登陆注册
5271400000062

第62章 CHAPTER XI IMMIGRANTS AND THEIR CHILDREN(2)

An overmastering desire to reveal the humbler immigrant parents to their own children lay at the base of what has come to be called the Hull-House Labor Museum. This was first suggested to my mind one early spring day when I saw an old Italian woman, her distaff against her homesick face, patiently spinning a thread by the simple stick spindle so reminiscent of all southern Europe. I was walking down Polk Street, perturbed in spirit, because it seemed so difficult to come into genuine relations with the Italian women and because they themselves so often lost their hold upon their Americanized children. It seemed to me that Hull-House ought to be able to devise some educational enterprise which should build a bridge between European and American experiences in such wise as to give them both more meaning and a sense of relation. I meditated that perhaps the power to see life as a whole is more needed in the immigrant quarter of a large city than anywhere else, and that the lack of this power is the most fruitful source of misunderstanding between European immigrants and their children, as it is between them and their American neighbors; and why should that chasm between fathers and sons, yawning at the feet of each generation, be made so unnecessarily cruel and impassable to these bewildered immigrants? Suddenly I looked up and saw the old woman with her distaff, sitting in the sun on the steps of a tenement house. She might have served as a model for one of Michelangelo's Fates, but her face brightened as I passed and, holding up her spindle for me to see, she called out that when she had spun a little more yarn, she would knit a pair of stockings for her goddaughter.

The occupation of the old woman gave me the clue that was needed.

Could we not interest the young people working in the neighborhood factories in these older forms of industry, so that, through their own parents and grandparents, they would find a dramatic representation of the inherited resources of their daily occupation. If these young people could actually see that the complicated machinery of the factory had been evolved from simple tools, they might at least make a beginning toward that education which Dr. Dewey defines as "a continuing reconstruction of experience." They might also lay a foundation for reverence of the past which Goethe declares to be the basis of all sound progress.

My exciting walk on Polk Street was followed by many talks with Dr. Dewey and with one of the teachers in his school who was a resident at Hull-House. Within a month a room was fitted up to which we might invite those of our neighbors who were possessed of old crafts and who were eager to use them.

We found in the immediate neighborhood at least four varieties of these most primitive methods of spinning and three distinct variations of the same spindle in connection with wheels. It was possible to put these seven into historic sequence and order and to connect the whole with the present method of factory spinning.

The same thing was done for weaving, and on every Saturday evening a little exhibit was made of these various forms of labor in the textile industry. Within one room a Syrian woman, a Greek, an Italian, a Russian, and an Irishwoman enabled even the most casual observer to see that there is no break in orderly evolution if we look at history from the industrial standpoint; that industry develops similarly and peacefully year by year among the workers of each nation, heedless of differences in language, religion, and political experiences.

And then we grew ambitious and arranged lectures upon industrial history. I remember that after an interesting lecture upon the industrial revolution in England and a portrayal of the appalling conditions throughout the weaving districts of the north, which resulted from the hasty gathering of the weavers into the new towns, a Russian tailor in the audience was moved to make a speech. He suggested that whereas time had done much to alleviate the first difficulties in the transition of weaving from hand work to steam power, that in the application of steam to sewing we are still in our first stages, illustrated by the isolated woman who tries to support herself by hand needlework at home until driven out by starvation, as many of the hand weavers had been.

The historical analogy seemed to bring a certain comfort to the tailor, as did a chart upon the wall showing the infinitesimal amount of time that steam had been applied to manufacturing processes compared to the centuries of hand labor. Human progress is slow and perhaps never more cruel than in the advance of industry, but is not the worker comforted by knowing that other historical periods have existed similar to the one in which he finds himself, and that the readjustment may be shortened and alleviated by judicious action; and is he not entitled to the solace which an artistic portrayal of the situation might give him? I remember the evening of the tailor's speech that I felt reproached because no poet or artist has endeared the sweaters' victim to us as George Eliot has made us love the belated weaver, Silas Marner. The textile museum is connected directly with the basket weaving, sewing, millinery, embroidery, and dressmaking constantly being taught at Hull-House, and so far as possible with the other educational departments; we have also been able to make a collection of products, of early implements, and of photographs which are full of suggestion. Yet far beyond its direct educational value, we prize it because it so often puts the immigrants into the position of teachers, and we imagine that it affords them a pleasant change from the tutelage in which all Americans, including their own children, are so apt to hold them.

同类推荐
  • 五代春秋

    五代春秋

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 云栖法汇

    云栖法汇

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 权谋残卷

    权谋残卷

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 拳学要义

    拳学要义

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 清代野记

    清代野记

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 一生要避开的26个心灵陷阱

    一生要避开的26个心灵陷阱

    “《正向力:一生要避开的26个心灵陷阱》由墨墨编著。世间陷阱是有形的,即使涉世不深,只要带着防范之心审慎行事,也不至轻易受骗。最难防范的是我们自身心中各种无形的陷阱。倘若不加警惕与辨别,那我们的一生,就会从这个陷阱落入那个陷阱,永远暗无天日。永远遭受伤害。我们应仔细审查内心,发现陷阱所在。同时,培养正知正念的力量,彻底清除陷阱,而不是简单地在表面掩盖一番,那样就会埋下更深的隐患,更重的危机。《正向力:一生要避开的26个心灵陷阱》就将告诉你一生要避开的26个心灵陷阱!”
  • 超级巨星,我的绯闻男友

    超级巨星,我的绯闻男友

    都说三个女人一台戏。那么问题来了,三个男人凑在一起呢?......安初晴活了二十几年,一直很普通。她谈过三次恋爱。但是某一天,前男友一二三跟商量好了似的一个一个跳了出来,把她的生活弄了个天翻地覆。“我们复合吧。”“跟我结婚,我需要一个妻子。”“......我爱你。”安初晴觉着,自己可能会被四分五裂......--情节虚构,请勿模仿
  • 四季飘香

    四季飘香

    一个崭新的时代即将到来,更多的赋予了年轻一代的拼搏机会,同时酸甜苦辣滋味百态的人生,考验了他们坚强的毅力和命运的不同选择。
  • 青玉

    青玉

    青玉出狱那阵儿,学校里只剩下一个正常上课的老师刘文俊,他是老师校长一肩挑。当然挑得不会潇洒,趔趔趄趄的。只有区区十来个学生娃,在校园里打打闹闹,距散坛只有一步之遥。村民们在四板桥头超市门前打麻将,都能听得见刘四眼一天到晚的叹息声。刘文俊往中心校去反映,领导双手一摊,说你要是缺个办公用品、课辅资料,甚至电脑,都可以供应,唯独这缺学生与老师,真是爱莫能助。你想想,有条件的娃儿都去了城里念书;老师呢,也都不愿呆在这乡旮旯里,这也是形势撵的,怪不得你。
  • 送韦弇

    送韦弇

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 千家诗

    千家诗

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 哈佛财商课大全集(超值金版)

    哈佛财商课大全集(超值金版)

    年轻人如今所承受的物质压力,似乎产生的种种问题都于钱有关:住房、教育、出行……似乎有了钱就可以解决掉一切问题。但不管事实是否如此,钱的重要性不言而喻。 钱,本身无所谓善恶,我们追求金钱也无可非议。并且生活在如今社会中,想要过上好生活,是不可能离开钱的。吃穿住行、看病吃药、看演出、逛街游玩……样样都离不开钱。钱,是享受生活的一个先决条件。
  • 认识自己

    认识自己

    你认识自己吗?当你听到这个问题的时候,是不是感到很惊讶呢?谁能不认识自己呢?每一个人都希望自己的一生是幸福和成功的,是有效率的。只有真正清醒地认识自己,才有可能获得成功的人生。而认识自己,却是一件非常难做到的事。在急剧变革的今天,面对色彩斑驳日渐月新,认识自己更是件困难的事情。有句话说得好,“万千皆识,唯有辩自己”。
  • 妖精与死神

    妖精与死神

    渡尽劫难兄弟在,相逢一笑泯恩仇。一壶浊酒,饮尽此生,一抹柔情,荡涤乾坤。......且看少年少女们荡气回肠的修真之路。
  • 神魔之盛世红莲

    神魔之盛世红莲

    新书《香骨妖姬》已发,请多多支持!新婚之夜,她把诛魔剑插入他的胸膛。他深深的看着她,没有愤怒,没有惊讶,只有平静。他问:“为什么?”她说:“我爱的是帝君。”一把诛魔,一弯射神,两朵古莲,一尾白鱼,一只红狐。远古神话,强大力量,看不同界族的他们,如何活出属于自己的人生!