Talk:Melting pot

Americanize not divide

I'm for immigration and acceptance of new comers wish to be americans. but I dont like pluralism or multi-culti liberals who racialize or divide us for their gain. It's against what I stand for. I'm a 45 years old white man born and raised in the USA. America had to get a melting pot to accept and merge all of its different people into not one race but one nation. The United States of America. I won't put up with p-c crowd insane pleed not to asimilate asians or latinos, cause they lose the right to have a religion, culture or language. So? We have freedom of religion for starters, millions of peeple in america live like their ancestors did, but call themselves americans first and foremost. Enuogh of this tossed salad or meltin' pot talk. Or a pizza or sub sandwich talk. We come in colors, shapes or sizes anyway. Not all americans are alike. We focus on similarity and what makes us americans not the p-c weapon to hate, divide or discriminate. That's why I'm not for affirmative action, the use of the race for job hiring or college admission is odious and a product of the 60s when the law had to step in to stop discrimination. Now what it stands for the majority of people, white americans, is they get left out or not hired. Why a latino or asian, on their way to be american, are said 'people of color'? I'm sure they look different, from other lands, don't speak english, and this hocky dory stuff on need to integrate into american society. Then why throw away the united common majority culture in favor of a silly, messy, doomed to fail, multicultureism? Look we are americans not white people or black people or brown people, and lets not get into whos asian american or arab american or native american anymore. the article said how we never overdo the irish american, italian american or polish american thing. we only can accept so many people, & dont let the left make race or culture an issue. this is whats wrong with illegal imigration or culture tolerance. we need borders as much we need workers. we need to band together, in a melting pot or not. - signed, open-minded conservative

The US has never had one single unified culture. I can go to any of the 50 states and fully expect cultural differences. If anything, there has been increased cultural homogenization taking place, with local culture supplanted by generic corporate culture. Why is it that people get upset about Cinco de Mayo, but have no problem with Saint Patrick's Day or a Sons of Norway Parade? We can focus on both similarity and differences. People have the right to live their lives as they see fit. Forcing people to "assimilate" raises problems - assimilate to what? Should the people of Georgia be assimilated to ne just like the people of Wisconsin? Should the people of Wisconsin be assimilated to ne just like the people of Georgia?--RLent (talk) 18:35, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

With all due respect, why is this first paragraph still here & for more than 10 years? I assume the second, indented paragraph is someone's response. In any event, I thought the purpose of the talk page was not to editorialize or discuss politics, yet that's exactly what it does. The purpose of talk pages, I thought was to work on improving the main article - criticism, corrections, additions, suggestions, etc. Ileanadu (talk) 23:38, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

FWIW, he does seem to have had enough exposure to to the culinary analogies. Perhaps removing any analogy suggesting that these living arrangements are culinary dishes would help. ~2026-17842-44 (talk) 23:28, 29 March 2026 (UTC)

Salad bowl

I remember reading the term "salad bowl" in the 1970s as a synonym of multiculturalism, as "melting pot" associates with assimilation. However, it never caught on.

Well to some extend it did, if you look in just about any sociological or anthroloplogical reference book, it is mention how the new goal of American society is the Salad bowl, how it is the most humane ideology and how it has replaced the melting pot. The problem is that most poeple stop learning bout these ideologies in college and probably havn't look at a Antrhopology textbook since, thus still beleiving in the melting pot idea. Regards, Signature^brendel 19:30, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

It would be nice if a link to human cannibalism was included. Both melting pot and salad bowl seem to both lead to such an obvious and ugly conclusion ~2026-17842-44 (talk) 23:21, 29 March 2026 (UTC)

§…—

Statements such as the one contending that the melting pot metiphor is"largely disregared by most modern sociologists as outdated" or the one opining that the salad bowel of multiculturalism is "the goal for America as seen by most prominent sociologists", in both cases without any substantiation tend to identify a polemic for what it is. Who make up the cadre that includes "most prominent sociologists"? When did modern sociologists vote out the melting pot and vote in the salad bowl? Was there a referendum? A poll? Nonsense and non-scholarship.

Well, speaking of "melting pots" and "salad bowls", there's also the "pizza" concept, which, I think the article kind of does mention (without actually calling it the pizza-concept), where the ingredients are visible (to the naked eye), yet form an inseparable unit. However, as has been mentioned here, all concepts are "in the eye of the beholder" and I am afraid different people might interpret them in different ways. In this respect, the whole issue is more a battle of words and does not really help solve the overall issue. What it does do, at least, is to get people thinking about the whole problem.Crucible the crucible, by aurthur millar was not written in 1908 and was based on a puritan experience of america, not the immigrant integration of New York during the 19th and early 20th centruies. the oragin of the term is most often attributed to political cartoonists.

That's correct and I fixed the reference. If you have sources for an alternate origin of the term, you might add it here or to the article. Antonrojo 20:40, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

What is the whole issue? Is it just a dating issue with concepts being outdated? ~2026-17842-44 (talk) 23:38, 29 March 2026 (UTC)

The United States celebrates immigration like no other country

Disagreeing with a remark above, it's not true that all countries are melting pots. Every country has immigrants, but some have lots and others only a few. Some countries welcome immigrants, at least sometimes, but most don't want them. More than any other country, the United States has celebrated immigration, and at least some people at some times saw and still see the diversity of the immigrants, including descendants of black slaves, as a source of national strength and something to be proud of. The United States is the ethnic and cultural melting pot.

To say that Colombia or Argentina or Chile are melting pots because they are made up of diverse ethnic groups is missing the point. No country in Latin America celebrates or honors its natives as an ethnic group. Nowhere do they have the recognition, the legal protections, or the economic strength (casinos, in some cases) that they do in tbe U.S. Nowhere else celebrates its minority of African origin like the United States does. I know Brazil well and it's no exception.

What I'm getting at, is that "melting pot" pertains to the U.S., and only the U.S. deisenbe (talk) 03:25, 17 September 2021 (UTC)

The status of Native Americans is mostly OUTSIDE the melting pot. They are protected in many ways that keep them separate (eg reservations, separate schools, separate medical services, casinos, special protection for historic religious holy places). Furthermore US every so often (eg 1790s. 1850s, 1920s, and today in 2020s) goes through an anti-immigrant anti-melting pot mode. We are in it today. Canada is a rather better metling pot than USA. Rjensen Rjensen (talk) 04:38, 17 September 2021 (UTC)

Is someone proposing an edit? WP:NOTAFORUM MartinezMD (talk) 12:58, 17 September 2021 (UTC)

I can tell (both by your statement and by your Nordic username) that you have never been to the Dakotas. If you have, would not have made that statement.

It is true that the United States has historically discriminated (and in many ways continues to discriminate) against its indigenous populations (though I think anyone from a Nordic country where the Sámi people live is one to talk), but the ideal of the Melting pot (which, remember, is mostly what this Wikipedia page is about) has always sought to include Native Americans as part of the broader American identity. MagyarNavy1918 (talk) 23:55, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

It would be nice if a link to human cannibalism would be included in this article. ~2026-17842-44 (talk) 13:33, 30 March 2026 (UTC)

FWIW, there’s already salad and pizza being mentioned in the discussion, though I feel that a more adequate dish, like maybe paella may fit better. ~2026-17842-44 (talk) 13:37, 30 March 2026 (UTC)

Who Wrote This?

"Melting pot" has always been a metaphor for America being a multicultural society. Who the HELL is talking about "assimilation?" Into what? American culture is made up of all the people who immigrate here and bring their own cultural identities into a broader cultural identity. This doesn't mean minorities are assimilated into one culture, but rather that the broader culture assimilates to the culture of immigrant communities. That's what makes American unique and beautiful. Unfortunately, this article was probably either written by some nativist America Firster arguing that immigrants should "love it or leave it" (with some frankly nasty and racist implications to say the least, especially given the recent horrifying mass deportation of 23,000 US residents, most of whom were fleeing conflict or violence in their home countries), or some anti-American progressive who wants to find something to slander about the United States even though this core part of American identity was created by patriotic progressives who had a progressive vision of American identity. Or by a Canadian nationalist, and if that's the case then I'm sorry to burst your bubble but a "melting pot" and a "cultural mosaic" are the exact same thing. In fact, I would argue we should merge these pages with "Cultural mosaic" or "Canada" being a subsection of this Melting pot Wikipedia page. MagyarNavy1918 (talk) 23:49, 20 April 2025 (UTC)