Portside

The 'Drinking Gourd' refers to the stars of the Big Dipper constellation, pointing the North Star (Polaris). The song was reportedly used as a kind of Underground Railroad map guiding the route of escaped slaves to freedom. It was first published in 1928. Lee Hayes published the song in 1947 in something like its current form in the People's Songs Bulletin. In the following decades the song featured prominently in the civil rights movement and in the folk song movement. For more Songs of Immigration, Deportation and Identity, go here.

 

No Irish Need Apply is performed by Pete Seeger, Earl Robinson, Odetta, Ronnie Gilbert, Alan Lomax, Tommy Makem and Chet Washington on the album Songs of the Working People -- From the American Revolution to the Civil War (1987). For more Songs of Immigration, Deportation and Identity, go here.

 

A nostalgic Yiddish song about 'The Old Country,' here performed by the Limeliters in Yiddish and with English translation and wry commentary by Lou Gottlieb. Rumania, Rumania was written by Aaron Lebedeff, who immigrated to the United States in 1920. For more Songs of Immigration, Deportation and Identity, go here.

 

The musical West Side Story is a Romeo and Juliet crossing rival Italian and Puerto Rican gangs in New York City. In the song America, George Chakiris and Rita Moreno debate whether life is better in the adopted country or the native land. The music is by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. For more Songs of Immigration, Deportation and Identity, go here.

 

Lead rapper will.i.am (William Adams) introduces this 2011 performance in New York's Central Park with an impassioned explanation of the debt the Black Eyed Peas owes to immigrants and their supporters: fellow BEP Allan Pineda (apl.de.ap) immigrated "from a third world country."  Where Is the Love was written by Ralph MacDonald and William Salter, and originally performed by Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway. For more Songs of Immigration, Deportation and Identity, go here.

 

Written by John La Touche, with music by Earl Robinson, as part of a WPA theatre project in 1939, Ballad for Americans was first performed by Paul Robeson. The song emphatically asserts the democratic character of Amerian nationality from class, ethnic and racial, and religious angles, declaring that to be American is to be "Irish, Negro, Jewish, Italian, French and English, Spanish, Russian, Chinese, Polish, Scotch, Hungarian, Litwak, Swedish, Finnish, Canadian, Greek and Turk and Czech ... and lots more." For more Songs of Immigration, Deportation and Identity, go here.

 

Lyrics by folk trailblazer Woody Guthrie, and set to music by Martin Hoffman, in honor of 28 Mexican nationals who died in a plane crash while being flown back to Mexico. They were buried in an unmarked grave, their names unknown until 65 years later, when a remarkable piece of detective work brought them to light. This performance is by The Highwaymen -- Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, and Kris Kristofferson. For more Songs of Immigration, Deportation and Identity, go here.