The Seeds Are Planted
The first significant wave of Sicilian immigrants to the United States began in the late 1880s. Before 1880 less than 1,000 Sicilians immigrated to America per year. But by 1906 over 100,000 Sicilians left Sicily for the States in that year alone. Ultimately, out of the 4.5 million Italians that immigrated to the United States between the years 1880 and 1930, one out of every four was a Sicilian. The immigrants represented virtually every area in Sicily. The numbers would have been higher but for the passage of the U.S. Immigration Act of 1924. The Act reduced the number of persons allowed to immigrate to the United States from Italy to 3,845.
The surge of Italian immigrants to the United States happened for several reasons. After the unification of Italy was completed in 1870, Sicilians were confident their lot would improve after centuries of la miseria. However, they were soon disillusioned. Sicily suffered a series of agricultural crises, which precipitated a sharp drop in the grain and citrus markets. The discovery of sulfur in America greatly reduced Sicily's role in foreign markets. In addition, there was widespread economic exploitation of the Sicilians, who were heavily taxed under the new government.
Eventually, the Sicilians banded together against the intolerable conditions, largely in the form of peasants' and workers' organizations termed mutual aid societies (mutuo soccorso). The mutual aid societies contributed in part to the formation of the Fasci, a Socialist-directed movement. By the 1890s, the Fasci movement was a powerful force, with revolts that were increasingly threatening to those in power. Between the years 1892 and 1894, the Fasci was forcibly suppressed by the government and ordered to disband. Many of the former leaders of the movement fled to the United States, while other immigrants responded to the deteriorating economic conditions, from which they saw no relief.
Settlement Patterns
The main areas of Sicilian settlement in the United States included the major industrial centers of the country including New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, California, Illinois, and some parts of the South, including Louisiana and Texas. The heaviest concentrations of Sicilian Americans were in New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, Boston, New Orleans, and San Francisco, where jobs for unskilled workers were readily available. Sicilians also migrated to rural areas such as Bryan, Texas, where over 3,000 Sicilians had settled by the 1890s.
This generation of Sicilian immigrants tended to cluster together in groups according to the regions from which they had emigrated. In New York City, those emigrating from the village of Cinisi huddled together on East 69th Street, while larger sections like Elizabeth Street contained emigrants from several different areas including Sciacca and Palermo. Sicilians from fishing villages settled in Boston on North Street, while others settled in San Francisco's North Beach. Many of the districts were soon regarded as "Little Italy." Sicilians in Chicago congregated in an area known as "Little Sicily," and those in New Orleans lived in a district dubbed "Little Palermo."
While large proportions of Sicilian Americans continue to live in urban areas, subsequent generations of Sicilian Americans gradually moved away from the old neighborhoods. Economic prosperity has enabled many to own their own houses in the suburbs, a fulfillment of the dreams of their immigrant grandparents.
Acculturation and Assimilation
Many of the earliest immigrants from Sicily were young males or heads of households who intended to work for a short time in the United States before returning to Sicily. After several years of working, over half would eventually send for their families and permanently establish themselves in various cities across the country. In a “chain migration,” other families from the village would then immigrate to the same area. There was subsequently little assimilation at first, even among Sicilians who had emigrated from different regions.
The early Sicilian immigrants held fast to the various dialects and celebrations of their native villages. Many never learned to speak English at all, and there was little intermarriage with other immigrant groups. Sheltered from the larger culture, the "Little Sicilies" that the immigrants created mimicked the world they had left behind. Mutual aid societies like the Caltanisetta (Sicily) Society in Baltimore and the Trinacria Fratellanza Siciliana in Chicago aided the immigrants with housing, employment, and general acclimation. Sicilian cuisine and entertainment could be found in virtually every Sicilian settlement area. Sicilian dances and songs were performed at the local music halls, in addition to a number of puppet shows, a traditional Sicilian entertainment. Agrippino Manteo's widely popular "Papa Manteo's Life-Size Marionettes," attracted large Sicilian audiences throughout the early part of the twentieth century. Weekly newspapers like the Corriere Siciliano (The Sicilian Courier) brought the Sicilian immigrants news from Sicily. Religious belief was split between the Roman Catholic faith and the Greek Orthodox faith, with the former claiming the larger adherents among the Sicilian populations.
The Sicilians' seemingly stubborn resistance to assimilation was fueled in part by the hatred they aroused in their new country. Many Americans believed Sicilians were an "inferior race" destined to remain in ignorance and poverty. The prejudice that this belief encouraged generated a vicious cycle of limited economic and educational opportunities. Foremost among those who spurned the Sicilians were the earlier arrivals from northern Italy. The traditional animosity between the northern and southern Italians spilled over into the new land. Northern Italians, who had a greater number of skilled laborers among them, were, therefore, more likely to land higher-paying jobs than Sicilians, the majority of whom were peasants. Furthermore, northern Italian immigrants were more established in the New World and had begun to achieve a relative degree of prosperity. They were reluctant to be lumped with the newly arrived Sicilians, who they had long considered inferior to them. Consequently, they struggled to disassociate themselves from the Sicilian immigrants. In many instances, the northern Italians would move out of neighborhoods when the Sicilians began to populate them. A 1975 article by F. Ianni and E. Reuss in Psychology Today quotes a northern Italian immigrant: "Trust family first, relatives second, Sicilians third, and after that, forget it."
But if the northern Italians were suspicious and dismissive of the Sicilians, then the rest of America was openly hostile. Sicilians were labeled "dirty," "diseased," and "political anarchists," and were accused of introducing a criminal element into the United States, namely the Mafia. The notorious underworld activities of Sicilian Americans such as Charles "Lucky" Luciano were duly reported in newspapers across the United States. The image of the Sicilian "mobster" had devastating consequences for all Sicilians. Numerous innocent Sicilians were charged and convicted of heinous crimes, usually with flimsy circumstantial evidence to support their cases. When the jury system failed to convict, citizens took matters into their own hands. A case in point occurred in 1891 in New Orleans, Louisiana, where 11 Sicilians were lynched by a mob of "good citizens," outraged at the not-guilty verdict returned in a trial. Similar incidents on a smaller scale occurred in other towns throughout Louisiana well into the next century.
Given the amount of hatred these first Sicilian immigrants encountered in the New World, it is not surprising that they preferred to remain in sheltered enclaves surrounded by familiar village dialects and customs. Even as other immigrants began to consider themselves "Americans," Sicilians continued to identify themselves by their particular villages. Neither were they entirely sure of their place in the emerging Italian American culture. Although the United States grouped Sicilians under the category of "Italians," Sicilians were reluctant to do so. The unification with Italy and Sicily was less than 100 years old, and the bitterness it had wrought ran deep among Sicilians. However, second and third-generation Sicilian Americans were less concerned with such distinctions and were more apt to label themselves "Italian Americans."
Ultimately, Sicilian immigrants followed an assimilation pattern similar to northern Italians, albeit at a noticeably slower rate. As educational opportunities increased, so too did economic opportunities. As with Italian Americans overall, Sicilians proved they were "American" in the fullest sense of the word during World War II. Sicilian Americans were able to provide crucial military aid, particularly during the Sicilian campaign of 1943. World War II marked something of a turning point as second-and third-generation Sicilians achieved financial security and social acceptance. Although images of mafia lords continue to dog the Sicilians, they are far from being the victims of the hatred and discrimination they once were.
Family and Community Dynamics
In Sicily, the family was a strong defense against the desperate and unrelieved poverty that characterized life. Each family member contributed to the all-encompassing and often heartbreaking effort to survive. First loyalties were reserved for the closest kin (casa). This was an economic necessity as each family competed with other families for survival. Resolutely patriarchal, the family deferred to the father on every decision. But the mother's role in the family was also important; while she did not possess an equal share of the authority, she nevertheless had the important task of running the household. Children were expected to share the responsibilities of maintaining the household from an early age.
A new emphasis was placed on extended relatives during the immigration process. Although the economic competition in Sicily fostered less of a sense of cooperation beyond the casa, a distinction was generally made for a second tier of kin (parenti). While the parenti played a peripheral role in Sicily, they became an important factor in immigrants' lives, in many cases becoming the first link in a migration chain. The parenti provided much-needed emotional and financial support, eventually commanding almost as much loyalty as the casa.
Many Sicilians, however, felt that family loyalty as a whole suffered as a consequence of migration to the United States. The early Sicilian immigrants attempted to duplicate traditional Sicilian family patterns in the New World. This was especially true among the Italo-Greeks, whose Orthodox Christian faith emphasized the biological family unit as a domestic Church, which intimately linked it to the family’s parish Church, and through that, to the wider Italo-Greek Orthodox Christian communities both in the United States and back home in Sicily. These Italo-Greek Orthodox communities, while priestless for many years, nevertheless provided a sense of unity and cohesion for the Italo-Greeks that allowed them to continue their long-held traditions, values, and beliefs, especially those related to faith and family.
Divergence Between Catholic and Orthodox Familial Bonds
In both the Roman Catholic and Italo-Greek Orthodox familial constructs, men continued to exert the greater share of authority, at least on the surface, while the women ran the households. Children continued to contribute to the economic support of the family from an early age. However, among Roman Catholic Sicilians, there were important changes that occurred with migration. Frequently the women, both wives and daughters, worked outside of the home. Mothers could no longer supervise their children in the manner they were accustomed to in Sicily. First, the children went to school, and from there they were pulled out as soon as possible to go to work. As the children of the immigrants began to absorb American ways, they felt increasingly resentful of the expectations of their parents. The children began to question the old ways, such as automatically turning over their wages to their parents. The parents in turn felt betrayed by what they felt was the children's lack of respect for the family. The gap between the immigrants and their children continued to widen and foster tensions as the children grew more "Americanized." As these first immigrants passed on, however, traditional Sicilian family values gradually waned and the distinctions that marked a Sicilian family became less apparent.
Among Orthodox Christian Sicilians, however, traditional family values have, for the most part, endured unabated. Most Italo-Greeks live as nuclear families in a single household; however, the extended family is kept close and visited often. In some cases, more than two generations may live together. This usually occurs when aging parents and grandparents have moved in to live and be cared for by the core family unit. Nursing homes and residential care are viewed negatively; if Italo-Greeks must live in a nursing home, their children are expected to make all arrangements for them, visit them often, and ensure their proper care.
In Italo-Greek culture, age conveys authority in Italo-Greek families, and society at large. The elderly are treated with the utmost respect and are consulted when any major decision is made. Most people are taught never to talk back or argue with the opinions of those older than them. Italo-Greek parents generally have a lot of influence over their children throughout their lives and are deeply devoted to them. Indeed, Italo-Greek children often live in their parent’s homes for years into their adulthood. Newlywed couples may also live in the home of their in-laws until they can find or afford their own housing.
The ‘nonna’ (grandmother) and ‘nannu’ (grandfather) play a particularly important role in child raising, often looking after a child whenever parents are unavailable. Many Italo-Greeks also have a pair of godparents that are chosen at their birth. The choice of ‘cummari’ (godmother) and ‘cumpari’ (godfather) is particularly significant because it represents the solidification of a friendship within the inner family. It is expected that grandparents and godparents will take responsibility to ensure that a child brought up in the Orthodox Christian faith, finishes their education, and enters the workforce if anything renders their parents unable to care for them.
Gender Roles
Italo-Greek society has been traditionally male-dominated. There has been quite a masculine ideal of men cast as the strong provider for the family. Many Italo-Greek men today continue to feel that it is their responsibility to be the provider and breadwinner for their family. While Italo-Greek society is still very patriarchal, women have nevertheless attained equality that has enhanced the Italo-Greek understanding of family and marital relationships. While some Italo-Greek men may feel that it is emasculating to have their wives earn more than themselves, most Italo-Greek men today are accepting of and even encouraging their spouses to contribute equally to the household and make their own way in the world. Today, most Italo-Greek women receive a high level of education and work to contribute to the household income and Italo-Greek men share in the household responsibilities. This has led to more stable and enduring marriages.
Relationships and Marriage
Marriage is a highly respected institution in Italo-Greek society, especially among devout Orthodox Catholic Christians. The dynamics of a couple’s engagement and union have changed little with modern times. It is not uncommon, even today, for a man to ask a woman’s parents for permission to marry her. Though this may be more symbolic, it nevertheless is still a sign of respect and reflects the important role that family plays in Italo-Greek culture. Once permission is given, the couple then embarks on a long period of engagement (at least a year) in which they became more acquainted with each other. Italo-Greek betrothal and marriage customs have remained intact to this day. For example, when a couple gets engaged, the betrothal is celebrated as an important family and Church event. A couple’s engagement is a very formal affair in Italo-Greek society, with it being solemnized in a Service of Betrothal celebrated publicly in front of witnesses and the Christian community in the parish church. A couple's engagement normally lasts about a year, after which time the marriage is solemnized in the Church.
While most Italo-Greek parents rarely exercise control over their children’s choice of partners, the acceptance of a child’s marriage partner by his or her parents is still highly regarded and thought of. In the past, it was unheard of for engaged Italo-Greek couples to live together prior to their marriage (crowning) but the custom of engaged couples living together but not engaging in sexual activity has become common practice.
De facto relationships, common law marriages, and civil marriages alone are not recognized in Italo-Greek society; all marriages must be blessed by the Church in order for the marriage to be considered valid in the eyes of Italo-Greek families and society.
The average age of marriage in Italo-Greek society is 20 to 26 for women and 25 to 35 for men. Divorce is still frowned upon and in those cases where it is permitted, an individual may only remarry once, although the marriage service in the Church is more penitential and low-keyed.
Regardless of whether a Sicilian is Roman Catholic or Orthodox Catholic, “la famiglia” nevertheless continues to play an important role in the lives of Sicilian Americans today.
Religion and Faith
