How did the environment of living and working conditions of NYC in the early to mid-1900’s effect incoming Puerto Ricans health? Was it their fault or NYC’s for the outcomes? In this blogpost I will argue that the poor living and working conditions that were supplied for Puerto Rican immigrants, did in fact contribute greatly to their overall health and well-being. I will also argue about how they were perceived when immigrating into the country and how that led to this type of treatment and low standard of living.
To start off, why did Puerto Ricans
want to immigrate to the U.S. in the first place? They saw job opportunities, congressional
legislature, efficient transportation routes, a new way of life, a healthier
and more prosperous life. (pg. 28) Little did they know that they would be
looked down upon as this problem for NYC, and later deemed as “The Puerto Rican
Problem.” Puerto Ricans seen as a
problem to NYC because they were bringing in disease, living in densely
populated areas, and incorporated a dirty life style that was meant to ruin the
“NYC way of life.” Not many people
stopped to think that it was possibly NYC’s problem, and that it was the reason
there was a Puerto Rican problem. Puerto
Ricans were put up in the ghetto of public housing. I don’t know about you but that doesn’t seem
to clean to start off with! The U.S. was
looked at as the land of opportunity, not the land of stay cramped and get
by. Living in the conditions that they
had was what created this problem. Close
living quarters is a disease playground and combine that with high volumes of
people and then you have an unsanitary/dirty living environment. I believe that the Puerto Ricans were not the
reason for this, but the city itself and how they went about handling the
immigrants was.
Also looking into just the Puerto
Ricans personal health, it was not improved when they moved to the U.S. Many of the jobs that were given to Puerto
Ricans were blue collar. In 1930-36, the
highest numbers of job hiring’s were in laborers and construction, laundry and
factories. (pg. 33) I know from my experience with the topic of job safety and
health, that these are among the top when it comes to injury and disease. Puerto Ricans left in hopes of a better life
and to be settled down in a new job in a factory was not it. There
are immediate health risks such as personal injury due to equipment, exposure
to factory chemicals, sickness due to long hours of work, high prevalence of
asthma forming, etc. There were also
long term effects like respiratory problems and cancer later on in life. So I could ask the real question, did NYC
really turn out to be the sanctuary that most Puerto Ricans believed it to be?
Source: Sanchez Korrol, Virginia E. 1994. From Colonia to Community: The History of Puerto Ricans in New York
City. Ch. 2 [31]
I agree with the statements said by this blogger because till this day you can still see Latinos being mistreated and exploited because of their ethnicity. To answer the question at the end of the blog post I would like to say no because as stated in the blog posted Puerto Ricans were just thrown into public housing and placed in unsafe working conditions leading to unhealthy life style for these individuals. These neighborhoods that Puerto Ricans are placed in does not really promote a successful life style because of its dense populations. I find it very interesting how America treated Puerto Ricans so badly but they are the only Latino group that are considered to be American citizens. Do Americans really care if you are a citizen or do they just care if you are Latino/a? Does your ethnical background affect how you are perceived and treated in the United States? If you are an American citizen with a Latino background are you still going to be mistreated? Were Puerto Ricans just brought into the Unites States to complete labor Americans do not want to complete?
ReplyDelete-Emylie S.