Ethnic Groups in America sample essay

It is a well known fact that such notions as globalization and internationalization have become common nowadays. Worldwide migration is a regular phenomenon. As people seek better life, they move from their native countries to more developed ones. America is a great example of such country, which accepts millions of immigrants from all over the world from Siberia to Mexico. The Eastern countries also fall in the list, and a story from Connections proves this statement by describing the lives of Chinese immigrants in the United States of America. In general terms, the face of America is changing first because of the great variety of ethnic minorities within the country, and secondly because of the constant immense inflow of these new faces. Thus, people form Asia, Africa, and Europe come to America in great quantities, and these quantities grow every year. Because of this mass phenomenon, the face of America has changed and is still changing greatly. After all, America is a country of immigrants and was formed by immigrants. That is why such a phenomenon is completely natural, taking into account that worldwide globalization and migration is a common phenomenon in nearly all countries.

Arrivals, roots and memories has a great story about a girl in America who is of Chinese origin. Although the story did not provide many details about how ethnic minorities shaped the form of the United States, it did however mention some of the concepts that may be related to this topic. One of the most notable parts of the story is the fact of how Chinese culture penetrated into the United States.

The heroine lived in a Chinatown. The name of the neighborhood itself provides much information, and means that the numbers of Chinese are so huge and increasing, that they have formed their own neighborhood to live in a community. The purpose for such concentration and density is to be closer to compatriots and create a slight feeling of home. However, even though ethnic minorities live in communities or neighborhoods, they do have a great influence on the culture of the surrounding people in the long term. Thus, ethnic minorities bring to America the root of their culture and insert them into American culture, which is in fact the mixture of cultures. This mixture has already taken some form, which identified itself as American culture, but the current roles minorities play distort and change this culture even more, and keep it dynamic.

A great example of the differences in culture can be traced from the relationship between the heroine and her parents, especially her mother. While a typical American family is more liberal, and allows much freedom for the kids, encouraging the Montessori approach to pedagogy, the Chinese are more radical. As all Easterners, Chinese are more strict and straightforward, and talk between the heroine of the story and her mother supports this statement. If an American daughter would behave naughty, parents would probably calmly find out the reasons for the problem and disobedience, and follow a more scientific approach to reach the motivational centers. In the story, however, the daughter says, “I’ll never be the kind of daughter you want me to be,” and the mother instead of something astoundingly calm and relaxing says this radical Eastern, “only two kinds of daughters. Those who are obedient and those who follow their own mind! Only one kind of daughter can live in this house. Obedient daughter” (page 131). By this statement she did not mean that she did not love her daughter, or that the daughter is bad. The mother simply exhibited the element of culture of East, and the ways parents bring up children and discipline them. The fact is these are different, not bad or good, but different.

Ultimately, the story from the book described memories of childhood of the main character, which were closely related to a piano. This piano was the reason for numerous disputes and disagreements between her and her mother. These arguments, in turn, reveal the fundamental difference between the Asian culture and American culture, especially in terms of pedagogy. While Americans would try to address the problem from a liberal and more calm and scientific point of view, Chinese show their conservatism, which does influence the overall image of the nation. The more Asians, Arabs, and African-Americans come to the united States, and the more frequently they come, the more diversified the country becomes. And this diversification and multiculturalism has become a regular and common phenomenon nowadays.
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