America As A Melting Pot

America was founded on change. Past revolutions were fought to make new ways in which to live life in this country. Our families all came to America, at one point, to feed into this definition of being an American. The term melting pot in my mind means structure, meaning what we, as

America is the "great Melting Pot". From an early age every "American" is taught that America contains a mixture of the world 's cultures in a perfectly blended mixture. We honor and respect all cultures and invite them to bring their customs here to the United States. But do we really? Take for instance, the Hmong refugees who involuntarily moved to America. Cultural Assimilation seemed to be forced down the refugees throats. Keeping their native customs was looked on with horror and disgust.

So many times the phrase "melting pot" is used to describe the United States of America. It is a country built on ideals such as freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and other basic human rights. These  ideals, though they may have originated from European men labeled as liberals, eventually captured followers from all over the world. Soon, America was a mixture of peoples with different ethnic backgrounds, religions, and cultures all working together for the "American Dream."

America was widely known as a “melting pot” of sorts for many generations. The country earned its title by accepting immigrants of various cultures and molding, or melting, them into the American lifestyle. However, the “melting pot” idea of America is starting to dissipate. According to a Newsweek Poll on the public, “only 20 percent still think America is a melting pot” (Morganthau and Wolfberg, par.4). As more Americans push away immigrants and create stereotypes against said immigrants, America continues to lose its title as a “melting pot.” There is ethnic friction in America and people have begun to have a hard time assimilating (Morganthau and Wolfberg, par.18). .America is beginning to place a negative outlook on its

The melting pot myth is a belief that America is a society of equality and that racism is not applicable. Although racism is still a major issue in our society and thriving to this day. At a young age, people are taught that whites are greater than any of the other cultures, which causes many of us to create a sense of our own society. The melting pot society may have been an attempt to create equality, but was it ever truly an entity? The melting pot society is only a image for a culture containing different types of ethnicities and races that blend together as a whole, but it is not a society that contains any equality. The myth of unity will never become a reality, and here is why; the myth is used to create a glamorized version of American history where every immigrant was greeted with an equal opportunity for a better lifestyle (“Pluralism vs. Melting Pot” pdf, by Dr. Taylor); and it puts responsibility on an individual to face poverties and assimilations, which is more difficult for ethnic minorities, because of how race is perceived.

Overtime, people wander around the world in search of a place that could help them survive, which is why the flow of people of different ethnic backgrounds has been large in our country. America has always been regarded too as a “great melting pot” due to the diversity of its nation. America is filled with people of different ethnic backgrounds, cultures, and rituals, which is what has given America its unique identity. Thomas Paine states that everyone in America has been brought into “cordial unison” because the values by which America was constructed on have not changed. The diversity in America has simply added details and little changes to American values, but it's central values are kept secure.

The US may occasionally be labeled a melting pot because of the immense number of immigrants and diversity in one country. Over time all of the various nationalities have transformed this country into

America the great melting pot. Some have argued that the melting pot analogy is inaccurate. Instead America is like a tossed salad. A person can see all the individual ingredients that make up the salad. People will argue of what can go into a salad and what cannot go into just as people will argue about the place of certain groups with America. Some find disgust in certain groups of people and praise other. The situation is dynamic. The way people interact with groups are constantly changing and morphing due to different influences. Antisemitism is one of the ways people interact with the tossed salad that is America. Antisemitism in United States is on a decline because other groups are being used as scapegoats instead, Jews are not seen to pose a threat, a strong Holocaust remembrance, and the hatred of African Americans continues to be the predominate form of hate in the American context.

BBC News states that “ the melting pot imagery has been contested by the idea of multiculturalism, the “salad bowl theory”, or as it is known in Canada, “the Cultural Mosaic”, whereby the immigrants retain their own national characteristics while integrating into a new society” (“Melting pot America”) . BBC News put into words that while immigrants are trying to settle into a new society and new culture they can express their lifestyle along the way. The process of integrating into a new civilization is all about coming together as a whole which creates “America’s Melting point” status. BBC News explains that immigrants have been coming into the United States and have been able to keep and bring in their cultural background during the development. Brandi Waters states that “America is a country of immigrants… one thing that every immigrant brings with them is their culture”. He claims that to be the reason why America is known as the melting pot with all new immigrants with different cultures blending with the American culture (“America: a Melting Pot of Cultures”). Brandi Waters has well explaining that immigrants contribute to the American culture. They expanded on the diversity and culture involving themselves with the already settled in, but also mixed variety United States of America. Waters is explaining that America’s melting pot is made up of all the diverse

The United States of America is considered a melting pot of heritages and nationalities from all around the world. There is no official language, and no one culture all citizens abide by. Despite the fact that everyone in this country is different from one another, there is still a constant uniform citizen that has a more favorable position. This citizen is white, English-speaking, and somehow always in the front of the public sphere. In the recent years, there has been an increasingly dominant Latino presence in America. Their strength in numbers challenges there being a poster American citizen, and that that citizen will remain white. When working to assimilate to America’s “culture,” Lations seem to believe that there is one America, within which people speak a singular language and experience one culture. The pressure to assimilate stems from the white citizens of the country feeling threatened when there is a new culture and language, which they do not understand. As a result they feel personally threatened by the people who can speak both Spanish and English, and their response response involves marginalization and the obvious exclusion of Latino groups in the United States. There is a phenomenon, cultural citizenship, where Latinos perform their cultural practices to stretch their identity into the states, and practice their right to be authentic members of their community.

According to The Bureau of International Information Programs of the US Department of State, "Becoming American: Beyond the Melting Pot" they stated that, "The United States has been ‘a permanently unfinished country' because it has been continuously built and rebuilt by immigration" (5). So what does it mean to be "American" in a country as diverse as the United States? In Immigration Issues: Major Issues in American history, Henry Bischoff stated, "The only man who is a good American is the man who is an American and nothing else" (201). This acknowledges the fact that in order for immigrants to be given the favorable circumstances of being accepted into the American mainstream, it is required for them to lose their identity and adapt into

According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, 47% of hate crimes are racially motivated. In second place, a tie between religion and sexual orientation account for about 19%. Many people face discrimination every day because of religion, where they’re from, and even what they look like, but it should not be this way. The definition of melting pot is a place where different peoples, styles, theories, etc., are mixed together. Using this definition you could say that some parts of the United states can be considered a melting pot. Living in the united states we are promised certain human rights and we should be able to be who we are without fear of being judged or discriminated against, but for some people that’s not the case. At first glance America may seem like a melting pot because of all the differences between the people here, but after a closer look you can see that those differences are rarely accepted and people are judged for their race, religion, and many other things.

The United States has Changed from a Melting Pot to a Vast Culture with Varying Racial Backgrounds

The United States is commonly know as a melting pot of nations, in which people from around the world have emigrated to form a homogeneous yet varied culture. Although we come from different ethnic groups, we are usually bound together through our common English language. This becomes an issue, however, when immigrants are not familiar with English and American culture, and instead attempt to keep their own heritage alive. They are often torn between identities through language, the one they speak at home which they are familiar with, and the one they must adhere to in public. This often leads to struggle and conflict on both sides, dealing with different cultures and how people react when assimilation occurs. Because of this, living in the United States often requires us to completely accept only one identity, even though hints of the other may spill over at times.

The “melting pot” culture refers to people from various cultures coming together to create a new unique culture. (Lorenzo, 2000) In other words, these cultures have ‘melted’ together in a ‘pot’. For example, Chinese, Koreans, Germans and more cultures blended in together to create a whole new American culture. They are not Chinese-Americans, Korean-Americans or German-Americans anymore but just Americans. On the other hand, “salad bowl” culture refers to immigrants who do not lose the aspects of their cultures. . (Lorenzo, 2000) To put it in another way, you can still clearly see the different ‘ingredients’ in a ‘salad bowl’. As a contrast to the melting pot theory’s example, Chinese-Americans, Korean-Americans and German-Americans will still keep the unique traits of their cultures while living together in the country. America has been traditionally referred to as a ‘melting pot’, but recently; there are people who argue that ‘salad bowl’ will be a better description of America’s society today.