The Book of the Immigrant: Greek American Guides as Mediators of Sociohistorical Knowledge

The first wave of Greek immigrants to the United States at the turn of the twentieth century published a wide range of Greek books. These include literary, instructional, religious, bilingual and monolingual texts, as well as community periodicals, journals and newspapers. This extensive variety of publications written by Greek Americans of that generation, in addition to those following, disproves the widespread stereotype that the first immigrants were ‘illiterate’. In fact, the first Greeks in America wanted to express themselves in various genres, be culturally active and adapted in their new social life.

My paper focuses on one particular genre that was created purposefully for Greek immigrants to America during the first decades of the 20^th century: the Greek American Guides. These manual books with advice for immigrants offer a combination of information and advice to orient the immigrants and integrate them into their new environment. The Guides represent the ambivalent and complicated perceptions that members of the Greek diaspora had towards their new home. While those written by the Greek American elite mediate America as the land of success, those by popular, anonymous authors express strong nostalgia for the home they left behind in Greece.

Based on socio-historical analysis of the material, I show that these books were crucial to the historical and cultural education of the immigrants. These books also complicated immigrants’ emotional and cultural identification with their old and new homes. Furthermore, I investigate the role of community leaders in creating popular knowledge for the new members of the immigrants’ community.