Push-Pull Theory and Displaced Person
This photo pictures my grandmother Sylvia, who gave permission to be used, at my house last week. Sylvia was born in Krakow, Poland in 1938. When the war broke out and the Holocaust began, she was hidden in a convent for most of the duration of the war, while her mother was hidden around Poland, eventually ending up in Austria with fake papers as slave labor, and her father escaped a work camp and hid under fake papers. Obviously, the conditions of the war made life extremely dangerous and difficult in Europe, and much of their family was killed. In the case of my grandmother and great grandparents, however, they luckily all three survived the war, ending up as displaced persons. A displaced person is defined someone who is forced to leave his or her home, community, or country, due to factors such as colonialism, slavery, war, and persecution (Miller 2017, p. 329). Due to the war, after Eastern Europe was liberated, they became displaced people with no communities to return to. This pushed them to look for options to emigrate to Israel (then Palestine) or the US. According the Miller textbook (2017, p. 325) push-pull theory is defined as an explanation for rural-to-urban migration that emphasizes people’s incentives to move because of a lack of opportunity in rural areas (the “push”) compared with urban areas (the “pull”). The push-pull theory is also used in general when discussing why people choose to migrate. In this case, there were simply no opportunities for my family following the war, as their communities and businesses had been destroyed or taken, so there were major push factors at work causing them to leave Poland. They craved opportunities for a fresh start in places like Israel and the US, so as soon as they were able, they moved to New York.
While obviously my grandmother is not currently migrating, she is still an example of these key concepts because she is a product of these experiences and still an example of being a displaced person and push-pull factors.
