The Melting Pot is a title given to the United States that represents its many cultural backgrounds, often represented by the immigrants. These travelers have different incentives for leaving their home, one being the hope of a better life in “the Land of Milk and Honey.” Unfortunately, not all voyagers are given the circumstances that lead to a brighter future. Regardless of how and why they arrived in the country, all groups had different experiences that involved the American Dream. The Native Americans were unknowingly already living this ideal, though it did not exist at the time their literary works were written. The European explorers, in comparison, pursued the unknown world full of opportunity upon which the standards are based, persuading
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The American Dream included the element that the next generations will improve and surpass the present ones, but it is not the situation with the slaves. Prince is sold as a slave in the exposition of The History of Mary Prince, a West Indian Slave, leaving her mother to embark on the journey to the New World. For the slaves, the concept of a better future and progress ultimately becomes more of a wish than an actuality. In addition, unlike the other groups, a slave’s individuality is completely suppressed. Prince narrates she was being sold like she was sheep or cattle. The simile not only delineates the cruelty she received, but also the slaves’ dehumanization and loss of identity. Moreover, the classless society trait of Eden was one wherein the slaves could not participate. In The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, Olaudah Equiano uses strong and exploiting diction to describe the treatment of him and other slaves, including how they were chained together in close proximity and whipped. They are indisputably treated as less than equals to the white people, not applying to the nonhierarchical ideals the Native Americans and Europeans strived for. The misfortune the African slaves have faced reveals that they were unable to experience the American Dream the way the other groups did, because for them the Dream was more so a
The American Dream included the element that the next generations will improve and surpass the present ones, but it is not the situation with the slaves. Prince is sold as a slave in the exposition of The History of Mary Prince, a West Indian Slave, leaving her mother to embark on the journey to the New World. For the slaves, the concept of a better future and progress ultimately becomes more of a wish than an actuality. In addition, unlike the other groups, a slave’s individuality is completely suppressed. Prince narrates she was being sold like she was sheep or cattle. The simile not only delineates the cruelty she received, but also the slaves’ dehumanization and loss of identity. Moreover, the classless society trait of Eden was one wherein the slaves could not participate. In The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, Olaudah Equiano uses strong and exploiting diction to describe the treatment of him and other slaves, including how they were chained together in close proximity and whipped. They are indisputably treated as less than equals to the white people, not applying to the nonhierarchical ideals the Native Americans and Europeans strived for. The misfortune the African slaves have faced reveals that they were unable to experience the American Dream the way the other groups did, because for them the Dream was more so a