Melting Pot or Tossed Salad?
Which is the proper metaphor for our American cultural experience?
Growing up we often hear the term “melting pot” to describe our American experience. We viewed immigrants coming from many corners of the world as assimilating into American culture and joining the “melting pot”. We put tremendous emphasis on learning the language, adopting the customs and becoming a part of a continent-wide community. We had health screenings to keep out communicable diseases, questions about financial status and political opinions to weed out any who we thought would be a drain or disturbance on our country.
Every new demographic group faced discrimination amid fear that they would not assimilate properly. For the Irish and Italians, it was the specter of the Pope. plus alcohol and the mob respectively. We let the Chinese and other Asians in for their help on the railroad, but didn’t intend for them to stay, did we? Africans and Native Americans had their own troubled American experience. Eastern Europeans had the specter of suspicion even while they were fleeing persecution in their own countries. And Jews were always suspect, just like in Europe.
