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Encyclopedia of North American Immigration. By John Powell. Facts On File Library of American History Series. New York: Facts On File, 2005. 464p. acid free $75 (ISBN 0-8160-4658-1).
This concise volume has large ambitions. In more than three hundred alphabetical entries it seeks to provide a comprehensive overview of the people, places, events, and topics relevant to United States and Canadian immigration. The scope is vast, encompassing more than five hundred years of migration and settlement, action, and interaction.
Acknowledging that this work enters a crowded field, the author makes two major claims to uniqueness. First, he has chosen to emphasize historical factors in contrast to other recent resources that the author believes "... have a heavy sociological bent . . . " (x). The second claim to distinction is the treatment of Canadian and United States immigration in the same volume. It should be noted that, despite the...