Jacob Riis, "How the Other Half Lives"

            Jacob Riis, in his informational glance at the immigration period, creates a comparative view of the pyramidal structure of social class, blaming the plight of the poor on the horrible living conditions of dilapidated tenement buildings and exposing the exploitation of the lower class, specifically immigrants, by those with monetary power. His argument for social change is drawn from the impression that the upper-half of the population “cared little for the struggles, and less for the fate of those who were underneath, so long as it was able to hold them there” (1).

            In Riis’ exploration of the tenement, he employs the anecdotes from immigrant boarders to display the harsh conditions and unsympathetic landlords. He delves into thick description of the lack of ventilation and light, the presence of mold and rats, and the pervasive “slovenliness, discontent, privation, and ignorance” (3). Riis speaks of irrational rent prices for rooms incapable of holding a family, overcrowding in poor conditions. Living in the tenements, one is exposed to disease, sickness, and death from lack of ventilation or light. In the wider view of the economy, this irreverence for the plight of the poor directly correlates to crime rate; those who commit crime are often people “whose homes had ceased to be sufficiently separate, decent, and desirable to afford” (1). The upper-half must care for the “other half” if not for human empathy, but for the financial strain.

            Jacob Riis underlines the idea of the poor immigrants as a class, ethnicizing poverty. Those who live in tenements are nearly exclusively immgrants: “when once I asked the agent of a notorious Fourth Ward alley how many people might be living in it I was told: one hundred and forty families, one hundred Irish, thirty-eight Italian, and two that spoke the German tongue” (8). Beyond being lower-class, lacking the cultural knowledge and sometimes language acquisition to find decent employment, these ethnic groups fronted opposition from the upper-crust, unwelcome into society. Riis speaks of America missing a “distinctively American community” (8). This opposition plays out in the tenements, where landlords exploit the boarders by forcing high rents for disliked immigrants, a price unreasonable for the dilapidated building and tiny rooms.

This intense view of tenements is in service of Riis’ project to illuminate the carelessness of the landowners; the proprietors accused the “filthy habits of the tenants as an excuse for the condition of their property” (3), seeking neither to improve the situation, end their tolerance for such living, or recognize their illogical human greed preventing change. The poor succumb to unlivable conditions, struggling to meet the standards placed upon them by higher classes. As Riis explains, “if it shall appear that the sufferings and the sins of the ‘other half,’ and the evil they breed, are but as a just punishment upon the community that gave it no other choice, it will be because that is the truth” (1). Exploitation of the class structure has pervaded our society, allowing those with financial resources and power to perpetuate the suffering of the “other half.”