Originally Posted by onetwentyeight
Ghetto comes from the name of an island near Venice that the jews were forced on in the middle ages.
Close but not quite. Says the etymology dictionary:
Originally Posted by Etymology Dictionary
ghetto
1611, from It. ghetto "part of a city to which Jews are restricted," various theories of its origin include: Yiddish get "deed of separation;" special use of Venetian getto "foundry" (there was one near the site of that city's ghetto in 1516); Egitto "Egypt," from L. Aegyptus (presumably in memory of the exile); or It. borghetto "small section of a town" (dim. of borgo, of Gmc. origin, see borough). Extended 1892 to crowded urban quarters of other minority groups.
Nowadays it just means an area where one particular cultural group (religious, national, racial, or otherwise) lives together whether voluntarily or otherwise. It usually but not always implies poverty... One could reasonably describe the upper east side as a "WASP ghetto" or the lower east side as "a white-belted hipster ghetto".