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The effects of cultural assimilation
The effects of cultural assimilation
The effects of cultural assimilation
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Cultural assimilation is the process by which a person or a group's language and/or culture come to resemble those of another group. The term is used to refer to both individuals and groups, and in the latter case it can refer to either immigrant diasporas or native residents that come to be culturally dominated by another society (Wikipedia). However, this process will be difficult to implement in today’s time in America because many of the citizen are from different cultures and races. Assimilation is a practice that does not encourage cooperation or unity between cultures, assimilation encourages dominance of one culture over another; We cannot progress as a nation by suppressing minority practices and their beliefs but the only way we can achieve world peace is by attempting to understand people differences.
Differences is a unique feature that some use it to their
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We are all human, the differences in our skin shouldn’t define what we can achieve in life or stop us from enjoying the fruit of life; progress were hard fought and it wasn’t earned overnight but when people stood up and raised their voices, it shed a light into the life of most that were silenced for decades.
The perfect example was highlighted in the novel “I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem”. I, Tituba is a fictionalization of a real life experience of a black woman tried as a witch in the 1600s America. It focuses on telling the story of African America at the time, it was a way of letting their voice be heard after so many years of been shut down. The story of Tituba began with:
Abena, my mother, an English sailor raped her on the bridge of the Christ the King, one day in 16** while the ship was sailing toward Barbados. It is from that aggression that I was born. From that act of hatred and
Many accuse John Proctor being the cause of the Salem Witch Trials. If he did not cheat on his wife then Abigail would not have such an anger towards the world. But, if it was not for Tituba those girls would have never been in the forest, she would not have been accused, and Tituba would not have confessed to a lie. Tituba is the “Gas to the Fire”, she may not be the cause of the witch trials, although, she is a large contributor to all of the problems. She wanted nothing more than to save her own life but she did not realize that all of the deaths that were to come all began with her.
The Salem Witch Trials were a scary time but the director of this movie made it seem action packed. The actors made it seem like they actually lived in that time. The wardrobe in the movie also had a huge impact on how the movie appeared and it also told the viewer how to be emotionally. I would give this movie a thumbs up for many reasons. Now I am going to tell you about the characters and the directors perspective.
The Salem Witch Trials. This period in history is known for its witch craziness and it
In the strict Puritan villages of Massachusetts Bay Colony in the late 1600s, people were uncomfortable about foreigners and strange manners. Puritans were bothered about the “evil eye”, where a sudden illness or death of an animal was commonly misinterpreted as the “devil’s work”. It was a place where anybody different was not trusted and Tituba was perhaps the most different among them. Maryse Condé’s novel I, Tituba Black Witch of Salem, is the story of a black woman who was born into a troubled life plagued with many challenges. Born by a mother who was a victim of rape, Tituba’s life is set for one that is filled with tragic and unlucky events. She seemed doomed for misfortune and grief due her trials and tribulations of the fact that she was an African American woman. Tituba, as well other female characters in this book are continually pushed around because of their gender. Anytime a woman tried to defend her human rights she was punished for it in the most extreme way possible. Maryse Condé takes on race, gender, religion, the idea of America as a land of wealth, the idea of the victim’s guilt, revenge, sexuality, and many other powerful motifs, and weaves them together in Tituba.
The book Witches! The Absolutely True Tale Of Disaster In Salem by Rosalyn Schanzer is about the Salem Witch Trials. In January 1692, three women were accused of being witches by two girls who claimed to be “tortured” by them. More and more women and men were accused for about a year until the trials stopped. Overall, more than 200 people were accused, but why? There had to be a reason for these people to be accused. Some of the top reasons for people to be accused of witchcraft were poorness, feuds or revenge, and different opinions/beliefs.
1. Becoming Bicultural is another form of assimilation. It entails people of different cultures borrowing from one another’s culture what they consider right and integrating it within their individual cultures. The United States being a nation of immigrants and due to the recent massive immigration, the country is led to a nationwide struggle with the need to become bicultural, a difficult and sometimes painful process of navigating between ethnic cultures. Some former minority groups are now becoming the dominating group due to their high rate of immigration and high birth rate. The Latino and Asian populations form the largest portion of the leading groups that have literally changed the face of the nation and thus calling in for the need to become bicultural.
Society throughout time has proven to be a frail and feeble structure that has failed to maintain organization on multiple occasions. People have demonstrated that with just enough chaos and pressure, they will have no qualms with deserting their morals at the sight of adversity. Whether it be creating a witch hunt to better the lives of the poor, or putting fellow American citizens’ in concentration camps based off their Japanese ancestry. There is no boundary that people won’t cross in order to feel safe and justified in their decisions. In Isaac Reed’s article,” Deep culture in action: resignification, synecdoche, and metanarrative in the moral panic of the Salem Witch Trials”, he examines the concept of
Maryse Condé, has written quite a few books in her time, but nothing associated with the novel she wrote in 1986. I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem shows the issues resembling gender, race, feminism, gender, passion, and the calamity of the people of Salem being recognized as witches. By expressing these objectives Condé overcomes obstacles that once detained her and other women. With challenges being thrown at Condé, she took on the challenge to write Tituba.
Back to the American history, "assimilation" policy was introduced to the Native Americans during the earliest colonial times. During that time, all American Indians must either adopt the White's lifestyles or perish. With the declaration of the Dawes Act, a goal of destroying all tribal structure and their communal life were summoned. Tribal lands were divided among natives and the Westerners, leaving the natives, a land surrounded by the foreigners. With such acts, the American Indians were slowly assimilated into the White's culture and without their own people around them, they will have to communicate with the Westerners with their language instead of their indigenous languages; they ...
Assimilation, different from accommodation, implied that the “outsider” group actually came to accept and internalise the values and culture of the native group which usually shows up at second generation of immigrants. They grow up with two different cultures and they will have to face the difference between these cultures and form their own opinion and tendency which may eventually coming out a behavior stander of the combination of two cultures. People in this period will have more individual understanding because they have chance to choose they life they want to live. It also means this period is not only the most important time for assimilation but also the most struggling time. Just as what Eric’s mentioned in “Notes of a Native Speaker”, “Being an ABC certainly affected me another way. It made me feel like something of a greenhorn, a social immigrant”. Most offsprings of immigrants will have the same confusion because they get their early education from their parents, but after experiencing social contacts(generally after they go to school), a new sense of value from the society will refresh their brains. Some people says that these kids are blessed because they have chance to aware two cultures and get benefits from both, but some would say they are cursed to live in a life like this because they have to face so many confusions in a young age. What
Witchcraft is a term which sprouts many different meanings. As stated above, it is attributed to witches. But what is a witch? Probably an evil haggish-like women who has signed a pact with the devil if we think of it in the English sense. So witchcraft must be evil doings; putting curses on people to make their life miserable, using wicked spells to transform humans to frogs etc. But does this hold true to everyone's idea of what witchcraft is.People's believes on the subject of witchcraft might differ between different cultures.
Multiculturalism vs Assimilation America is a place where many cultures and races co-exist, so there are many different opinions and beliefs. Of course there is bound to be tension and misunderstandings, which unfortunately escalates (in some cases) into violence that we hear about in the media. So what is the solution? Should we all assimilate to one standard or should we recognize our individual cultures and consider ourselves multicultural? The answer is not an easy one to define.
It is impossible to separate my voice from this topic, as I was born as an African
At some point in our lives we experience a culture as an outsider by moving from one culture to another.In the world today there are so many different cultures and not one of them is found to be the same.Instead they all have something that makes them unique, whether its language or even the clothes they wear and their behavior as well.The differences they have is what separates them from one another and who ever joins that particular culture must get accustomed to their way of life.In the society today we have many people immigrating to the United States to start a new and better life but what they soon begin to realize is that it’s a whole new world out there and in order to survive they have to get accustomed to the new way of life which is much different from their lives before.
12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright is a photo and text book which poetically tells the tale of African Americans from the time they were taken from Africa to the time things started to improve for them in a 149 page reflection. Using interchanging series of texts and photographs, Richard Wright encompasses the voices of 12 Million African-Americans, and tells of their sufferings, their fears, the phases through which they have gone and their hopes. In this book, most of the photos used were from the FSA: Farm Security Administration and a few others not from them. They were selected to complement and show the points of the text. The African-Americans in the photos were depicted with dignity. In their eyes, even though clearly victims, exists strengths and hopes for the future. The photos indicated that they could and did create their own culture both in the past and present. From the same photos plus the texts, it could be gathered that they have done things to improve their lives of their own despite the many odds against them. The photographs showed their lives, their suffering, and their journey for better lives, their happy moments, and the places that were of importance to them. Despite the importance of the photographs they were not as effective as the text in showing the African-American lives and how the things happening in them had affected them, more specifically their complex feelings. 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright represents the voice of African-Americans from their point of view of their long journey from Africa to America, and from there through their search for equality, the scars and prints of where they come from, their children born during these struggles, their journeys, their loss, and plight...