A Metaphor

I would tend to agree.

There is a saying that goes something like this.

Some come to America to be in America.

Some come to America to BE American.

Well that's not really what I meant to convey. Rather the change in our society about expectations which lead to non-integration. "salad bowl" expectations of each being a separate element of society as in "this is the carrot and this is the lettuce etc"as opposed to say "melting pot" chile where the beans and the meat and the spices are all mixed together creating a meal in and of itself. A meal of common values/social rules/expectations.

Dys, you've hit the nail square on the head.

Trevor Phillips has a lot to say about this.

He recently took over as boss of the Commission for racial equality (a non ministerial government office), and very quickly shook everyone up, with a remarkable speech.


What gives his speech even more impact, is that Mr Phillips is black, and is basically saying that multiculturalism is wrong.

Up until that point, the CRE had always devoted most of their energy towards persuing cases of discrimination down to the silliest level, causing even more racial tension.
They never seemed to be about looking for a solution to the root cause, only who to blame.
Then Phillips made this speech......it also covers the American problem, and how he views it.
http://www.cre.gov.uk/Default.aspx.LocID-0hgnew07s.RefLocID-0hg00900c002.Lang-EN.htm

Well LP It appears I am not the only wacko on this planet.

I agree with your metaphor 1000% dys although I would not presume to be in your class as a whacko. That would be most dysrespectful.

You know, I may have opened myself up to be charged as anti-muslim with this thread which is totally not true. I grew up in Saudi Arabia with the muslim culture as the only one I knew and have continued throughout my life with muslim/arab friends. I do think we as a western society setup our muslim newcomers to expectations that are not in our or their best intrests.
Thank you bear, I get no respect.

I don't know that it has really changed that much over the last 200 years. Chinatown, Little Italy, and all the other neighborhoods and ghettos that have collected like immigrants have always existed in the US. It may not have been so noticable when large contingents of Germans and Norwegians settled in isolated parts of Minnesota and the Dakotas in the mid 1800s but most of those immigrants took time to assimilate.

I see lots of first generation Somalis, Mexicans, Eastern Europeans, speaking English very well and working jobs that are visible and well paying. Yes, there are those having a hard time but it has always been so. In the 1980s, I went to college with a 3rd generation Italian. His grandmother still didn't really speak a word of English.

Well parados I think it has changed but what I'm attempting (poorly) is the attitudes of our current society of "salad bowl" placing more importance on diversity than on integration. I don't expect or desire mayonaise but I do think we all need commonality in values/expectations/social acceptance of boundries. I don't think I am being very clear on this but I'm trying.

I understand what you are saying Dys.

I just think it is on the same level of saying, "Kids today will never be as smart as our generation." Variations of that statement have been going on for thousands of years but somehow, in spite of kids always being not as smart as their parents, we have advanced.

I think every generation has had their immigrants that aren't assimilating. We just look back now with a different viewpoint because they have assimilated. They never totally gave up their culture, we just made it part of the whole.

The same is happening with the new immigrants now. It just is disconcerting for some because it isn't just food that our culture is taking on. We now have signs in Spanish in most Home Depots and Lowes. Are they not assimilating or are we just adding them to the over all culture? Is it a bad thing that I now know what pintura means?

If you put onions in chile, the onions don't stop being onions. They add flavor to everything else.

I think it is a fine line between a culture changing to accept elements of new immigrants and immigrants not adapting to an existing culture. Both have to change.

I think you got the point across quite clearly and agree with you totally.

For example, all you'd need to do is compare the accomplishments (re assimilation) of an Hispanic immigrant to California in 1960 (and the policies that were in place at that time to assure that assimilation), versus the policies that have evolved over the past four decades and their results.

I think it's why California, through ballot initiative, has curtailed bilingual education, among other things. Language can be a strong uniter of culture and encouraging immigrants to not learn English quickly doesn't bode well for them in a state as highly competitive as California.

It never occurred to me to think you were being anti-Muslim, by the way. Did you have primarily Muslims in mind when you posted? I think overall, they've assimilated quite well here.

Indeed. A very fine line. Fragile, too.

JW,
Yes language is a big thing that ties immigrants together. But like I noted, there have always been those neighborhoods. Go to any Chinatown across the country and you will find people that don't speak a word of English. They don't need to. Their shops and shop owners all use Chinese as well as English. NYC has a section for just about every immigrant population where many still speak the language of the home country.

The difference with Hispanics is they are such a large population. Too large to be forced into little areas. They aren't slowly filtering into the population at large but in some places they are becoming the predominate culture. In some places they always were predominate.


If you suddenly throw a pound of potatoes into a pound of chili is it still recognizable as chile? Add an extra potato each time you serve chili and the change won't be so noticable by the time you get to a pound of each.

But, do the shopowners of the Chinatowns separate themselves in further ways, or do they go home to neighborhoods like yours and mine and blend into the culture of their adopted homeland, its values and laws?

I agree that not only was there less Hispanic immigration 40 years ago, but most was legal then, too.

I'm just proposing examination of what the policies of 40 years ago produced versus the multiculturism policies that are in place today.

I understand what you are saying.

In high school where I live, we were taught that the USA is a 'melting pot' - assimilating all peoples together.
I do not know if that is actually the case in reality!
Canada was described to us as a "mosaic" - various cultures retaining their identity yet 'braided' together as a whole. I always thought of it more as a quilt, or I could easily switch to your salad bowl metaphor. But there is definite assimilation as well - it's how we all get along somewhat.

There are real problems when there is not sufficient assimilation amongst people who live together, work together, and are striving for a common way of life.

I'm going out on a limb here, but I think the neverending 'problems' that are struggled with every day amongst First Nations peoples and 'others' is a good example of a somewhat extreme 'salad'.
People from many fronts fighting to retain individual ways of life and cultural values at the expense of community unity.

Certain concepts move in and out of popularity. "assimilation' seems to get an automatic flinch from many people (as though it would mean giving up who they are).

Hmmm. I have to watch what I say here, but I like that you brought this topic up.

bm

Damn, I've long been a fan of miscengenation and associated tendencies. Mix it up and deal.

At the same time I am avid for saving most aspects of culture, in some kind of living archive, and delving on to other ways of being.

One of the reasons I still love LA, sorry, soz, is the thwap of cultures I experienced myself, and I was just one person in the mix. Admittedly some of that led to riot-known circumstances and I know by association and some immediacy a fair amount about all that. A lot of LA gets along, or did when I was there. A lot of LA doesn't get along, or didn't when I was there. So it goes.

Uh, opposites attract...

There was a letter to the editor of the New York Tiimes several years ago written by a man from India. It was in response to the question of bilingual education in public schools. He provided an excellent example of separate cultures in one country causing alienation and misunderstanding. As he pointed out, he could not understand his fellow Indians when he traveled throughout his country because of all the different languages. That is only one example of ethnic cultures separating fellow citizens from one another.

When in Rome do as the Romans do. Laws and rights define a country. If they are ignored because ethnicity becomes more important than citizenship, our basic, cultural foundation is weakened.

I have seen both sides of the issue during my life, growing up in Arizona, raising my family in Connecticut and now living in New Mexico.

Some people think that their ethnic and family traditions will disappear if they learn English and they are assimilated into American society; yet there are Italian neighborhoods in New Haven, CT that are very much a thriving part of American society without losing their ethnicity--all the wonderful cooking, religious traditions and parades and the retention of their knowledge of Italian. That, though, is left up to each family, not through laws. If they value those traditions enough, they teach their children and their children's children.

Here in Albuquerque, the Mexican population is predominant. Yet, they handle business with profit in mind, with the ability to maintain relationships with businesses throughout the country. (One of the most pleasing differences is that they tend to be much, much more polite in their dealings with customers). And most of them speak perfect English as well as Spanish. They also maintain their wonderful cooking and old Spanish traditions.

The people who don't learn English and the rights of living in a free society never quite make it in mainstream society, regardless of their country of origin. Is the continuation of one's past culture so important that isolation results along with poverty and marginalization?

Political correctness has become a muzzle that has prevented us from coming to an understanding that is positive and inclusive for all races, not one that excludes or discriminates, regardless of all the good intentions.

Without honest discourse, the separateness we are seeing will continue and become even more destructive and cause even more separation between the poor and the middle-class. (Being rich is not part of the equation, this is about simply being an equal and valued part of society).

As I write, it becomes so clear how complex this problem has become. Just reading the different posts shows differences of understanding. My mind reels at the range and consequences of ethnicity and assimilation.

bump

I wanna be part of the salad...or am I already?