Latinos from around the globe have settled here. They speak a different language, but in so many ways their lives are similar to the earlier immigrants from Ireland and Scotland, Italy and Portugal, Canada and Cape Verde.
When it comes to immigration, everything old really is new again.
Just about every immigrant group had the same experience. The first generation endured discrimination in every realm of life and at work, where they toiled as maids, gardeners or endured the mind-numbing clatter of a textile mill.
Succeeding generations used the levers of American democracy - the ballot box, the public school, the labor union and the free economy - to move up.
In Providence, you don't have to look far back to remember a day when the surnames of the political leaders were Roberts, Doorley, McGarry and Boyle. Then they became Cianci, Paolino, Lombardi and Igliozzi. Now they are Taveras, Pichardo, Diaz and Aponte.
Latinos are not a monolith; they all may speak Spanish but they hail from many different political cultures and nations. They are Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, Guatemalans', Dominicans, Venezuelans and Colombians. In Providence, leaders of these groups coalesced around Angel Taveras to help elect him the city's first Latino mayor in November.
Taveras election is more than a matter of pride to Latinos, says State Sen. Juan Pichardo, who in the 1990s became the city's first Latino senator. For young Latinos the election of Taveras sends a message: You too can make it.
Every year Pichardo brings a dozen or so interns from his South Side neighborhood to the State House to give them a taste of government and to deliver a sermon to the young:
"Stay away from the negative stereotypes, the gangs. Stay in school. Get a good education.''
Despite the poor economy and the barriers to escaping poverty, Pichardo says Latinos are walking the same path as other immigrant groups that have flourished in the city. Ten years ago, Broad Street on the South Side was the center of Latino business. Now, many commercial areas of the city, from Elmwood Avenue in Elmwood to Pocasset Avenue in Silver Lake, have a strong Latino economic presence.
The old stereotypes are shattering too. Pichardo points to the city's emerging Latino professional community. "We have doctors, teachers, lawyers, businessmen, real estate brokers, bankers and artists,'' he says.
In the sweet nostalgia of family legend, descendants of European immigrants often claim that all of their forebears came here legally and walked off the boat or train speaking English and living in nuclear families.
That isn't the way it was. It's too bad that the old triple-deckers on the South Side - the wood frame houses of the generations of Irish, Jews, Italians, African-Americans and Armenians - can't talk. Those walls could spin quite a tale, because Latinos climbing the immigrant ladder in Providence now live in many of those same houses.
Scott MacKay's commentary can be heard every Monday at 6:35 and 8:35 on Morning Edition. You can also follow his political reporting at the `On Politics' blog at WRNI.org.
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