lawrence, Massachusetts, 1945–2000, explores the influx of Dominicans and Puerto Ricans to Lawrence, Massachusetts, and how their settlement has shaped the city. González’s book, Latino City: Urban Planning, Politics, and the Grassroots, traces the history of urban development in Santa Ana, California—one of the most highly populated Latino communities in the United States. Although their research focused on communities separated by thousands of miles, several similar themes emerged: the role that urban planning and development played in gentrifying Latino communities and, more importantly, the impact of activism and community engagement on strengthening bonds despite the hardships they faced.
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 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.
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 occurred 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.
Lawrence residents targeted Latino immigration as scapegoats during economic decline, 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 1980s and 1990s, after the peak of Lawrence’s recession.
“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 economic activity that the growing Latino population brought to Lawrence, white residents still blamed the influx of Latinos as the root of the city’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 shouldered the weight of the urban crisis at the time: heightened racial segregation, concentrated urban poverty, disinvestment, and decreased public funding. Many sought the American Dream, but economic and social hardship rendered them vulnerable.
Despite the setbacks they faced, Puerto Ricans and Dominicans formed activist networks, organizations, and grassroots movements which aligned their vision for social change. They developed a strong community that enabled them to make a home out of Lawrence.
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 gentrification, affects its majority working-class Latino population.
The current population of Santa Ana has reached 380,000, with nearly 80% Latino residents. In 1960, the city housed 100,000 residents with a 15% Latino population.
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.”
González cited the numerous projects that Santa Ana city council undertook in an attempt to reinvigorate the city from 1980-2000. But urban planners neglected its growing Latino community, using community development to attract a more “first class” population by pushing the Latino residents out.
By the 2000s, the city had experimented with multiple projects in an attempt to “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”.
Despite racial discrimination, the Latino community in Santa Ana responded similar to that of 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.
A key takeaway from the discussion is society’s skewed perception of immigrants, who, in the words of Dr. Barber, are “imperial migrants.” What many fail to recognize is that immigrants from Latin America often seek refuge from danger, discrimination, or poverty when the unstable nature of their their home countries stems from U.S. intervention. 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. created on policy 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.