Italian-Americans in the United States This pape

This paper will discuss the history and experience of Italian-Americans in the United States since the beginning of European exploration. The first part of the paper will briefly provide a history of Italian immigrants in America. The second part of the paper will discuss the culture and lifestyle of Italian immigrants in the United States. The third part of the paper will examine some of the more famous stereotypes of Italian-Americans. The fourth and fifth parts of the paper will describe the acculturation and assimilation of Italian-Americans into the larger American culture.

Italian explorers were among the first to discover the "New World" in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries. The most famous of these explorers was, of course, Christopher Columbus, whose initial voyage in 1492 explored islands in the Caribbean. Columbus has long been celebrated for his "discovery" and most traditional surveys of United States history begin with his voyages. Although he sailed under the flag of Spain, he is generally thought to have been born in Genoa to Italian parents. Thus, the holiday set aside in the United States commemorating his accomplishments is widely regarded as an "Italian American" holiday, with large parades and celebrations in the Italian quarters of large cities. Following Columbus' voyage, many Italians began exploring the new territory, although these territories were claimed by Spain, France, and Great Britain. T

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-Americans replaced the first (Nelli, 1983, pp. 123-27). Although almost all of the Italian immigrants were at least nominally Catholic, their relationship with the Catholic Church in the United States was often problematic. The U.S. church was controlled by Irish-Americans, who were zealously devoted to their faith after centuries of religious persecution by the British. The Church in Italy, on the other hand, had always enjoyed a privileged and somewhat despised status. Thus, nationalism and religion were opposing forces for the Italian immigrants, while they were one and the same for the Irish Church leaders. The numerous Italian feast days more often represented opportunities for celebration than religious devotions and the Irish leadership in the American Church viewed the Italian immigrants as falling away from their faith. Italian-Americans did, on the whole, remain faithful to Catholicism but did not devote themselves to it (Nelli, 1983, pp. 127-30). As noted above, Italian immigrants went to great lengths to assimilate into the larger American culture, with the second generation Italian-Americans largely turning away from their Italian cultural heritage. Children of immigrants, especially, felt themselves to be
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Approximate Word count = 3257
Approximate Pages = 13 (250 words per page)