My fieldwork in Perth Amboy

On Thursday afternoon, my friend and I took the train down to Perth Amboy to pretty much walked around for a bit to get to know some parts of the city. I invited her along because she is from Perth Amboy so she guided me around so I wouldn’t get lost. First we arrived at the train station which is very small and has two tracks, north and south. The train station drops you off right by the downtown area of the city. The downtown area of Perth Amboy consists of multiple shopping centers, restaurants, barbers, and hair salons. It is very similar to Broad St. in Elizabeth; however, it is much cleaner. There is also a mall downtown called Amboy Mall. It is not a big mall, like Newport or Jersey Gardens, but it does have a few clothing stores in it, kind of like the Hudson Mall on 440 in Jersey City. Leaving downtown, there are a few Spanish food restaurants called Montezuma and Mi Tierra, to name a few that are in the same direction going towards my friend’s house. She lives only about ten minutes from there. While walking, I noticed there are a lot of two family houses and apartments more than one family houses. I asked her if there is a division between class and income in families living in the city. She told me that the majority is pretty much the same which is middle class, although I wouldn’t doubt there are lower class families. My friend lives next to her family church which is called St. Mary’s. There is a gym located right next to it that belongs to the church where children usually come together and play sports such as basketball and more. After passing her home, we walked three more blocks down towards the waterfront. The waterfront area has more of the expensive housing. Near the waterfront there is an old fire and police department building that was just remodeled. Around the waterfront, there are signs that go along and tell you factual information about the waterfront, such as the history and events which I thought was pretty interesting. Around the waterfront she also pointed out to me The Proprietary House, an Art Gallery, and a popular seafood restaurant called “The Barge.” For those who don’t know, William Franklin, Benjamin Franklin’s son lived in the Proprietary House which is still considered a historical place. There’s a club called the “Yacht Club” which didn’t seem that interesting, but they also have a boat at the front where people can go crabbing and fishing. The ice cream shop that everybody goes to by the front is only open in the summer time. As we leave the waterfront, we stop at the park that’s nearby known as the Waterfront Park. In the park there is a staircase thing that has a stage on the top where bands usually perform during the spring and summertime. After the park, we pretty much were done looking around for the day and headed back to school.

Black? White? Asian? More Young Americans Choose All of the Above

The beginning of the article briefly talks about how the game of “What are you?” was played at the University of Maryland with about fifty students. The students from this discussion were formerly part of the Multiracial and Biracial Student Association and they talked about how they are all proud to be a mixture of races. Today in our generation, there are a lot of people come from mixed backgrounds and this is affecting how people feel when it comes to filling out forms because they feel obligated to choose “other.” According to data, Multiracial Americans are the most rapidly growing demographic groups. “I think it’s really important to acknowledge who you are and everything that makes you that,” said Ms. Wood, the 19-year-old vice president of the group. She feels like the reason people refuse to acknowledge, or make known mixed race individuals is because of how society makes of it. There are those few groups of people who do feel like multiracial population will help benefit the United States because this can help diminish the amount prejudice people that are in our society. On the other hand, there are those people who will always be against this because in their opinion, the more people want to be accepted for their mixed backgrounds, the more they feel that society will be divided. Sociologists also say that interracial people are basically cover ups for the differences that are seen around us. For example, “among interracial couples, white-Asian pairings tend to be better educated and have higher incomes, according to Reynolds Farley, a professor emeritus at the University of Michigan.” There are fewer black and white mixed people than any other races because of economic and societal differences. The face of America is rapidly changing with this diversity of people coming together to have interracial marriages. This goes to show that the United States has come a long way in making the society a better place because decades ago, this would not be occurring.

Thinking of Perth Amboy- Edited

The City of Perth Amboy

Facts that interest me:

·    The city of Perth Amboy has a population of 48,343 with 36,933 of the people being Hispanic or Latino. They make up 76.4% of the city.
·         Ethnicity- Next to the Hispanic community, the second most populated race is White. There are about 28, 182 living in Perth Amboy, which make up 58.3% of the city. After that are Blacks, or African Americans that make up 4, 211 of the people and 8.7% of the population. Asians are the least with about 507 people and make up 1.0%. Those with two or more races make up 29.8% being that the estimate amount of people is 14, 427.
·    When it comes to language spoken in households, an estimate of 11,366 people speaks English only. About 15,000 people living in Perth Amboy speak English fluently along with their native language Spanish. 70.1% of the people speak only Spanish.
·        There are more females living in Perth Amboy than males. Males make up 48.7% whiles females make up 51.3%. The majority of the population is people between the ages of 18 and over, which is about 35,163 people. There are about 3,869 females living without spouses that have children under the age of 18. The single women make up 25.3% of the people in Perth Amboy while the women with children under 18 make up 14.3%.
·         When it comes to education, there are 55.7% of people who are 25 and older that have earned a High School diploma. However, only 9.7% of people about the age 25 or older received a bachelor’s degree in College. This goes to show how many people go to college after school. Reasons for this could be anywhere from, financial problems, High School dropouts, and more.
·         Economics- The good part about this is that more than half of the people, 59.6%, are employed within the city. This means that 21,853 have a steady income, while 1,635 are unemployed. The average age that females begin working in this community is 16.  The majority of the people in Perth Amboy have occupations with sales and office occupations. Only 20.2% make the average income which is between $50,000- $74,999.Two other facts that interest me:

·    Perth Amboy was originally supposed to be the capital of New Jersey until they decided not to make it anymore.

·    William Franklin, Benjamin Franklin’s son lived in the proprietary house which is still standing as a historic place.