Ministry of Education of the Republic of Azerbaijan Baku International Multiculturalism Centre Azerbaijani Multiculturalism Textbook for Higher Education

The Melting Pot

The United States received about one million immigrants from the end of World War I to the early 1990s. The wave of immigrants to the country came mainly from Western and Eastern Europe. The settlement of those immigrants in big cities led to the creation of an ‘immigrant problem’ in the country. The America of the 1960s, as well as of previous years, was able to eliminate the differences that emerged in the adaptation of immigrants to the socio-economic structure of society. It consisted of the adaptation of individuals and communities with different cultural characteristics to the US ‘common’ economic and social ‘life’, ‘values’ and ‘life style’, and in finding their own ‘place’ in this structure. Another important aspect of this issue concerns the assimilation of ethnic minorities into American values and life style.

It is very important to clarify the historical reasons for the application of the assimilation policy. The preservation of difference by many groups coming to the country with different cultures, languages and religions alongside their integration into society is among these historical reasons. Since the integration of these groups into society resulted in a number of difficulties, the need arose to find a solution to them. The challenges facing minorities who integrate into US society have led both politicians and intellectuals to use the concept of the melting pot instead of the concept of assimilation to address those challenges. Since there are a number of problems with the assimilation of diverse religious groups, as stated by Herberg, it is important to create a different melting pot in this regard.

Difficulties caused by religious assimilation have led to this process almost losing its functionality, so the issue has become a social problem. Glazer notes that although the history of waves of migration to the USA of African Americans, Latinos, Jews, Scots and Italians living in New York City predates the 20th century, they

have created a different social and economic environment. There is some truth in Glazer’s words when he points out the economic and social problems that emerged during the rapid integration of different ethnic groups into the US before the 1960s. The main problem of the USA, as a country with ethnic and religious diversity, is the elimination of these differences in society, and directing the differences towards social integration rather than towards problems. At the same time, the emphasis on the ‘cult of ethnicity’ in the concept of the melting pot has made this issue even more problematic. Because the cult of ethnicity has a communitarian nature, it has been shaped to expose the idea of the melting pot among both non-Anglo-Saxon Whites and non-white groups, as well as to defy the concept of the individual, and to protect and support other ethnic groups. In other words, the cult of ethnicity rejected the idea that individuals of all nations are melted into a new race of man. This factor also expresses the idea that the United States of America is not a country of groups made up of individuals, but rather a country comprised of social groups. Ethnic thinking is a proof accepted by many Americans and the issue of ethnicity is considered permanent and stable. In addition to this argument, it should be noted that the cult of ethnicity is also completely contrary to the theory of American history, which portrays US society as an integrated whole.

The melting pot has meant the integration of ethnic minorities into society as they renounce their cultural characteristics and differences. To put it more precisely, the melting pot means immigrants abandoning their own way of life, values and identity in order to integrate into society. However, it would not be right to call the melting pot an assimilation pot, because the melting pot does not mean that all ethnic minorities have totally to renounce their own differences and distinctive values. It was expected that the cultural, religious, linguistic and social characteristics of ethnic

Section III

Chapter 7

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Azerbaijani Multiculturalism

groups would integrate into society in the course of time as a result of evolution. At the same time, the melting pot promotes the biological mix through marriage, rather than the integration of different ethnic groups and cultures. In this regard, Theodore Roosevelt said: ‘The people belonging to different races of the old world have got a new identity. However, the formation of the new identity of the people by the melting pot took place from 1776 to 1879, and our nationality was determined by the people of the Washington period.’