This is the USA. Колотыгина Т.Л - 10 стр.

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African-Americans
From 1620 to 1820 by far the largest group of people to come to the United
States came, not as willing immigrants, but against their will. These people were West
Africans brought to work as slaves, especially on the plantations, or large farms, of
the South. In all, about million people were brought from Africa. The Civil War, in
the 1860s, ended slavery and established equal rights for black Americans . But
many states, especially in the South, passed laws segregating (separating) and
discriminating against black Americans. The civil rights movement, in the 1950s
and 1960s, helped get rid of these laws .
However, the effects of 200 years of slavery, 100 years of segregation, and
continued prejudice are not as easy to get rid of. Despite many changes, black
Americans are still much more likely than white Americans to be poor and to
suffer the bad effects that poverty brings. Today about 12 percent of America's popu-
lation is black. Many black Americans live in the South and in the cities of the North-
east and Midwest.
Immigrants from Northern and Western Europe
Beginning in the 1820s; the number of immigrants coming to the United States
began to increase rapidly. Faced with problems i. Europe—poverty, war, discrimina-
tion—immigrants hoped for, and often found, better opportunities in the United
States. For the first half-century, most immigrants were from northwestern
Europe—from Germany, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Sweden, and Norway. In the
late 1840s, for example, widespread hunger resulting from the failure of the potato
crop led many Irish people to emigrate to the United States.
During these years, the United States was expanding into what is now the Mid-
west. There was a lot of land available for farming. Many new immigrants became
farmers in the Midwest. To this day, German and Scandinavian influence is obvi-
ous in Midwestern foods and festivals.
Immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe
Although immigration from northwestern Europe continued, from the 1870s to
the 1930s even more people came from the countries of southern and eastern Europe
- for example, Italy, Greece, Poland, and Russ. Like the earlier immigrants,
they came to escape poverty and discrimination. From 1900 to 1910 alone, almost 9
million people arrived from these and other countries. ,; During this period, the United
States was changing from a mainly agricultural to a mainly industrial country. The
new immigrants helped make this change possible. Many .settled in cities and
worked in factories, often under conditions that were quite bad.

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