Ethnoconsciousness and Political Powerlessness: Boston's Irish

A history of the city of Boston is in a real sense of history of ethnic enclaves and ethnic migratory patterns. As with the early English settlers, so with the later Irish, Italians, and Jews, each group entered at the bottom rung of the socioeconomic ladder gradually to climb up socioeconomically and out geographically into the suburbs. However, with each ethnic enclave, some did not middle-classify nor de-ethnicize. The Irish of South Boston are a living example of an intentional ethnic blue-collar community within the megalopolis. But can they survive? Should they be allowed to? Is their continuing existence an affront to the American Dream or is the survival of the Irish of South Boston in some way a genuine testing of the viability and legitimacy of American pluralism? To these questions, this paper is addressed.