In Chapter 8, Huntington discusses immigration and how the composition of American immigrants has undergone drastic changes over the years. At the onset of mass American immigration, the composition of immigrants was relatively homogenous in that people coming into the country mostly consisted of white European Christians. Many people entered the country, but not all stayed. Those that remained and did not return to their home countries truly wanted to be American and embraced the ideals. As time has progressed, however, immigrant groups have varied significantly. No longer do all immigrants coming into America at any given time share the same skin color, religious beliefs, or cultural backgrounds. Traditionally, these groups face some adversity on their route to being fully integrated in society. Events that inspire patriotism like wars help assimilate these immigrants because everyone is fighting under the same flag for the nation. No one can risk more than their life for their country and generally this has caused Americans to be more accepting of foreign immigrants.
One of the largest issues facing American immigrant assimilation in today’s world is the idea of dual citizenship. In the past, people came to America to become Americans and generally abandon past identities, while still retaining cultural values. Today, however, immigrants tend to hold onto their past identities and maintain dual citizenship, creating a fundamental lack of commitment to their country. One can never be truly part of country if deep down they have allegiance to another. Symptoms of this are people not fully wanting to assimilate into a new country’s culture, which will inevitably cause issues down the road. It goes without question that immigration is at a perilous point. Can immigration continue to thrive in a traditional way while the prospect of dual citizenship still exists? Can a person fully assimilate into a new nation while maintaining an allegiance to a past country, or is this impossible?
3 replies on “Who Are We? Ch 8 ERA”
I agree that immigration is an important part of American culture and that there are many questions to be asked about the conflicts that arise from the lack of assimilation to an American identity. However, I believe that a sense of dual citizenship and strong ties to a previous culture are not detrimental to American society. To answer your question I think that remaining connected to a past culture is possible and even if one has ties to a previous country they can still become a legitimized member of American society. Having previous culture ties may even help people assimilate to American culture more easily. Thus having a strong connection to a previous culture can still allow for assimilation and can even help it happen more smoothly.
I find your stance on dual citizenship very interesting. To be clear, I am also pro dual citizenship and see nothing intrinsically wrong with the issue. It allows people to maintain ties back home while still journeying elsewhere in the world to live their lives. From an objective perspective, however, it may be problematic for one to fully integrate themselves into a new society if they still hold the values and cultural beliefs of another society. Again, I have nothing wrong with this approach and certainly does not stop one from being legitimized as a member of American society, but deep down it might prevent full assimilation into a new lifestyle.
In this ERA you make good arguments and express the importance of immigration in the United States, which is certainly an important issue to be discussed. To answer your questions, I do think that immigration can continue to thrive in a traditional way while the prospect of dual citizenship still exists. However, it would be essential for the immigrants to prioritize the United States, but at the same time they can still connect to their other cultures. Therefore, this would hopefully allow immigrants to be happy and maintain some of their values, while still being able to assimilate themselves to American society. Furthermore, a person can fully assimilate into a new nation while maintaining an allegiance to a past country, as this is not impossible. As previously mentioned, this process can be done by maintaining some values, but making sure to prioritize the United States. This can be seen as people often have multiple identities, and therefore, can have multiple allegiances to multiple cultures. However, this may become an issue if people do not prioritize the United States, as this would cause divisions within the nation. With this in mind, some may consider this likely to occur and that these divisions are inevitable, but I do not think this would necessarily happen if people make sure to at least emphasize the importance of American culture. By putting these values first, the immigrants are essentially putting the United States first.