Multiculturalism Presentation -Sam K

Multiculturalism

by Sam Komaragiri Heritage High School AP Human Geography Mr. Mumford 3B

What is multiculturalism?

By a formal definition, multiculturalism is the coexistence of several cultures in one society, with the ideal of all cultures being valued and worthy of study.

Rather than assimilating and homogenizing all of a society's population into one, unified culture, multicultural societies acknowledge the diversity there is and many types of distinct and blended cultures within a certain society. All cultures are not alike, and we must recognize them each individually.

Multicultural Countries Around the World

Many countries in the world, such as the US, Canada, and Belgium are examples of multicultural countries or multinational states. Multinational states are organized territories with an established government with sovereignty over their own political affairs but contain more than one distinct groups of people with different shared cultures and histories, all living together in a single country.

Of couse, these are not the only multinational or multicultutural states in the world (there are too many to cover), but the ones shown in the map are few examples of multinational states.

Here are some couple examples of mutlinational states:

(Click on the dots)

Positives of Multiculturalism

• Multiculturalism can enrich the lives of all people by teaching us more about other people's cultures and gaining an understanding of their cultural lives.
• Multiculturalism can help us learn more about our cultural differences and similarities and come together. For example, although racial and cultural prejudice is still present in the US (with the BLM protests and movements aiming to fight that), compared to before the Civil Rights Act of 1914, we have seen an improvement in our treatment and perception of people of other races.
• As we learn more about the political and economic contributions that indigenous and colored people have done in our society, we start to go from a Eurocentric level of thinking, which overemphasized contributions by white Europeans, while underemphasizing minority ones, to a more open-minded and diverse level of thinking.
• People can also get the opportunity to learn more languages other than their native one, which can give them more opportunities in jobs, communicating with immigrants and other native speakers, and increasing their cognitive ability, since learning another language can show that you can communicate with speakers of different languages during a job, which can help translate other people's words, and as you become more knowledgable in learning a language, your cognitive ability will increase.
• It can also help people with increasing creativity. As you acquire different aspects of knowledge from other people from different cultures, and you influence them significantly too, we will become stimulated by different ideas and perspectives and can face questions and challenges much more easier.

Negatives of Multiculturalism

• It can cause conflicts since people with different values, beliefs, and customs can clash together, since people always do not agree with each others ideas and perspectives.
• There can be a fear of new people with a different culture coming into the country, often referred to as xenophobia, a fear of foreigners. Xenophobia often targets immigrants from outside their own country and with a distinct culture, who are perceived as a threat b the country's nativists or xenophobic. Some examples include anti-semitism, which has been around for a long time and the Holocaust resulting from it has ended up killing 5-6 million Jews and along with other ethnic minorities, and Islamophobia, a fear of Muslim believers which is currently going on in the post-9/11 US.
• Stereotypes can also occur. Stereotypes are generalized and oversimplified beliefs about a group of people and their culture. The one who is doing the stereotypign does not have a clear understanding of the culture they are stereotyping on. Stereotypes are not exactly untrue, but they are incomplete and based on only a section of a picture. Most stereotypes are make people be viewed as bad, which can make the whole group be perceived as bad or another negative word.
• Certain aspects of culture can also disappear as many smaller cultures tend to dominate. When a culture is in influenced by another culture, some aspects of a culture can be lost if it abandons one part of its culture for another part of another culture that is close by, and the host culture can be diluted by quite a bit.
• It might also take a longer time for people of a different culture than the majority to integrate and adapt to the larger culture. For example, if a student moved from Mexico to the US, there may be barriers for him to be accustomed to the culture of the US, as he doesn't know the language and he is setting foot in a completely new culture that looks new to him.

Why is multiculturalism so important in the world and our lives now?

Looking at our modern globalized world, especially in 2021, we can see that multiculturalism is found everywhere. We live in an interconnected world, with people of all cultures following certain customs at ease to interact with people who are part of another culture, especially through the Internet and social media. Since we are constantly interacting with people from other cultures every day, it is important for us to understand their rules and values so that we don't come into conflict with them and we can stay aware of them always. On a larger scale, like Frisco, this is especially important. Frisco is such a diverse place, containing many ethnicities, such as White, Indian, Hispanic, Chinese, African American, and more. For us to cooperate together and work towards a common goal when we need to, we must find our differences and appreciate them. We must take time to learn about other's cultures and traditions because it can give us more knowledge about the people around the world and prepare us for the diverse society, that is the globalized Earth. To address issues such as inequality, injustice, and inequity, we must address all of our cultural groups and work together to solve these issues. We can also bring attention to other issues regarding the the prejudice of other human beings and culture. I, like many teens, am adamant about social change and want to do anything to get our multicultural society the way it should be functioning, peaceful with all open minds. However, this is surely not possible, as there will be some who will never open their minds to accepting other cultures. We as a multicultural society should learn much about each other and think of each other as great contributors to the establishment of our modern society. For example, through pop culture, BLM protests, have not only spread in the US, bt also throughout the rest the world, including the UK and even South Korea, which has made our multicultural society to fight against racial prejudice around the world. The coexistence of several different cultures is an important factor in our lives and throughout the whole entire world.

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