Spatial Analyses of Segregation Trends

Brown University, Providence RI

Investigators

Abstract

SES-1355693 John Logan Brown University This project analyzes the changes in residential patterns of European immigrants and African American migrants in ten major Northern and Midwestern cities. For the case of African Americans it will provide new detailed information about the trend toward increasing residential segregation that accompanied the Great Migration from the South. To what extent did individual socioeconomic mobility translate into living in more integrated or higher status neighborhoods for blacks? What was the response of whites to growing black population in certain parts of the city? For the case of European immigrants, the study will shed light on the process of spatial assimilation that has been documented in prior research. Were the earlier arriving groups (Germans, Irish, and British) still segregated from native whites when new groups began to arrive in large numbers? How long did it take for Italians, Russians, and Scandinavians to begin moving out of dense ethnic neighborhoods, and what were the characteristics of people who left or stayed within them? How did these processes vary across cities, based on group size or composition? The selection of cities for this study makes it possible to analyze both the spatial assimilation and segregation of immigrants, who were highly concentrated in these cities,. With respect to both kinds of minorities the study breaks new ground by studying segregation at a much higher spatial resolution (the enumeration district and census tract) than the ward (which is the basis for most research on segregation). A key comparison is between black-white segregation (believed to be moderate until after 1920 when blacks began moving in large numbers in the Great Migration) and immigrant residential enclaves that are viewed as transitory in nature. This project will offer a critical test of these conclusions and provide some of the first analyses of trends in class segregation. In addition, it will answer questions about the processes of residential change based on spatial analyses of neighborhoods. First, which group members lived in co-ethnic neighborhoods and how did social mobility and acculturation translate into living outside of these enclaves for different groups, in different kinds of cities, and in different decades)? For this purpose neighborhoods will be defined as combinations of enumeration districts based on spatial dependence in social composition. Neighborhoods, then, are expected to vary in location and scale over time as settlement patterns evolve. Second, how do neighborhoods change, particularly in relation to the invasion/succession process that has been documented for much of the 20th Century ? the phenomenon of native (3+ generation) whites deserting neighborhoods when blacks and immigrants began arriving. Were there tipping points of racial and ethnic change in the early decades of the century, and if so did the extent of white native flight differ according to the race and ethnicity of new arrivals? Broader Impacts These questions will be addressed using 100% samples of residents of ten cities in each decade, aggregated to small areas (enumeration districts) and mapped within a GIS system. The data and maps will be made available for public use via a web-based map browser and also shared through direct download. This study is highly relevant to major contemporary social concerns. Black ghettoization anchored patterns of racial segregation, and processes of immigrant spatial assimilation have been renewed as Hispanics and Asians have become the fastest growing population groups in the nation. It is essential to understand the precedents for these processes in order to have realistic expectations about the current situation.