The Summariser

Reading notes:

• “E Pluribus Unum” – can be regarded as an unofficial motto of the United States and a standard manifestation of the melting pot myth (second chances and new beginnings, but also molding into a new race) – it is a myth about the making of the American society, which through it seems in perpetual movement – as opposed to other myths, this one is a myth about the future: one in which all differences would be transcended;
• the author: points to narrative variations, iconic symbolizations, and ritualistic practices that have shaped the myth of the melting pot; in her view: the notion of the melting pot has been used in three different modes: 1. descriptive (history): as a phrase with which historical developments in the US have been described and projected into the future; 2. normative (program): as a normative concept in order to affirm the melting pot at various points in American history; 3. analytical (category): as an analytic term in order to study cultural, social, and demographic processes in American society; – the oscillation between the three modes has contributed to the ELASTICITY of the melting pot myth;
• ZANGWILL’S play THE MELTING POT: the protagonist (David Quixano – Jewish-Russian musician) of Zangwill’s play, The Melting Pot, portrays the American experience as a process of amelioration through amalgamation;
• the plot of the play: Quixano immigrates to the US after his family’s brutal murder; in New York, he meets Vera Revendal, who then reveals to be the daughter of the person responsible for that murder; Quixano thus leaves Vera; Quixano then acknowledges that he had been wrong in rejecting Vera’s love and this gives the play an aura of the Redeemer Nation so cherished in exceptionalist rhetoric; David’s faith in the melting pot is thus reassured and strengthened: the two overcome family rivalries and make a new start in America (this process emphasizes the values that Americans have in common rather than those that make them different); the American crucible melts those differences and makes them literally new (the two are redeemed via the melting pot); – all these elements echo the Promised Land rhetoric, Manifest Destiny, American Exceptionalism, and American civil religion;
• some critics of the play have argued that the play, in fact, portrays the melting pot as only a dream;
• CONTESTING the melting pot: on the one hand, liberals accused the notion as one that flattens differences and leads to forced homogenization (they suggested diversity and plurality as a solution to this); on the other hand, nativist anti-immigration critics saw the melting pot as a threat to (Anglo-) American society and supported anti-immigration legislation (proto-fascist notions of racial hygiene and racial purity); others perceived it as a repressive concept rather than one of assimilation (coercive homogenization into Anglo-Saxon culture);

Reformist positions of intellectual progressive figures:

• other critics (such as Horace Kallen) proposed a democracy of various nationalities, a nation of nations (as in an orchestra); cultural PLURALISM where ethnic diversity is an asset rather than an issue; the metaphor of the orchestra to illustrate the challenges of the melting pot has been used extensively by various critics; – KALLEN saw American society as a WORK IN PROGRESS rather than as a society in cultural decline;
• other critics (such as Randolph Bourne) have argued that immigrants should retain their languages and customs: “immigrants merge but they do not fuse”; assimilation into an Anglo-Saxon culture is seen as violent, undemocratic and inhumane; liberal critics such as Bourne, see this failure to assimilate into American society as something positive; American Progressivism: a reform movement that advocated for an American society in which all the cultures of the world would coexist peacefully;

Conservative critics:

• critics such as eugenicist E.A. Ross found both pluralism and assimilation equally problematic: their anti-immigration stance was motivated by a nationalist outlook based on the notions of white supremacy and racial purity; SO: the melting pot as a threat to the white race (what they saw as “mongrelization”);
• their faction was the one that garnered support (even from politicians) and legislation in line with it was enforced (the Chinese Exclusion Act, the Gentleman’s Agreement, the Immigration acts of 1917 and 1924); there began a strong eugenics movement which became a “central national ideology” – people with good genetic make-up should therefore the encouraged to reproduce while the “inferiors” should be stopped from doing that;
• proponents of “scientific racism” such as Harry H. Laughlin claimed that social and racial degeneracy (poverty and criminality were hereditary) came from the new immigrants, a notion that stood at the heart of exclusionist legislation: by early 1930s, some 30 American states had adopted such eugenics laws (people could be branded as “feeble-minded” by a court and sterilized); Laughlin’s law served as the basis for Germany’s Law for the Prevention of Genetically Diseased Offspring (1933);
• other critics such as Henry Fairchild went against unrestricted immigration and saw it as a threat to American society (immigrants were seen as “parasites” and “alien particles”);
• such imagery has influenced the discourse on immigration until today;
• SO: reformist, progressive figures, and conservative critics were opposed to the melting pot idea for different reasons – the pluralists (Bourne and Kallen) saw it as TOO REPRESSIVE, while the nativists (Ross, Laughlin, and Fairchild) saw it as TOO INCLUSIVE.
• BUT (the author claims): “the melting pot myth is a singular vision in the way that is de-emphasizes difference while holding the middle ground between total assimilation on the one hand and racist exclusion on the other”.
• other critics such as Ernest Poole see in the melting pot a reversal of the Towel of Babel drama; the melting pot promises unification through the creation of a new race;
• in the period between the 1880s and 1920s discussions of the melting pot became increasingly polarized, and the concept lost much of its elasticity; BUT reconstructing that ORIGINAL elasticity (i.e. before the 1880s) lets us see how race and racial difference were at the heart of debates on national social, and cultural cohesion; the melting pot myth in its hegemonic version has obscured the role of racism in American society by projecting a colorblind version of social harmony and by obscuring ongoing inequality.

Summary of “E Pluribus Unum? The Myth of the Melting Pot” by Heike Paul

In “E Pluribus Unum? The Myth of the Melting Pot” Heike Paul argues that the melting pot, a myth about the making of American society originating in Israel Zangwill’s play The Melting Pot, has consistently obscured the importance of race and racial differences in national, social, and cultural cohesion debates. In particular, she argues that due to its elasticity as a concept and its modus operandi, which is concurrently descriptive, normative, and analytical, it has enabled and maintained contrasting views.

In the discussion about the tenability of the melting pot, Paul contends, critiques came from all sides of the ideological spectrum and censured it for different reasons. On the one hand, intellectual progressives saw the notion as overly repressive and accused it of flattening differences and leading to forced homogenisation. Critics such as Horace Kallen, who perceived American society as a “work in progress”, advocated for cultural pluralism and ethnic diversity and used the metaphor of an orchestra to illustrate that both can be an asset rather than a nuisance. Other critics, such as Randolph Bourne, saw assimilation into an Anglo-Saxon culture as a violent act that erased the immigrants’ language and customs. Finally, Ernest Poole saw a reversal of the Tower of Babel drama in the melting pot, which promised unification by creating a new race.

Conservative and nativist anti-immigration critics, on the other hand, saw in the melting pot a looming threat to the purity of the white race. For example, eugenicists and proponents of scientific racism, such as E.A. Ross and Harry H. Laughlin, warned of “mongrelisation” and argued that immigrants were a source of degeneracy if unguarded. To them, the pluralism and the assimilation promised by the melting pot were troublesome to the same degree. Other critics, such as Henry Fairchild, advocated for restrictive immigration laws and spoke of immigrants as parasites that would only drain American society of its potential and resources. Such extreme views and imagery, Paul argues, continue to influence the discourse on immigration even today.

However, notwithstanding the elasticity of the myth of the melting pot, it was the faction of conservative and nativist critics that garnered political support and became a central national ideology. Their views were translated into exclusionist legislation such as the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882) and the subsequent immigration acts of 1917 and 1924. Additionally, American eugenics laws and scientific racism even came to inform Germany’s Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring (1933), legislation that led to the horrors of Nazi Germany.

Paul concludes that what is missing in this entire discussion is any reference to the role of racism. The myth’s capacity to support opposing views has obscured the role of racism and the inequalities that stem from it by prescribing a colourblind version of societal harmony. If one was to refer to James Baldwin’s “My Dungeon Shook,” Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Between the World and Me, and Toni Morrison’s “Make America White Again,” one could safely claim that a societal harmony that would include African-Americans has not yet been achieved.