Another St. Patrick’s Day is upon us. And despite the stereotypes of leprechauns and pots’o’gold, Irish Americans will proudly show off their green and hoist a pint. Each surely aware of how their ancestors overcame oppression and famine to become a glowing success in American society. The media will be awash in positive Irish movies and celebrations.
Unlike Italian Americans who struggle to defend the legacy of Christopher Columbus from myth and distortion, the Irish patron saint thrives on myth and shuns historical accuracy. To wit: he drove out the snakes of Ireland and converted the pagan Irish using the shamrock to explain the Trinity. That Patrick was a Roman of Italic stock, kidnapped from England as a teen by Irish pirates doesn’t figure big in the festivities.
of Irish accomplishments
In 1995, scholar Thomas Cahill found a publisher for his book with the seductive title, How the Irish Saved Civilization. It became a bestseller, spent nearly two years on the New York Times best-seller list, and sold around two million copies thus far. According to AI the book continues to be relevant, finding its way into reading lists for world history courses. I’m sure it’s also among the educational gifts with which Irish grandparents inspire their adolescent grandkids.
I would guess that Cahill sold most of his books to Irish Americans. (Would Italian Americans support a book titled How Italians Saved Civilization? Ask any Italian American activist what publishers have constantly told them: ‘Italians don’t buy books.’ But that’s a topic for another day.)
the right way.
Cahill’s book has been criticized as simplistic. It was rejected by five publishing houses before it was accepted by Nan A. Talese at Doubleday in 1991. Nan (née Ahearn) has Irish roots but is married to Italian American author Gay Talese. So, Cahill had a sympathetic landsman. The story he unfolds is true enough, Irish monks did copy Greco-Roman manuscripts during the Dark Ages. However, they weren’t the only monks or scholars ‘saving civilization’ in Europe. Moreover, who taught those Irish monks to read and write Latin? – that began with the Roman St. Patrick.
Historically, Ireland was never the seat of civilization, nor did the Irish have a ‘renaissance.’ Even after independence from Great Britain in 1922 they never amounted to anything until they joined the European Union in 1999 and received billions of euros to modernize. Even then, in 2008, they needed another costly bailout by the EU and the International Monetary Fund. Thereafter they cleverly attracted 9 out of 10 major pharmaceutical companies with a bargain corporate tax rate and an educated population that spoke English. Today, the Irish rank 2nd in European per capita income ($133,895), #4 is tiny San Marino ($86,989), with Italy coming in #18 ($56,905).
Sgt Quincannon,
the hard-drinking Irish patriot
But the Irish have plenty to be proud of right here in America. Their awakening and greatness were here. Their practical intellect and ability to network established the American Catholic Church and parochial school system, they quickly took control of police forces, unions, and politics in major cities within decades of arrival. By 1961 they had an Irish president (JFK). Even Jewish-dominated Hollywood sang their praises with positive movie images, from idyllic Irish priests (Bing Crosby, Pat O’Brien) to heroic, hard-drinking soldiers winning the West and all our wars. Even their cinematic criminals came from honest families who were victims of society not their own nature.
I can’t resist juxtaposing what the Irish accomplished with our ‘community.’ Italy was, in fact, the seat and savior of civilization. Our ancestors launched the Renaissance and opened the New World. Nevertheless, whatever great deeds we accomplished for humanity or for America a perverse minority of filmmakers managed to suppress and distort into stereotypes. Try finding an Italian American in Hollywood hoisting a Chianti for Columbus next October.
Although they remain susceptible to some stereotypes, Irish Americans are not overwhelmed by them, nor do they have a clique of professional defamers grinding out negative media images as Italian Americans have. Whitey Bolger will never reach the heights of John Gotti. An arrest of an 85-year-old wise guy for illegal gambling will always grab more headlines than stories of endemic alcoholism or predatory priests.
If I’m wearing green today, it’s for envy. -JLM
With Brexit, Ireland became the recipient of unexpected monies and growth….since the UK and London in particular lost its mainland markets so had to switch many of their international headquarters to Dublin to interact with the mainland…..I keep thinking that Ulster who also voted to stay in the common market may find affinity with their Catholic neighbors…and form a federation of sorts……naturally religious hatred, no pun intended trumps rationality for sure so we will see.
As for positive identity, just finished watching the U.S. premier of an amazing documentary, The Little Fellow: the legacy of A P Giannini…..it was presented at San Jose’s Cinequest. It was directed by Davide Fiore, and I could connect you if your interested. It is a true revelation as to his accomplishments, and vision.. It even highlighted the fact that even up to establishing the Bank of American well into the 1950’s, his critics continued to use ethnic attack when they could not attack his solid business practices.
It is titled “The little fellow” because A P Giannini had faith in the little fellows and not the patrician bankers (totally WASP controlled). Giannini built the workers, immigrants and even woman into a large economic force that made the banking establishment very uncomfortable…hence the ethnic dispersions……he overcame it all, and what a legacy and role model, and all without a formal business degree!!!!
It is well known that he rescued the production of Gone With the Wind from bankruptcy, and invested in Disney animation…so I wonder, would he have invested in The Godfather????.ps just to toute the neighborhood….A P was born in San Jose and lived through an amazing epoch from rural Alviso/San Jose int the 1880’s to the world stage post WW II …..totally unbelievable and brilliant…I also might add the director’s challenge in funding the film, is a story within a story…and highlights the lack of available funds in our so called community, for these and similar projects. .
Paul Moses, a former Newsday city editor with mixed Italian and Jewish ancestry and an Irish-American wife, wrote a book about the relationship between the Irish and the Italians (“An Unlikely Union: The Love-Hate Story of New York’s Irish and Italians“) that I would highly recommend.
The relationship, he notes, had been highly laced with prejudice but since the end of World War II has become mostly harmonious, spurred by many mixed Irish-Italian marriages (including my own) and a realization that the two groups have much in common.
Both came to America in desperate poverty, uneducated, with few skills and were despised by the “real” Americans (i.e., white Protestants). Both were largely agricultural people, mostly forced into city life. And, of course, both were Catholics.
True, the Irish had one big advantage: they spoke English. But as Mancini points out, they also quickly got into influential positions in religion, politics, law enforcement, etc. They stuck together and rarely fought among themselves. And they made alliances with other groups. That could be why they did so well in the movies.
The Italians, on the other hand, brought with them the concept of campanilismo: don’t trust anyone from the next town or even out of the immediate family. They almost never made alliances, not even with other Italians. There may have been justifications for this attitude in Italy, but not here. Hence, the Irish advantage.
So I share Mancini’s sense of envy. Erin go bragh.
Very interesting. I’ve had to constantly defend my Italian ancestry to friends, co workers and even my sister in law. I also have Irish ancestry. I get far less disparaging lectures or comments. In fact, when these same people find out I have some Irish ancestry, they start praising it. There is suddenly more respect… It’s as if that will wipe away any insults or ignorant comments about my Italian ancestry!! Or I’m suddenly okay…
The Irish get green love, we get “The Green Book.” Not a fair trade-off.
There can be no doubt that systemic racism was prevalent within the American Catholic Church and hierarchy until well into the 20th century. This resulted in Italian Americans and Polish Americans (and probably other ethnic groups as well) establishing their own parishes and schools. Mark Twain once composed a little poem that he believed summarized the hypocritical relationship the Pilgrims had with the Native Americans, which is: “First they fell upon their knees, and then upon the aborigine”. Substitute “Italiani” for aborigine and that would not be an unreasonable analogy of the attitude that prevailed within the American Catholic Church of an earlier era.