A lively, street-level history of turn-of-the-century urban life explores the Americanizing influence of the Irish on successive waves of migrants to the American city. Historian James R. Barrett chronicles how a new urban American identity was forged in the interactions between immigrants in the streets, saloons, churches, and workplaces of the American city. For good or ill, Barrett contends, this process of Americanization was shaped largely by the Irish. From Boston to Chicago, newer waves of immigrants and African Americans found it nearly impossible to avoid the entrenched Irish. While historians have long emphasized the role of settlement houses and other mainstream institutions in Americanizing immigrants, Barrett makes the original case that the culture absorbed by newcomers had a distinctly Hibernian cast. Drawing on contemporary sociological studies, Irish American literature, and newspaper accounts, The Irish Way recounts how the interactions between the Irish and later immigrants helped to forge a multiethnic American identity that has a profound legacy in our cities today.--From publisher description.

The street -- The parish -- The workplace -- The stage -- The machine -- The nation.