Negotiating Local and Non-Local Identities: Chicago’s Jewish, Irish, and Czech Communities in the Great Depression and World War II

My paper explores the process whereby immigrant communities, by incorporating national and international events into local ethnic identities, bridge geographical boundaries to create “non-local” ethnic communities. Through my paper, I examine how local and non-local identities interacted, largely reinforcing each other.

Focusing on Chicago suburbs in the 1930s and early 1940s, I explore how German Jews, Irish Catholics, and Czech workers—groups who had already established strong local ethnic communities—were pulled into non-local ethnic communities because of events in Europe. These groups faced appeals from their European counterparts for aid and advocacy; one Jewish temple actually facilitated the immigration of a German rabbi to Chicago. Local priests and rabbis, furthermore, introduced their congregations to the global conflict on a personal level by becoming chaplains.

At the same time as these groups came to identify with a broader ethnic community, their interest in these larger ethnic issues reinforced their local ethnicity. All three groups used the existing structure of ethnic institutions to address conditions in Europe and the state of their ethnic diaspora, bringing local and non-local communities into dialogue with one another. It was through their churches and temples, for example, that these Catholics and Jews organized assistance and lobbied for U.S. intervention in Europe. Moreover, it was through these local institutions that Jews, Irish, and Czech suburbanites debated the interaction of these multiple identities—how did interest in Europe affect their identity as Americans? How did it change their perception by other Americans?

Ultimately, my paper illustrates the role of international events in forming local and non-local communities, at the same time as it reveals how these identities were able to reinforce each other through ethnic infrastructure.