international: forced and voluntary

Ethnic clusters are a result of the diverse identities within the U.S., which have been created due to several migration related factors, such as international, interregional, and intraregional migration. International migration is migrating across international borders and moving into a new country. There are two types of international migration: forced and voluntary. An example of forced migration is the slave trade. During the 18th century, African Americans underwent forced migration, which meant they were forced to migrate to the United States as slaves. During the triangular slave trade, there was a triangular trading pattern spanning from North America, Europe, and Africa, and many African Americans came to the United States and later became its citizens. Aside from forced migration, there is voluntary migration, which is migrating voluntarily instead of being forced. Voluntary migration was popular with Hispanics and Asian Americans after quotas that limited immigration were changed during the 1960s and 1970s. This led to a rapid increase of Asian Americans and Hispanics, particularly near the West Coast and Southern borders.

interregional and intraregional

Aside from international migration, interregional and intraregional migration plays a role in the ethnic distribution. Interregional migration is a migration between regions, such as moving from the southern part of the U.S. to the northern part, like what most African Americans did after the Civil War. Initially, they stayed in the South to work as sharecroppers, where they rented land as farmers and returned a portion of their crops to the landowners. However, as manufacturing grew, the opportunities for jobs in the industrial North became a pull factor and led to the interregional migration of African Americans to the North. On the other hand, intraregional migration involves migration within cities and metropolitan areas. It led to the expansion of black ghettos in American cities as more African Americans migrated North for jobs. However, it also led to “white flight,” which meant white people were leaving towns near black communities. White flight was mostly done through blockbusting; real estate agents convinced white homeowners that black families living near their neighborhood would soon move in and lower the property values in the neighborhood. The persuaded white homeowners then quickly sold their house at a cheap price to the real estate agents, and “fled” to white communities without black communities nearby. This led to segregation, where racism forced people of color to move away from white communities.