Urban villages and local identities : Germans from Russia, Omaha Indians, and Vietnamese in Lincoln, Nebraska / Kurt E. Kinbacher ; plainsword by Timothy R. Mahoney.
Introduction: Ethnicity and Identity in Lincoln; Performed Culture; Ethnic Saliency; Urban Villages; Frameworks of this Study -- 1. Local Knowledge and National Perspectives : Ethnicities and the Mainstream in Lincoln -- Omaha Confinement and Disfranchisement -- Volga German Immigration -- Omahas Return to the Salt Basin -- Vietnamese Immigration -- Multiculturalism in the Modern Mainstream -- 2. Life in the Russian Bottoms : Community Building and Identity Transformation among Germans from Russia -- The Founding Generation -- "We Became Americanized" : The Second Fifty Years -- Survivals, Revivals, and a New German from Russia Identity -- Conclusion -- 3. From the Big Village to the Urban Village : Omahas in Lincoln -- Community -- Particularism : The Omaha Way -- Cosmopolitanism -- Transnationalism -- Conclusion -- 4. Vietnamese Urban Villagers in Lincoln : Clustered Communities and Flexible Identities -- Immigrant Communities -- Particularism -- Cosmopolitanism -- Transnationalism -- Conclusion -- 5. Comparisons : Identities and Communities during the Long Twentieth Century -- Pluralistic Communities -- Ethnicity and Race -- Transnationalism, Internationalism, and Nationalism -- Performed Culture -- Conclusion.
Summary:
"Urban Villages and Local Identities examines immigration to the Great Plains by surveying the experiences of three divergent ethnic groups--Volga Germans, Omaha Indians, and Vietnamese--that settled in enclaves in Lincoln, Nebraska, beginning in 1876, 1941, and 1975, respectively. These urban villages served as safe havens that protected new arrivals from a mainstream that often eschewed unfamiliar cultural practices. Lincoln's large Volga German population was last fully discussed in 1918; Omahas are rarely studied as urban people although sixy-five percent of their population lives in cities; and the growing body of work on Vietnamese tends to be conducted by social scientists rather than historians, few of whom contrast Southeast Asian experiences with those of earlier waves of immigration. As a comparative study, Urban Villages and Local Identities is inspired, in part, by Reinventing Free Labor, by Gunther Peck. By focusing on the experiences of three populations over the course of 130 years, Urban Villages connects two distinct eras of international border crossing and broadens the field of immigration to include Native Americans. Ultimately, the work yields insights into the complexity, flexibility, and durability of cultural identities among ethnic groups and the urban mainstream in one capital city"-- Provided by publisher.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.