Melting Pot or Salad Bowl Some people describe American society as a salad bowl while others see it as a melting pot. In a sense both are correct depending on one’s point of view. In a bowl of freshly tossed salad, all the ingredients are mixed together. Yet they never lose their shape, form or identity. Together, however, the ingredients make up a unity. In a sense, all the ingredients of a salad contribute to the finished product. They may be covered with the same dressing, but the green vegetables, tomatoes, lettuce and eggs can all be seen for what they are. From this point of view, America is very much like a salad bowl where individual ethnic groups blend together; yet maintain their cultural uniqueness. They may work together during the day at similar jobs and in identical companies but at night they may return to their ethnic communities where the flavor of their individual culture dominates their way of life. This is why perhaps there is so much diversity within America. Each ethnic group has its own special interests, language, food, customs and traditions to protect and defend. This idea of the salad bowl is referred to by sociologists and cultural pluralism. It simply means that American society is a collection of many cultures living side by side within one country. The other concept, which is also used to describe American society, is that of the melting pot. In this usage society is like a pot of stew or a cauldron of porridge. All of the ingredients mix and blend together losing their identity and yield a bit of what they were to become a new reality. A pot of stew is very different from a bowl of salad. Within the stew, the meat and vegetables in the cooking process give to each other a bit of their own flavor. The longer the step is allowed to simmer, the better the taste and the more likely it will be for the mixture to dissolve. In this sense America can surely be seen as melting pot where people from all over the world come to live and work together forming one nation. In such a culture there are dozens of shared symbols which serve to develop all of the various ethnic groups to create a larger unified culture. The flag, the national anthem, the Pledge of Allegiance all serve to break down the walls which isolate ethnic groups. The melting pot evokes another image; that of the colonial quilt which is made out of fragments of different material but fashioned into one blanket. Whether a salad bowl or a melting pot, America can best be described as mixture of both; that is to say, a nation where there is unity in diversity. Define Melting Pot: Salad Bowl: Cultural Pluralism: Americanization: Assimilation: Melting Pot or Salad Bowl? Identify each of the following by writing “melting pot” if the example supports the melting pot theory or write “salad bowl” if the example supports the salad bowl theory. 1. _____________________ The Greek Festival held in Upper Darby. 2. _____________________ An immigrant student buys themselves a Philadelphia sports team shirt. 3. _____________________ Going to Chinatown for dinner. 4. _____________________ Putting up street signs in Spanish. 5. _____________________ A Russian child joining their high school football team. 6. _____________________ A town holding a Forth of July parade. 7. _____________________ Our class having an Multi-­‐Cultural Day celebration. 8. _____________________ Someone calling themselves an Italian-­‐American. 9. _____________________ Making English the official language in the United States. 10. _____________________ A Girl Scout Troop made up of primarily one ethnic group.