Firstly, what is your overall opinion on the article? Secondly, for those of you who live outside of Pakistan, in your view, which of Milton Gordon’s three models are different ethnic, cultural and/or religious minorities living in your country following more?
Okay, new question. Which of the following three models are you personally more in favor of and why?
Anglo conformity: “… [W]hen the minority or immigrant is taught that the norms, values, and institutions of the majority group are superior and that they should adopt them in order to be accepted.” (Depending on the country that a person lives in, this model may not necessarily be “Anglo” conformity and applicable to another majority group instead).
Melting pot: “… [W]hen different racial/ethnic groups come together and out of this interaction comes a new culture that incorporates elements from all groups into one.”
Cultural pluralism/salad bowl: “… W]hen the different racial/ethnic groups keep their unique cultural norms, traditions, and behaviors, while still sharing common national values, goals, and institutions.”
Anglo conformity never works for the reason that those who are seen as being conformists will always be seen as lesser and this creates an environment for injustice and oppression and reaction away from the conformance.
Melting pot is perhaps a phenomenon for a few people but ultimately the Anglo conformity will win out - it is a very volatile and unstable position to be in a melting pot culture.
Cultural pluralism as defined above in reality will work only for those who know what they are doing. Most people who want to stick to their own cultural values are also the same people who care less about common goals … when they stick to their own values they are likely to stick to their own problematic baggage as well.
Convergence in Dominance, the Averaging effect in melting pot, or the spectral array effect of cultural pluralism all suffer from the same thing … None of their standards of operation are being taken from higher ideals but from practices that are already prevalent in their society and have different levels of mixing or blending - but none of them are advocating rising above and beyond their personal or cultural baggage.
We are talking about leaving one culture to another without talking about leaving the bad things and adopting good things. We are talking about common goals - but not addressing whether those common goals although shared by all - are they actually good to have or not? We have not discussed shedding bad ideas that are prevalent in all cultures.
It is a pick’n’mix culture that I advocate - we should each be able to select our cultural values but also all work towards good relations and improve each other - by conforming to an idealistic and higher moral being. This way no existing cultural group is dominant or advantaged … each are trying to get to the same higher value system in their own way expressed by their own cultural decoration.
