This is the sixth in a seven-part series on Somerville bystudents enrolled in Sociology 149A, Organizing Urban Communities,taught by Professor Susan Ostrander.
The Miriam Webster's Dictionary defines "diverse" simply as"differing from one another, and "composed of distinct or uniqueelements or qualities." Abiding by such definition, almost anyplace in the planet can be argued as diverse -- because to myknowledge, there is no place where people all are share exactly thesame qualities.
However, when we speak of diversity in the United States ofAmerica in the year 2004, we usually mean a racial, ethnic andeconomically mixed environment where people come from all differentparts of the world, look and dress differently, speak differentlanguages, are of different age brackets, and come from manydifferent economic and social classes. Some, however, argue thatdiversity in this country is defined as anything but WhiteAnglo-Saxon Protestant. But what about our own backyard... isSomerville really a diverse city?
According to the 2000 U.S. Census, 80 percent of Somerville's77,478 residents identify themselves as white, 7.9 percent asblack, 8.8 percent as Latino, and 7.2 percent Asian. About half ofSomerville's black residents identify as West Indian (e.g.,Haitian) making Somerville's black-American population quite small.Amongst the white population, there are many people of Italian,Irish, Portuguese, British and German ancestry.
The median household income in Somerville is around $32,400. Tenpercent of Somerville households have an income of less than$10,000, another ten percent make $15,000-$25,000, 17.5 percentmake $35,000-$50,000, and 21 percent make $50,000-$75,000.
According to the city's own data (see www.ci.somerville.ma.us),people in Somerville have a wide variety of jobs in differentindustries including construction, retail trade, transportation,education, health, and social services. 26 percent of Somerville'sresidents work in educational, health and social services, 18percent work in professional scientific, management,administrative, and waste management services, eight percent areinvolved in retail trade, seven percent in manufacturing, anotherseven percent work in the real estate and finance businesses, fivepercent in transportation, three percent in construction, andanother three percent work in public administration.
At home, 64 percent of Somerville residents only speak English.Eight percent of residents speak only Spanish. However, the 2000U.S. Census also reports that thirty-five percent of people inSomerville speak a language other than English at home, but thecensus provides only precise percentages of Spanish speakers.
If we define a diverse environment as simply being composed ofdifferent people, then Somerville seems to be a quite diverseplace, given all the above data. Somerville also seems to bediverse in the sense that there are people coming from many partsof the world, speaking various languages, making different incomes,and working in all types of industries. However, when one sees adiverse environment in strictly racial terms, then Somerville isarguably not one of the most diverse places on the map. With only20 percent of its residents being people of color, there arerelatively few minorities in Somerville compared with the nation asa whole. Over 30 percent of America is of color: 12 percent definethemselves as black, 12.5 percent Latino, four percent Asian, andthree percent as multiracial, according to the U.S. Census. Amongstthe people of color in Somerville, the presence of Latinos is morestrongly felt, but they are concentrated in East Somerville, alongBroadway, where many of them live and run businesses.
However, if we look within the white population at its ethnicdiversity, Somerville seems very diverse. According to the U.S.Census, nineteen percent of Somerville whites identify as Irish,14.5 percent as Italian, 7.5 percent as Portuguese, 5.6 percent asGerman, six percent as English, 2.8 percent as Polish, and twopercent as Russian.
In interpreting these numbers, it is perhaps fairest to arguethat the diversity that exists in Somerville is stronger in someforms than it is in others. It is important to analyze diversitymore carefully so we can see that it exists in Somerville andelsewhere in many forms, and so that we may come to understandwhere people come from. It is ultimately our personalresponsibility as Tufts students to be conscious of oursurroundings and come to know the many faces of the people whoshare their city with us. Indeed, as Tufts students who valuediversity, Somerville provides us with an off-campus opportunity toexplore how people from different backgrounds live and interactwith one another. The city beckons us to explore its faces.
Nick Ojeda is a freshman majoring in peace and justicestudies.
