| Chapter 1: | Introduction |
During the latter part of the previous century and into the present century, there has been a great deal of attention paid to the social, political, economic, and psychological consequences of the increasing ethnic diversification of the United States population (Jackson & Volckens, 1999; Myers, 2001). Central to this issue is the notion of racial and ethnic-specific identity1 and the importance that individuals place on these identities, as this newer diverse population represents a change in the landscape of American society. No longer do ethnic minority individuals simply seek to identify with and be accepted by mainstream American society (for a review, see Fong, 1998; Nagata, 1993; Portes & Rumbaut, 2001; Takaki, 1998; Uba, 1994), they now have the ability to incorporate the norms and values of both their home culture as well as their host (American) culture (conceptualized in the psychological literature as biculturalism).
This shift in attitudes regarding previously assimilating to the mainstream to now being able to embrace one’s home or ethnic culture has much to do with the idea of the “melting pot” in American society. The melting pot conception or theory relates to the idea that America is a country of many peoples and cultures, and that this variety is embraced and these cultures eventually become part of “American” culture and “melt” together in the pot of diversity.