ABSTRACT
Assimilation into the American way of life has occurred for the majority of new arrivals to the nation within the urban environment. This common experience of ethnic groups in urban America is well documented by Robert F. Harney and Harold M. Troper in Immigrants: A Portrait. Ethnicity in the American urban setting has been the focus of numerous works in the last decade. New York, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Boston, and Philadelphia have been carefully examined to yield information about ethnic groups within their political boundaries. New York City is the location of Deborah D. Moore's At Home in America: Second Generation New York Jews. Assimilation into American society for Jewish families often means the possible loss of religious identity. The Kirks insist that only by viewing the interaction of the urban structure and the attitudes and values of immigrant groups can generalizations about immigrant behavior be made.
