Dissertation Information for Josh A. SidesNAME:
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SCHOOL: ADVISORS: COMMITTEE MEMBERS: MPACT Status: Incomplete - Not_Inspected Title: Working away: African American migration and community in Los Angeles from the Great Depression to 1954 Abstract: This dissertation explores the social, political, and economic dimensions of the migration of African Americans from the southern United States to Los Angeles, California from the Great Depression through the early 1950s. In their origins, their life experiences, and their motivations, African American migrants to Los Angeles differed qualitatively from those African Americans who migrated to the North during the "Great Migration" of World War I. Furthermore, the history of industrial development, organized labor, and race relations in Los Angeles created a unique destination for African-American migrants. In pre-World War II Los Angeles, the city's relatively slow pace of industrialization, the profound weakness of organized labor, and the abundant labor pool created by the large Mexican immigrant population severely limited economic opportunities for African Americans. On the other hand, prewar Los Angeles compared favorably to virtually all other American cities in terms of the residential segregation of African Americans. During World War II rapid industrial expansion and aggressive civil rights activity on the part of African Americans and certain industrial unions brought expanded industrial employment opportunities for African Americans. But the concentration of African Americans in the least skilled, least stable, and lowest paying industrial jobs severely crippled black economic opportunity after World War II. Limited economic opportunities, a vastly expanded black population, and the changing social status of other minority groups in Los Angeles all contributed to the growing social and spatial isolation of African Americans in the postwar era. In the two decades after World War II African Americans in Los Angeles became more segregated than they had ever been, though they were still less segregated than African Americans in many other American cities with large black populations. |
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