Multiculturalism Essay ⋆ Political Science Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

States and empires containing different cultural groups have existed for millennia; the word multiculturalism, however, is of recent origin. Possibly the first time it was used was in a speech by Charles W. Hobart, an American sociologist, to the Canadian Council of Christians and Jews in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in 1963. Hobart’s speech, which congratulated Canada for its multiculturalism in contrast to America’s “melting pot,” was quoted extensively by Paul Yuzyk, a Canadian of Ukrainian ancestry, in a speech in the Senate of Canada on March 3, 1964.Yuzyk is sometimes regarded in Canada as the father of multiculturalism.

Canada in the early 1960s was intensely preoccupied with the relationship between its discontented French-speaking minority, mainly concentrated in Quebec, and the predominantly English-speaking majority of Canadians. In 1963 the Canadian government established the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism to study this question, but its terms of reference were criticized by many Canadians of European heritages other than British, Irish, or French. In response, the Royal Commission’s terms of reference were extended to include “the contributions of the other ethnic groups,” and in 1969 it published a volume of its report devoted to that subject. Two years later, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau declared that his government was officially committed to multiculturalism, although it would retain official bilingualism, and in 1977 he appointed a minister of state for multiculturalism.

Many Canadians initially welcomed the concept, both as a means of celebrating Canada’s increasing cultural diversity and as a means of distinguishing that country from the United States. Canadians had traditionally believed (on rather dubious evidence) that immigrants in Canada faced less pressure to assimilate to the majority culture than did immigrants in the United States. Before the word multiculturalism became popular, the expression “Canadian mosaic” had been used to indicate this belief. In 1982 a commitment to multiculturalism was incorporated into Canada’s constitution. As Canadian immigrants by this time came mainly from Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean, the emphasis of the multiculturalism policy gradually shifted from the preservation of languages and cultures to the prevention of racism and the promotion of equal opportunity.

The first country other than Canada to adopt multiculturalism as a policy was Australia; it did this between 1972 and 1975. Subsequently, the word, and the concept, spread to the United Kingdom, whose support for multiculturalism is sometimes contrasted with the assimilationist policies of republican France, and to the Netherlands, Germany, and Ireland. It also spread to the United States, where the retreat from a commitment to the melting pot idea of immigrant assimilation had perhaps begun with President John F. Kennedy, who took pride in his Irish Catholic heritage and who published a book entitled A Nation of Immigrants. In the 1980s, the Reverend Jesse Jackson was one of the first prominent Americans to use the word multiculturalism.

In the late twentieth century and early twenty-first century, multiculturalism became increasingly controversial, particularly in the United States, but elsewhere as well. In the United States, the concept became associated with cultural relativism and political correctness, as well as with the controversial practice of affirmative action and the growing importance of Spanish as a second language. In Canada it has always been resented by Quebec nationalists, who view Canada as a binational state and argue that multiculturalism downgrades the significance of French-speaking Quebec as a distinct society. In all countries where the word is used, it is the target of increasing concern that immigrants, particularly those of the Muslim faith, are not integrating into the society that receives them and are retaining antiliberal attitudes and values. This concern has placed severe strains on the alliance between supporters of multiculturalism and supporters of other causes such as feminism and equal rights for homosexuals and lesbians.

Supporters of multiculturalism argue in response that it facilitates the integration of immigrants and minorities into the host society and that countries that reject multiculturalism, such as France, have performed no better in this regard than countries that accept it. The debate is not likely to end soon, particularly since both sides tend to define the word multiculturalism in ways that lend support to their own arguments.

Bibliography:

Bissoondath, Neil. Selling Illusions:The Cult of Multiculturalism in Canada. Toronto: Penguin Books, 1994.
Glazer, Nathan. We Are All Multiculturalists Now. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1997.
Kernerman, Gerald. Multicultural Nationalism: Civilizing Difference, Constituting Community. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2005.
Kymlicka,Will. Finding Our Way: Rethinking Ethnocultural Relations in Canada. Toronto, Ont.: Oxford University Press, 1998.
Schlesinger, Arthur M., Jr. The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society. New York:W.W. Norton, 1992.
Schmidt, Alvin J. The Menace of Multiculturalism: Trojan Horse in America. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1997.

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