by Rita James Simon (Author), Unknown (Author)
From 1870 to 1900, over a half million Russian Jews came to the United States. Russian Jewish emigration had ceased by the 1920s due to the effects of the First World War, the Bolshevik Revolution, and the Quota Acts, but a century later, Jews from the former Soviet Union began to emigrate in large numbers. This detailed account describes the motivations of Russian and Soviet Jews for leaving their homeland and their subsequent adjustments to life in the United States. Simon, a sociologist, provides insight into who these Jewish immigrants were and are, what they accomplished, and how they have been viewed.
Author Biography
RITA J. SIMON is University Professor in the School of Public Affairs and the Washington College of Law at American University. A sociologist, she is editor of New Lives: The Adjustment of Soviet Jewish Immigrants in the United States and Israel and International Migration: The Female Experience, and coauthor of The Ambivalent Welcome: Media Coverage of American Immigration. She has also carried out a twenty-year study of transracial adoption. The major findings have been published in two books, Adoption, Race, and Identity and The Case for Transracial Adoption.