Synthesis Essay: What Makes America A Diverse Nation?

(16924) JONES, SHELLANDRIELLE J.
     America is a nation built on the struggles and perseverance of multiple cultures over the course of years. From the Civil Rights Movement to the vast immigration of Hispanics over the southwest border, these cultures have come together to make America as diverse as it is today. While some people believe that this diversity makes the nation un-unified, it can be argued that the differences are what makes it whole.

     In America, the people often try to define themselves under one description. They say the words "I am American" and are sure that the meaning behind that sentence can be applied to all that are citizens in this country. However, to be American is different for everyone. In the excerpt from

the essay "Notes of a Native Speaker," the narrator writes, "What it means to be American in spirit, in blood--is something far more borrowed and comingled than anything previous generations ever knew." The author expresses that there is no such thing as a true American.

All of the people come from various backgrounds. They come from different cultures, and come together under a single identity. The author mentions that what it means to be American is found in the spirit and in the blood. This blood is a reference to the past generations that passed on traits to an individual. These traits may include traditions, physical appearance, and many other distinctive qualities. By uniting, the traits from from other cultures join and add to each other as well. As time moves forward, each generation progresses to be even more diverse than the previous one. It is never the same. Yet, each generation is filled with people who identify themselves as Americans. There is no definition, no standard, and no set quality of a true American. In the excerpt "Aria: A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood," the author writes, "The biolingualists insist that a student should be reminded of his difference from other in mass society, his heritage. But they equate mere separateness with individuality...full individuality is achieved, paradoxically, by those who are able to consider themselves members of the crowd." The author believes that people that are truly individual are capable of

recognizing their own qualities even as they stand in the masses of a "crowd." This crowd is America. An American is able to find their own attributes that make them different, and then to use those attributes to better America. The crowd is filled with people who exchange ideas, some foreign and some familiar, with each other in order to create something new and original. They function as individual parts of the same machine that moves towards a brighter future. The country encourages this diversity, because it creates a society that is able to compound ideas and become more advanced. A person that is trying to become stronger cannot continue doing to do the same things and to eat the same unhealthy foods, and expect to gain muscle mass. They must try a different method that uses different components. Just as America has increased its diversity in order to become a stronger, smarter, and more innovative country.

     At the same time that the meaning of being American varies for each person, it also stands for the same thing.

America is known for the liberties and rights that it allows. There are opportunities in America that are not available in many other countries. If so many cultures and ethnicities have recognized that over the decades, then how could one's differences make them any less American than another's? In the excerpt from the essay "Notes of a Native Speaker, " the author states, "Alongside the pain of immigration, then, and the possibility, there is this truth: America is white no longer, and it will never be white again." The author refers to the fact that America was once made up of a predominantly white population. It is not that way anymore. As immigrants were brought in, some more voluntarily than others, the country became more diverse. It stands by the motto "liberty and justice for all." As long as an individual lives in America and believes in that same motto, then they are just as American as the white man who believes in the same thing. Or the black man. Or the coffee-colored man. This belief in equality despite differences is what has taken America as far as it has come. In the late 1900s, African Americans took this belief and marched for their rights and equalities that were guaranteed to them as Americans. Not as black people, but as Americans. This shows that individuality only proves to further the nation as a whole. The movement of black people was

also the movement of a country that was blind to color, and that accepts each difference as an addition to what an American is.

     To be American is to be as a painting in a grand museum filled with a world-wide collection of paintings. A museum filled with white canvases would be dull, and it would never change in value. However, as new colors are added, the museum gains value and prestige. Though each color is from a different part of the world, and may be made of different substances, they are all in that museum--in America--for the same reasons. The paintings are beautifully hand-crafted over generations, and add to the magnificence of the country.