In American literature and culture, identity is a major theme from Puritanism to Postmodernism. In Modernism and Postmodernism, the discourse on identity takes on more direct and explicit social, ethnic, racial and political overtones (Michaels, 1995). Up until Modernism, identity is discussed generally within the context of the melting-pot formula: i.e. that there is one American self (predominantly male, white, and Anglo-Saxon) within which Americans – from all origins, races, cultures, and backgrounds – "melt". (Wafa A. Alkhadra, )
In the early twentieth century, the playwright Israel Zangwill coined the phrase “melting pot” to describe how immigrants from many different backgrounds came together in the United States. In Zangwill’s highly popular 1908 …show more content…
If they would but suffer to be melted in the pot, then they would become just as American as anyone else” (2001). This “American model” of assimilation was reinforced by core values and ideals established by the country’s original Anglo Protestant settlers that are embedded in the American Creed, which promotes the principles of liberty, equality, individualism, populism, and laissez-faire that underpin the U.S. Constitution. The model also embraced, as Wattenberg notes, the notion of American Exceptionalism, a phrase coined by Alexis de Tocqueville in the mid-19th century which assumes that the nation’s extraordinary history and development warrants its special place in the world. American Exceptionalism is rooted in the conviction that the country’s vast frontier offers boundless and equal opportunities for individuals to achieve their goals through hard work and self-sacrifice. As de Tocqueville put it: “For 50 years, it has been constantly repeated to the inhabitants of the United States that they form the only religious, enlightened, and free people. Diana
In the early twentieth century, the playwright Israel Zangwill coined the phrase “melting pot” to describe how immigrants from many different backgrounds came together in the United States. In Zangwill’s highly popular 1908 …show more content…
If they would but suffer to be melted in the pot, then they would become just as American as anyone else” (2001). This “American model” of assimilation was reinforced by core values and ideals established by the country’s original Anglo Protestant settlers that are embedded in the American Creed, which promotes the principles of liberty, equality, individualism, populism, and laissez-faire that underpin the U.S. Constitution. The model also embraced, as Wattenberg notes, the notion of American Exceptionalism, a phrase coined by Alexis de Tocqueville in the mid-19th century which assumes that the nation’s extraordinary history and development warrants its special place in the world. American Exceptionalism is rooted in the conviction that the country’s vast frontier offers boundless and equal opportunities for individuals to achieve their goals through hard work and self-sacrifice. As de Tocqueville put it: “For 50 years, it has been constantly repeated to the inhabitants of the United States that they form the only religious, enlightened, and free people. Diana