Ethnicity, Bobby Vinton, and Happy Louie

Abstract This article examines the New Ethnicity movement through multiple lenses. First, it examines some of the objectives of the movement as articulated by its leaders and also looks at more recent scholarship on the lasting effects of the movement. During this ethnic reawakening of the 1970s, Polish American musical artists created songs with lyrics that reflected and reinforced Polish American ethnic identity. This paper examines two very different songs from this period: “My Melody of Love” by Bobby Vinton and “Love and Peace Polka” by Happy Louie (Dusseault). Then the immediate response to and lasting impact of these songs is examined through a survey primarily of Polish Americans. The cultural aspect of the New Ethnicity movement may endure, which helps to extend a theory of “latent ethnicity.” This means that the New Ethnicity movement's lasting legacy for Polonia may be the enduring impulse to preserve and promote ethnic identity through music, food, and other cultural means. This identity, while mostly latent, nonetheless exists, and can be activated in social and political life.