Assyrian Americans (
Syriac: ܣܘܼܖ̈ܵܝܹܐ ܐܲܡܪ̈ܝܼܟܵܝܹܐ) refers to individuals of
ethnicAssyrian ancestry born in or residing within the
United States. Assyrians are an
indigenousMiddle Eastern ethnic group native to
Mesopotamia in
West Asia who
descend from their
ancient counterparts, directly originating from the ancient indigenous Mesopotamians of
Akkad and
Sumer who first developed the independent
civilisation in northern Mesopotamia that would become
Assyria in
2600 BC. Modern Assyrians often culturally self-identify as
Syriacs,
Chaldeans, or
Arameans for religious and tribal identification. The first significant wave of Assyrian immigration to the United States was due to the
Sayfo genocide in the Assyrian homeland in 1914–1924.
Assyrians have been present in the United States since the late 19th century. The first recorded Assyrian in America was Zia Attala.[7] He reportedly immigrated to
Philadelphia in 1889 and found work in the hotel industry.[8] Most early Assyrian immigrants, however, were young men sent by Western missionaries for religious training.[9]
Second wave of immigration
Following the turn of the century, Assyrian immigration to America mostly came to a halt due to the
Immigration Act of 1924, which effectively cut off any legal immigration to the United States for Assyrians and other non-Western European groups. The second large wave of immigration occurred in the 1960s and 70s, mainly from northern
Iraq due to conflicts and persecution by the
Ba’athist government of Iraq. Others arrived from
Iran following the
Iranian Revolution. Many Assyrians arrived during this period and took advantage of the ongoing
White flight in
Detroit.
As a result of the situation, Assyrians gained a
monopoly over grocery stores and other small businesses, and in many cases used their finances and newfound wealth to benefit the Assyrian community there and take in Assyrian refugees from Iraq. More Assyrians arrived throughout the 80s and 90s for similar reasons, with newer residents moving out of Detroit into suburbs such as
Royal Oak and
Sterling Heights due to the
crack epidemic in Detroit, while others began to move to
San Diego, establishing a new Assyrian community there.
In 2005, the first Assyrian school in the United States, the Assyrian American Christian School, opened in
Tarzana,
Los Angeles.
Before the 1970s, Assyrians came to the United States in search of greater economic opportunities. After the 1970s, many Assyrians fled for political freedom, especially after the rise of
Saddam Hussein and after the
Gulf War. Some were drawn by the economic opportunities they had seen successfully affect their family members who had already immigrated.
Less stringent immigration laws during the 1960s and 1970s facilitated increasing numbers, with the 1970s seeing the highest number of Assyrians coming to the United States. In 1962, the number of Assyrian owned grocery stores was 120, but grew to 278 in 1972. The main cause of this were the
1967 Detroit riots, after which
Jewish grocery store owners left the area and left the opportunity open for Assyrians to take over. Often these Jews sold their old stores to Assyrians.[10]
Mostly all new
Chaldean Catholic Assyrian immigrants and low-income senior citizens tend to reside in Detroit, in the 7 Mile Road between
Woodward Avenue and John R Street. This area was officially named
Chaldean Town in 1999.[12] There are eight Chaldean Catholic Churches in
Metro Detroit, located in West Bloomfield, Troy (where there are two), Oak Park, Southfield, Warren, Sterling Heights and Detroit.
In California
After
World War II, several Assyrian men who had been educated in Iraq by American Jesuits traveled to the United States. They were to teach
Arabic to U.S. officers at the Army Language School who were going to be stationed in the Middle East. The men started the San Diego-area Chaldean Catholic community. Yasmeen S. Hanoosh, author of The Politics of Minority Chaldeans Between Iraq and America, wrote that the
Chaldean Catholic Church in San Diego "continued to grow in relative isolation from the family-chain-migration based communities in and around Michigan."[13]
In Illinois
Geographic distribution
This section's factual accuracy may be compromised due to out-of-date information. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(August 2012)
According to the 2011 American Community Survey 1-Year Estimates there are 110,807 Assyrian people in the United States.[3][4]
The 2000 U.S. Census counted 82,355 Assyrians (including those who identify as Chaldean or Syriac) in the country, of whom most lived in
Illinois. These 3 groups were listed as one category in the United States Census[14]
The
federal government of the United States took the word Syrian to mean
Arabs from the
Syrian Arab Republic and not as one of the terms to identify the ethnically distinct Assyrians, although the terms Syrian and Syriac are strongly accepted by mainstream majority academic opinion to be etymologically, historically, geographically and ethnically derivative of the earlier term Assyrian,[19][20] and historically meant Assyrian (see
Etymology of Syria) and not Arab or
Aramean. In addition, the Syrian Arab Republic is home to many ethnicities, including Arabs, Assyrians,
Armenians,
Kurds, and
Turkmens, and is thus not an exclusively Arab nation.
The
Syriac Orthodox Church was previously known as the Syrian Orthodox Church until a
Holy Synod in 2000 voted to change it to Syriac, thus distinguishing from the Arabs.
Mor Cyril Aphrem Karim wrote a letter to the Syriacs in 2000 urging them to register in the census as Syriac with a C, and not Syrian with an N to distinguish the group. He also urged them not to register as the country of origin.[21] The Church was previously known as the Assyrian Orthodox Church in America and Israel-Palestine, which can be seen in the name of the Syriac Orthodox Church of
Paramus,
New Jersey.[22]
Chaldean refers to ethnic Assyrians who are (traditionally)
Eastern Catholic, having split from the Assyrian Church in
Upper Mesopotamia between the 17th and 19th centuries (see
Schism of 1552). Chaldean is thus a religious term, not an ethnic term. The majority of Chaldean Catholics come from Iraq’s
Nineveh Plains region, which is located in
Upper Mesopotamia (northern Iraq). The Chaldeans of antiquity lived in southeast Mesopotamia from the 9th century BC and disappeared from history in the 6th century BC.
On the
US census, there is a section for the Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriacs, which is listed separately from Syrian, Syrian being a subcategory for Arab.[23]
^"Anna Eshoo: Biography". Congresswoman Anna Eshoo – California's 18th Congressional District. 13 December 2019. Retrieved 2 August 2020. Rep. Eshoo was born in New Britain, Connecticut, of Assyrian and Armenian heritage. She is the proud mother of two children, Karen and Paul.
^"Raad:Journal". sanclementejournal.com. Archived from
the original on 27 September 2007. Retrieved 24 August 2007.
^Collins, Margaret K. (18 January 2006).
"Man on the Move". The Record. Archived from the original on 25 February 2016. Retrieved 29 September 2015. His Assyrian grandfather was a tailor in Paterson and his boyhood pals on Wayne's Surrey Drive remember him more as an avid lacrosse player than a student of politics. But Rumana picked up the public-service bug from his godfather, Robert Roe, who was mayor of Wayne before serving as a 23-year Democratic congressman. It was interning for Roe in Washington, D.C., during the Iran-contra hearings in the summer of 1987 that turned Rumana into a visible and outspoken lover of all things government.
Hanoosh, Yasmeen H. The Politics of Minority Chaldeans Between Iraq and America.
ProQuest, 2008.
ISBN0549984755, 9780549984757.
Henrich, Natalie and Joseph Henrich. Why Humans Cooperate : A Cultural and Evolutionary Explanation: A Cultural and Evolutionary Explanation.
Oxford University Press, 30 May 2007.
ISBN0198041179, 9780198041177.
Sengstock, Mary C., and Sanaa Taha Al Harahsheh. "Chaldean Americans." Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, edited by Thomas Riggs, (3rd ed., vol. 1, Gale, 2014), pp. 441–452.
online
Sengstock, Mary C. Chaldean-Americans: Changing Conceptions of Ethnic Identity (Center for Migration Studies, 1999).
Sengstock, Mary C. Chaldeans in Michigan (Michigan State University Press, 2005).
Ethno-linguistic group(s) indigenous to the
Middle East with various additional/alternate self-identifications, such as Syriacs, Arameans, or Chaldeans