essay about multiculturalism

Essay on Multiculturalism

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100 Words Essay on Multiculturalism

What is multiculturalism.

Multiculturalism is when people from different places, with different ways of living and different beliefs, come together in one society. It’s like a salad bowl, where each unique ingredient adds to the flavor, making it better.

Benefits of Multiculturalism

When we live in a place with many cultures, we learn a lot. We get to try new foods, celebrate different festivals, and make friends with different backgrounds. This teaches us to be kind and open-minded.

Challenges of Multiculturalism

Sometimes, people find it hard to understand each other’s ways. This can lead to disagreements. But, talking and learning about each other’s cultures can help solve these problems.

Multiculturalism in Schools

Schools are great for multiculturalism. Kids learn about the world’s cultures and languages. This helps them become better citizens of the world, ready to work and live with all kinds of people.

250 Words Essay on Multiculturalism

Multiculturalism is when many different cultures live together in one place. Imagine a school where students come from all around the world. They may speak different languages, eat different foods, and celebrate different holidays. This mix of cultures adds variety and can make life more interesting.

Living in a multicultural society is like having the world at your doorstep. You get to learn about other ways of life without traveling far. For example, you can try different types of food, listen to new music, and make friends with people who have different stories to tell. This can help us become more understanding and accepting of others.

Sometimes, when people from different backgrounds live together, they might not agree on everything. It can be hard to understand someone who is very different from you. But it’s important to talk and listen to each other. This is how we can solve problems and live together peacefully.

Learning from Each Other

In a place full of different cultures, we can learn a lot from each other. We can see that even though we might do things differently, we often have the same hopes and dreams. By sharing our cultures, we can teach each other new things and grow together.

In conclusion, multiculturalism is about different cultures living together and learning from one another. It has its ups and downs, but it makes our world a more exciting and caring place.

500 Words Essay on Multiculturalism

Multiculturalism is like a big garden with many different types of flowers. Each flower has its own color, shape, and smell. This garden is more beautiful because it has so many kinds of flowers. In the same way, multiculturalism means having people from many different cultures and backgrounds living together in one place. Just like each flower adds beauty to the garden, every culture adds something special to a country or community.

When people from different cultures come together, they share their ways of life, their food, music, and stories. This sharing makes life more interesting for everyone. Imagine eating the same food every day; it would be boring. But in a multicultural place, you can try new foods, learn new dances, and hear different languages. It’s like going on a trip around the world without leaving your home.

In a multicultural school, you might have friends from different countries. You can learn from them about their holidays, how they dress, and what games they play. This is not just fun, but it also helps you understand how people see the world in different ways. By learning about other cultures, you become smarter and more understanding. It’s like each new friend is a new book full of exciting stories and lessons.

Sometimes, having many cultures together can be hard. People might not understand each other because they speak different languages or have different customs. It’s like when you play a team game, and everyone has different rules. To play well together, you need to learn the same rules. In multiculturalism, the “rules” are respect and kindness. When everyone follows these rules, it’s easier to get along.

How to Support Multiculturalism

You can support multiculturalism by being curious and open-minded. This means wanting to learn about other cultures and not being afraid of things that are different. It’s like trying a new sport; at first, it might feel strange, but you might end up loving it. You can also support multiculturalism by standing up for your friends if someone is not being nice to them because they are from a different culture.

Multiculturalism is like a colorful quilt. Each piece of fabric is different, but when sewn together, they make something warm and beautiful. Living in a multicultural world helps us learn, grow, and understand each other better. It’s important to remember that even though we might look or speak differently, inside, we all have feelings, dreams, and the need to be loved and respected. So, let’s celebrate the beauty of every culture and build a world where everyone feels like they belong.

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Multiculturalism

The idea of multiculturalism in contemporary political discourse and in political philosophy reflects a debate about how to understand and respond to the challenges associated with cultural diversity based on ethnic, national, and religious differences. The term “multicultural” is often used as a descriptive term to characterize the fact of diversity in a society, but in what follows, the focus is on multiculturalism as a normative ideal in the context of Western liberal democratic societies. While the term has come to encompass a variety of normative claims and goals, it is fair to say that proponents of multiculturalism find common ground in rejecting the ideal of the “melting pot” in which members of minority groups are expected to assimilate into the dominant culture. Instead, proponents of multiculturalism endorse an ideal in which members of minority groups can maintain their distinctive collective identities and practices. In the case of immigrants, proponents emphasize that multiculturalism is compatible with, not opposed to, the integration of immigrants into society; multiculturalism policies provide fairer terms of integration for immigrants.

Modern states are organized around the language and culture of the dominant groups that have historically constituted them. As a result, members of minority cultural groups face barriers in pursuing their social practices in ways that members of dominant groups do not. Some theorists argue for tolerating minority groups by leaving them free of state interference (Kukathas 1995, 2003). Others argue that mere toleration of group differences falls short of treating members of minority groups as equals; what is required is recognition and positive accommodation of minority group practices through what the leading theorist of multiculturalism Will Kymlicka has called “group-differentiated rights” (1995). Some group-differentiated rights are held by individual members of minority groups, as in the case of individuals who are granted exemptions from generally applicable laws in virtue of their religious beliefs or individuals who seek language accommodations in education and in voting. Other group-differentiated rights are held by the group qua group rather by its members severally; such rights are properly called “group rights,” as in the case of indigenous groups and minority nations, who claim the right of self-determination. In the latter respect, multiculturalism is closely allied with nationalism.

Multiculturalism is part of a broader political movement for greater inclusion of marginalized groups, including African Americans, women, LGBTQ people, and people with disabilities (Glazer 1997, Hollinger 1995, Taylor 1992). This broader political movement is reflected in the “multiculturalism” debates in the 1980s over whether and how to diversify school curricula to recognize the achievements of historically marginalized groups. But the more specific focus of contemporary theories of multiculturalism is the recognition and inclusion of minority groups defined primarily in terms of ethnicity, nationality, and religion. The main concern of contemporary multiculturalism are immigrants who are ethnic and religious minorities (e.g. Latinx people in the U.S., Muslims in Western Europe), minority nations (e.g. the Basque, Catalans, Québécois, Welsh) and indigenous peoples (e.g. Native peoples and indigenous groups in Canada, the U.S., Australia, and New Zealand).

1. The claims of multiculturalism

2.1 recognition, 2.2 equality, 2.3 freedom from domination, 2.4 addressing historical injustice, 3.1 cosmopolitan view of culture, 3.2 toleration requires indifference, not accommodation, 3.3 diversion from a “politics of redistribution”, 3.4 universalist ideal of equality, 3.5 postcolonial critique, 3.6 feminist critique of multiculturalism, 4. political retreat from multiculturalism, related entries, other internet resources.

Multiculturalism is closely associated with “identity politics,” “the politics of difference,” and “the politics of recognition,” all of which share a commitment to revaluing disrespected identities and changing dominant patterns of representation and communication that marginalize certain groups (Gutmann 2003, Taylor 1992, Young 1990). Multiculturalism involves not only claims of identity and culture as some critics of multiculturalism suggest. It is also a matter of economic interests and political power: it includes demands for remedying economic and political disadvantages that people suffer as a result of their marginalized group identities.

Multiculturalists take for granted that it is “culture” and “cultural groups” that are to be recognized and accommodated. Yet multicultural claims include a wide range of claims involving religion, language, ethnicity, nationality, and race. Culture is a contested, open-ended concept, and all of these categories have been subsumed by or equated with the concept of culture. Disaggregating and distinguishing among different types of claims can clarify what is at stake (Song 2008). Language and religion are at the heart of many claims for cultural accommodation by immigrants. The key claim made by minority nations is for self-government rights. Race has a more limited role in multicultural discourse. Antiracism and multiculturalism are distinct but related ideas: the former highlights “victimization and resistance” whereas the latter highlights “cultural life, cultural expression, achievements, and the like” (Blum 1992, 14). Claims for recognition in the context of multicultural education are demands not just for recognition of aspects of a group’s actual culture (e.g. African American art and literature) but also for acknowledgment of the history of group subordination and its concomitant experience (Gooding-Williams 1998).

Examples of cultural accommodations or “group-differentiated rights” include exemptions from generally applicable law (e.g. religious exemptions), assistance to do things that members of the majority culture are already enabled to do (e.g. multilingual ballots, funding for minority language schools and ethnic associations, affirmative action), representation of minorities in government bodies (e.g. ethnic quotas for party lists or legislative seats, minority-majority Congressional districts), recognition of traditional legal codes by the dominant legal system (e.g. granting jurisdiction over family law to religious courts), or limited self-government rights (e.g. qualified recognition of tribal sovereignty, federal arrangements recognizing the political autonomy of Québec) (for a helpful classification of cultural rights, see Levy 1997).

Typically, a group-differentiated right is a right of a minority group (or a member of such a group) to act or not act in a certain way in accordance with their religious obligations and/or cultural commitments. In some cases, it is a right that directly restricts the freedom of non-members in order to protect the minority group’s culture, as in the case of restrictions on the use of the English language in Québec. When the right-holder is the group, the right may protect group rules that restrict the freedom of individual members, as in the case of the Pueblo membership rule that excludes the children of women who marry outside the group. Now that you have a sense of the kinds of claims that have been made in the name of multiculturalism, we can now turn to consider different normative justifications for these claims.

2. Justifications for multiculturalism

One justification for multiculturalism arises out of the communitarian critique of liberalism. Liberals tend to be ethical individualists; they insist that individuals should be free to choose and pursue their own conceptions of the good life. They give primacy to individual rights and liberties over community life and collective goods. Some liberals are also individualists when it comes to social ontology (what some call methodological individualism or atomism). Methodological individualists believe that you can and should account for social actions and social goods in terms of the properties of the constituent individuals and individual goods. The target of the communitarian critique of liberalism is not so much liberal ethics as liberal social ontology. Communitarians reject the idea that the individual is prior to the community and that the value of social goods can be reduced to their contribution to individual well-being. They instead embrace ontological holism, which acknowledges collective goods as, in Charles Taylor’s words, “irreducibly social”and intrinsically valuable (Taylor 1995).

An ontologically holist view of collective identities and cultures underlies Taylor’s argument for a “politics of recognition.” Drawing on Rousseau, Herder, and Hegel, among others, Taylor argues that we do not become full human agents and define our identity in isolation from others; rather, “we define our identity always in dialogue with, sometimes in struggle against, the things our significant others want to see in us” (1994, 33). Because our identities are formed dialogically, we are dependent on the recognition of others. The absence of recognition or mis-recognition can cause serious injury: “A person or a group of people can suffer real damage, real distortion, if the people or society around them mirror back to them a confining or demeaning or contemptible picture of themselves” (25). The struggle for recognition can only be satisfactorily resolved through “a regime of reciprocal recognition among equals” (50). Taylor distinguishes the politics of recognition from the traditional liberal “politics of equal respect” that is “inhospitable to difference, because (a) it insists on uniform application of the rules defining these rights, without exception, and (b) it is suspicious of collective goals” (60). By contrast, the politics of recognition is grounded on “judgments about what makes a good life—judgments in which the integrity of cultures has an important place” (61). He discusses the example of the survival of French culture in Quebec. The French language is not merely a collective resource that individuals might want to make use of and thereby seek to preserve, as suggested by a politics of equal respect. Instead, the French language is an irreducibly collective good that itself deserves to be preserved: language policies aimed at preserving the French language in Québec “actively seek to create members of the community” by assuring that future generations continue to identify as French-speakers (58). Because of the indispensable role of cultures in the development human agency and identity, Taylor argues, we should adopt the presumption of the equal worth of all cultures (66).

A second justification for multiculturalism comes from within liberalism but a liberalism that has been revised through critical engagement with the communitarian critique of liberalism. Will Kymlicka has developed the most influential liberal theory of multiculturalism by marrying the liberal values of autonomy and equality with an argument about the value of cultural membership (1989, 1995, 2001). Rather than beginning with intrinsically valuable collective goals and goods as Taylor does, Kymlicka views cultures as instrumentally valuable to individuals, for two main reasons. First, cultural membership is an important condition of personal autonomy. In his first book, Liberalism, Community, and Culture (1989), Kymlicka develops his case for multiculturalism within a Rawlsian framework of justice, viewing cultural membership as a “primary good,” things that every rational person is presumed to want and which are necessary for the pursuit of one’s goals (Rawls 1971, 62). In his later book, Multicultural Citizenship (1995), Kymlicka drops the Rawlsian scaffolding, relying instead on the work of Avishai Margalit and Joseph Raz on national self-determination (1990). One important condition of autonomy is having an adequate range of options from which to choose (Raz 1986). Cultures serve as “contexts of choice,” which provide meaningful options and scripts with which people can frame, revise, and pursue their goals (Kymlicka 1995, 89). Second, cultural membership plays an important role in people’s self-identity. Citing Margalit and Raz as well as Taylor, Kymlicka views cultural identity as providing people with an “anchor for their self-identification and the safety of effortless secure belonging” (1995, 89, quoting Margalit and Raz 1990, 448 and also citing Taylor 1992). This means there is a deep and general connection between a person’s self-respect and the respect accorded to the cultural group of which she is a part. It is not simply membership in any culture but one’s own culture that must be secured in order for cultural membership to serve as a meaningful context of choice and a basis of self-respect.

Kymlicka moves from these premises about the instrumental value of cultural membership to the egalitarian claim that because members of minority groups are disadvantaged in terms of access to their own cultures (in contrast to members of the majority culture), they are entitled to special protections. It is important to note that Kymlicka’s egalitarian argument for multiculturalism rests on a theory of equality that critics have dubbed “luck egalitarianism” (Anderson 1999, Scheffler 2003). According to luck egalitarians, individuals should be held responsible for inequalities resulting from their own choices, but not for inequalities deriving from unchosen circumstances (Dworkin 1981; Rakowski 1993). The latter inequalities are the collective responsibility of citizens to address. For example, inequalities stemming from one’s social starting position in life are unchosen yet so strongly determine our prospects in life. Luck egalitarians argue that those born into poor families are entitled to collective support and assistance via a redistributive tax scheme. Kymlicka adds cultural membership to this list of unchosen inequalities. If one is born into the dominant culture of society, one enjoys good brute luck, whereas those who belong to minority cultures suffer disadvantages in virtue of the bad brute luck of their minority status. Insofar as inequality in access to cultural membership stems from luck (as opposed to individual choices) and one suffers disadvantages as a result of it, members of minority groups can reasonably demand that members of the majority culture must share in bearing the costs of accommodation. Minority group rights are justified, as Kymlicka argues, “within a liberal egalitarian theory…which emphasizes the importance of rectifying unchosen inequalities” (Kymlicka 1995, 109).

One might question whether cultural minority groups really are “disadvantaged” and thereby, owed positive accommodations. Why not just enforce antidiscrimination laws, stopping short of any positive accommodations for minority groups? Kymlicka and other liberal theorists of multiculturalism contend that antidiscrimination laws fall short of treating members of minority groups as equals; this is because states cannot be neutral with respect to culture. In culturally diverse societies, we can easily find patterns of state support for some cultural groups over others. While states may prohibit racial discrimination and avoid official establishment of any religion, they cannot avoid establishing one language for public schooling and other state services (language being a paradigmatic marker of culture) (Kymlicka 1995, 111; Carens 2000, 77–78; Patten 2001, 693). Linguistic advantage translates into economic and political advantage since members of the dominant cultural community have a leg up in schools, the workplace, and politics. Linguistic advantage also takes a symbolic form. When state action extends symbolic affirmation to some groups and not others by adopting a particular language or by organizing the work week and public holidays around the calendar of particular religions, it has a normalizing effect, suggesting that one group’s language and customs are more valued than those of other groups.

In addition to state support of certain cultures over others, state laws may place constraints on some cultural groups over others. Consider the case of dress code regulations in public schools or the workplace. A ban on religious dress burdens religious individuals, as in the case of Simcha Goldman, a U.S. Air Force officer, who was also an ordained rabbi and wished to wear a yarmulke out of respect to an omnipresent God ( Goldman v. Weinberger, 475 US 503 (1986)). The case of the French state’s ban on religious dress in public schools, which burdens Muslim girls who wish to wear headscarves to school, is another example (Bowen 2007, Laborde 2008). Religion may command that believers dress in a certain way (what Peter Jones calls an “intrinsic burden”), not that believers refrain from attending school or going to work (Jones 1994). Yet, burdens on believers do not stem from the dictates of religion alone; they also arise from the intersection of the demands of religion and the demands of the state (“extrinsic burden”). Individuals must bear intrinsic burdens themselves; bearing the burdens of the dictates of one’s faith, such as prayer, worship, and fasting, just is part of meeting one’s religious obligations. When it comes to extrinsic burdens, however, liberal multiculturalists argue that justice requires assisting cultural minorities bear the burdens of these unchosen disadvantages.

It is important to note that liberal multiculturalists distinguish among different types of groups. For instance, Kymlicka’s theory develops a typology of different groups and different types of rights for each. It offers the strongest form of group-differentiated rights—self-government rights—to indigenous peoples and national minorities for the luck egalitarian reason that their minority status is unchosen: they were coercively incorporated into the larger state. By contrast, immigrants are viewed as voluntary migrants: by choosing to migrate, they relinquished access to their native culture. Immigrant multiculturalism, what Kymlicka calls “polyethnic rights”, is understood as a demand for fairer terms of integration into the broader society through the granting of exemptions and accommodations, not a rejection of integration or a demand for collective self-determination (1995, 113–115).

Another set of arguments for multiculturalism rests on the value of freedom. Some theorists such as Phillip Pettit (1997) and Quentin Skinner (1998) have developed the idea of freedom from domination by drawing on the civic republican tradition. Building on this line of argument to argue for recognition, Frank Lovett (2009) maintains that domination presents a serious obstacle to human flourishing. In contrast to the conception of freedom as non-interference dominant in liberal theory, freedom as non-domination, drawn from the civic republic tradition, focuses on a person’s “capacity to interfere, on an arbitrary basis, in certain choices that the other is in a position to make” (Pettit 1997, 52). On this view of freedom, we can be unfree even when we are not experiencing any interference as in the case of a slave of a benevolent master. We are subject to domination to the extent that we are dependent on another person or group who can arbitrarily exercise power over us (Pettit 1997, ch. 2).

Frank Lovett has explored the implications of the value of freedom from domination for questions of multicultural accommodation (2010). He begins from the premise that freedom from domination is an important human good and that we have a prima facie obligation to reduce domination. He argues that the state should not accommodate social practices that directly involve domination. Indeed, if freedom from domination is a priority, then one should “aim to bring such practices to an end as quickly as possible, despite any subjective value they happen to have for their participants” (2010, 256). As for practices that do not involve subjecting individuals to domination, accommodation is permissible but not necessarily required. Accommodation is only required if accommodation would advance the goal of reducing domination. He discusses one stylized example based on a familiar real-world case: the practice among Muslim women and girls of wearing headscarves. Suppose, Lovett suggests, a detailed study of a particular Muslim community in a liberal democratic society is undertaken and it reveals that women’s educational and employment opportunities are discouraged, generating “severe patriarchal domination,” but the study also shows that the practice of wearing headscarves does not (2010, 258). Lovett argues that the practice of wearing headscarves should be accommodated because failure to do so might strengthen the community’s commitment to other shared practices that reinforce patriarchal domination.

A key empirical assumption here is that combating patriarchal practices within minority communities would be easier if the burdens on more benign practices, such as wearing headscarves, are lessened. Cecile Laborde’s analysis of the headscarf controversy in France provides support for this assumption: the effect of preventing Muslim girls from wearing headscarves is to encourage their parents to withdraw their daughters from civic education and send them to religious schools where they would not be exposed to the diversity of world views found in public schools. Formal restrictions on Muslim religious expression in the public sphere may make, in Laborde’s words, “members of dominated groups close ranks around the denigrated practice, precipitating a defensive retreat into conservative cultural forms and identities” (2008, 164).

Another situation in which accommodation is warranted on Lovett’s account is when individuals’ subjective attachment to particular practices makes them vulnerable to exploitation. He discusses the case of Mexican immigrant laborers with limited English language skills and limited knowledge of American laws and policies. Lovett argues that extending “special public measures,” such as exceptions to general rules and regulations and public legal assistance, is required insofar as such measures would reduce the domination of these workers (2010, 260). In contrast to the communitarian or liberal egalitarian arguments considered above, the basis for the special accommodations is not a desire to protect intrinsically valuable cultures or considerations of fairness or equality but the desire to reduce domination.

Mira Bachvarova has also argued for the merits of a non-domination-based multiculturalism as compared to liberal egalitarian approaches. Because of its focus on the arbitrary use of power and the broader structural inequalities within which groups interact, a non-domination approach may be more sensitive to power dynamics in both inter-group and intra-group relations. Also, in contrast to approaches developed out of egalitarian theories of distributive justice that focus on distributing different types of rights, a non-domination approach focuses on the “moral quality of the relationship between the central actors” and insists on continuity of treatment between and within groups (2014, 671).

Other theorists sympathetic to multiculturalism look beyond liberalism and republicanism, emphasizing instead the importance of grappling with historical injustice and listening to minority groups themselves. This is especially true of theorists writing from a postcolonial perspective. For example, in contemporary discussions of aboriginal sovereignty, rather than making claims based on premises about the value of Native cultures and their connection to individual members’ sense of self-worth as liberal multiculturalists have, the focus is on reckoning with history. Such proponents of indigenous sovereignty emphasize the importance of understanding indigenous claims against the historical background of the denial of equal sovereign status of indigenous groups, the dispossession of their lands, and the destruction of their cultural practices (Ivison 2006, Ivison et al. 2000, Moore 2005, Simpson 2000). This background calls into question the legitimacy of the state’s authority over aboriginal peoples and provides a prima facie case for special rights and protections for indigenous groups, including the right of self-government. Jeff Spinner-Halev has argued that the history of state oppression of a group should be a key factor in determining not only whether group rights should be extended but also whether the state should intervene in the internal affairs of the group when it discriminates against particular members of the group. For example, “when an oppressed group uses its autonomy in a discriminatory way against women it cannot simply be forced to stop this discrimination” (2001, 97). Oppressed groups that lack autonomy should be “provisionally privileged” over non-oppressed groups; this means that “barring cases of serious physical harm in the name of a group’s culture, it is important to consider some form of autonomy for the group” (2001, 97; see also Spinner-Halev 2012).

Theorists adopting a postcolonial perspective go beyond liberal multiculturalism toward the goal of developing models of constitutional and political dialogue that recognize culturally distinct ways of speaking and acting. Multicultural societies consist of diverse religious and moral outlooks, and if liberal societies are to take such diversity seriously, they must recognize that liberalism is just one of many substantive outlooks based on a specific view of man and society. Liberalism is not free of culture but expresses a distinctive culture of its own. This observation applies not only across territorial boundaries between liberal and nonliberal states, but also within liberal states and its relations with nonliteral minorities. James Tully has surveyed the language of historical and contemporary constitutionalism with a focus on Western state’s relations with Native peoples to uncover more inclusive bases for intercultural dialogue (1995). Bhikhu Parekh contends that liberal theory cannot provide an impartial framework governing relations between different cultural communities (2000). He argues instead for a more open model of intercultural dialogue in which a liberal society’s constitutional and legal values serve as the initial starting point for cross-cultural dialogue while also being open to contestation.

More recent work has emphasized the importance of developing more contextual approaches that engage with actual political struggles for recognition and give greater voice to minority groups. Through detailed examination of how national museums in Canada and the U.S. have sought to represent and recognize indigenous groups, Caitlin Tom identifies three principles for the practice of recognition: self-definition, responsiveness, and internal contestation. Whether it be museum officials seeking to exhibit the history and culture of minority groups or government officials deciding whether official apologies for historical injustices are in order, they should respect individual and collective self-definition, respond to demands for recognition on terms that align with the terms of those being recognized, and accommodate internal contestation of group meanings. As Tom argues, practices of recognition guided by these principles come closer to fostering freedom and equality of minority groups than existing approaches (2018).

3. Critique of multiculturalism

Some critics contend that theories of multiculturalism are premised on an essentialist view of culture. Cultures are not distinct, self-contained wholes; they have long interacted and influenced one another through war, imperialism, trade, and migration. People in many parts of the world live within cultures that are already cosmopolitan, characterized by cultural hybridity. As Jeremy Waldron argues, “We live in a world formed by technology and trade; by economic, religious, and political imperialism and their offspring; by mass migration and the dispersion of cultural influences. In this context, to immerse oneself in the traditional practices of, say, an aboriginal culture might be a fascinating anthropological experiment, but it involves an artificial dislocation from what actually is going on in the world” (1995, 100). To aim at preserving or protecting a culture runs the risk of privileging one allegedly pure version of that culture, thereby crippling its ability to adapt to changes in circumstances (Waldron 1995, 110; see also Appiah 2005, Benhabib 2002, Scheffler 2007). Waldron also rejects the premise that the options available to an individual must come from a particular culture; meaningful options may come from a variety of cultural sources. What people need are cultural materials, not access to a particular cultural structure. For example, the Bible, Roman mythology, and the Grimms’ fairy tales have all influenced American culture, but these cultural sources cannot be seen as part of a single cultural structure that multiculturalists like Kymlicka aim to protect.

In response, multicultural theorists agree that cultures are overlapping and interactive, but they nonetheless maintain that individuals belong to separate societal cultures. In particular, Kymlicka has argued that while options available to people in any modern society come from a variety of ethnic and historical sources, these options become meaningful to us only if “they become part of the shared vocabulary of social life—i.e. embodied in the social practices, based on a shared language, that we are exposed to... That we learn...from other cultures, or that we borrow words from other languages, does not mean that we do not still belong to separate societal cultures, or speak different languages” (1995, 103). Liberal egalitarian defenders of multiculturalism like Kymlicka maintain that special protections for minority cultural groups still hold, even after we adopt a more cosmopolitan view of cultures, because the aim of group-differentiated rights is not to freeze cultures in place but to empower members of minority groups to continue their distinctive cultural practices so long as they wish to.

A second major criticism is aimed at liberal multicultural theories of accommodation in particular and stems from the value of freedom of association and conscience. If we take these ideas seriously and accept both ontological and ethical individualism as discussed above, then we are led to defend not special protections for groups but the individual’s right to form and leave associations. As Chandran Kukathas (1995, 2003) argues, there are no group rights, only individual rights. By granting cultural groups special protections and rights, the state oversteps its role, which is to secure civility, and risks undermining individual rights of association. States should not pursue “cultural integration” or “cultural engineering” but rather a “politics of indifference” toward minority groups (2003, 15).

One limitation of such a laissez-faire approach is that groups that do not themselves value toleration and freedom of association, including the right to dissociate or exit a group, may practice internal discrimination against group members, and the state would have little authority to interfere in such associations. A politics of indifference would permit the abuse of vulnerable members of groups (discussed below in 3.6), tolerating, in Kukathas’s words, “communities which bring up children unschooled and illiterate; which enforce arranged marriages; which deny conventional medical care to their members (including children); and which inflict cruel and ‘unusual’ punishment” (Kukathas 2003, 134). To embrace such a state of affairs would be to abandon the values of autonomy and equality, values that many liberals take to be fundamental to any liberalism worth its name.

A third challenge to multiculturalism views it as a form of a “politics of recognition” that diverts attention from a “politics of redistribution.” We can distinguish analytically between these modes of politics: a politics of recognition challenges status inequality and the remedy it seeks is cultural and symbolic change, whereas a politics of redistribution challenges economic inequality and exploitation and the remedy it seeks is economic restructuring (Fraser 1997, Fraser and Honneth 2003). Working class mobilization tilts toward the redistribution end of the spectrum, and claims for exemption from generally applicable laws and the movement for same-sex marriage are on the recognition end. In the U.S. critics who view themselves as part of the “progressive left” worry that the rise of the “cultural left” with its emphasis on multiculturalism and difference turns the focus away from struggles for economic justice (Gitlin 1995, Rorty 1999). Critics in the United Kingdom and Europe have also expressed concern about the effects of multiculturalism on social trust and public support for economic redistribution (Barry 2001, Miller 2006, van Parijs 2004). Phillipe van Parijs invited scholars to consider the proposition, “Other things being equal, the more cultural... homogeneity within the population of a defined territory, the better the prospects in terms of economic solidarity” (2004, 8).

There are two distinct concerns here. The first is that the existence of racial and ethnic diversity reduces social trust and solidarity, which in turn undermines public support for policies that involve economic redistribution. For example, Robert Putnam argues that the decline in social trust and civic participation in the U.S. is strongly correlated with racial and ethnic diversity (2007). Rodney Hero has shown that the greater the racial and ethnic heterogeneity in a state, the more restrictive state-level welfare programs are (Hero 1998, Hero and Preuhs 2007). Cross-national analyses suggest that differences in racial diversity explain a significant part of the reason why the U.S. has not developed a European-style welfare state (Alesina and Glaeser 2004). The second concern is that multiculturalism policies themselves undermine the welfare-state by heightening the salience of racial and ethnic differences among groups and undermining a sense of common national identity that is viewed as necessary for a robust welfare state (Barry 2001, Gitlin 1995, Rorty 1999).

In response, theorists of multiculturalism have called for and collaborated on more empirical research of these purported trade-offs. With respect to the first concern about the tension between diversity and redistribution, Kymlicka and Banting question the generalizability of the empirical evidence that is largely drawn from research either on Africa, where the weakness of state institutions has meant no usable traditions or institutional capacity for dealing with diversity, or on the U.S., where racial inequality has been shaped by centuries of slavery and segregation. Where many minority groups are newcomers and where state institutions are strong, the impact of increasing diversity may be quite different (Kymlicka and Banting 2006, 287). Barbara Arneil has also challenged Putnam’s social capital thesis, arguing that participation in civil society has changed, not declined, largely as a result of mobilization among cultural minorities and women seeking greater inclusion and equality (Arneil 2006a). She argues that it is not diversity itself that leads to changes in trust and civic engagement but the politics of diversity, i.e. how different groups respond to and challenge the norms governing their society. The central issue, then, is not to reduce diversity but to determine principles and procedures by which differences are renegotiated in the name of justice (Arneil and MacDonald 2010).

As for the second concern about the tradeoff between recognition and redistribution, the evidence upon which early redistributionist critics such as Barry and Rorty relied was speculative and conjectural. Recent cross-national research suggests that there is no evidence of a systematic tendency for multiculturalism policies to weaken the welfare state (Banting et al. 2006). Irene Bloemraad’s comparative study of immigrant integration in Canada and the U.S. offers support for the view that not only is there no trade-off between multiculturalism and the welfare-state but multiculturalism policies can actually increase attention and resources devoted to redistributive policies. She finds that Canada’s multiculturalism policies, which provide immigrants with a variety of services in their native languages and encourage them to preserve their cultural traditions even as they become Canadian citizens, are the main reason why the naturalization rate among permanent residents in Canada is twice that of permanent residents in the U.S. Multiculturalists agree more empirical research is needed, but they nonetheless maintain that redistribution and recognition are not either/or propositions. Both are important dimensions in the pursuit of equality for minority groups. In practice, both redistribution and recognition—responding to material disadvantages and marginalized identities and statuses—are required to achieve greater equality across lines of race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, sexuality, and class, not least because many individuals stand at the intersection of these different categories and suffer multiple forms of marginalization. A politics of recognition is important not only on account of its effects on socioeconomic status and political participation but also for the sake of full inclusion of members of marginalized groups as equal citizens.

A fourth objection takes issue with liberal multiculturalist’s understanding of what equality requires. Brian Barry defends a universalist ideal of equality, in contrast to the group-differentiated ideal of equality defended by Kymlicka. Barry argues that religious and cultural minorities should be held responsible for bearing the consequences of their own beliefs and practices, just as members of the dominant culture are held responsible for bearing the consequences of their beliefs. He does think that special accommodations are owed to people with disabilities, but he believes religious and cultural affiliations are different from physical disabilities: the former do not constrain people in the way that physical disabilities do. A physical disability supports a strong prima facie claim to compensation because it limits a person’s opportunities to engage in activities that others are able to engage in. In contrast, religion and culture may shape one’s willingness to seize an opportunity, but they do not affect whether one has an opportunity. Barry argues that egalitarian justice is only concerned with ensuring a reasonable range of equal opportunities, not with ensuring equal access to any particular choices or outcomes (2001, 37). When it comes to cultural and religious affiliations, they do not limit the range of opportunities one enjoys but rather the choices one can make within the set of opportunities available to all.

In reply, one might agree that opportunities are not objective in the strong physicalist sense suggested by Barry. But the opportunity to do X is not just having the possibility to do X without facing physical encumbrances; it is also the possibility of doing X without incurring excessive costs or the risk of such costs (Miller 2002, 51). State law and cultural commitments can conflict in ways such that the costs for cultural minorities of taking advantage of the opportunity are prohibitively high. In contrast to Barry, liberal multiculturalists argue that many cases where a law or policy disparately impacts a religious or cultural practice constitute injustice. For instance, Kymlicka points to the Goldman case (discussed above) and other religion cases, as well as to claims for language rights, as examples in which group-differentiated rights are required in light of the differential impact of state action (1995, 108–115). His argument is that since the state cannot achieve complete disestablishment of culture or be neutral with respect to culture, it must somehow make it up to citizens who are bearers of minority religious beliefs and native speakers of other languages. Because complete state disestablishment of culture is not possible, one way to ensure fair background conditions is to provide roughly comparable forms of assistance or recognition to each of the various languages and religions of citizens. To do nothing would be to permit injustice.

Some postcolonial theorists are critical of multiculturalism and the contemporary politics of recognition for reinforcing, rather than transforming, structures of colonial domination in relations between settler states and indigenous communities. Focusing on Taylor’s theory of the politics of recognition, Glen Coulthard has argued that “instead of ushering in an era of peaceful coexistence grounded on the Hegelian idea of reciprocity, the politics of recognition in its contemporary form promises to reproduce the very configurations of colonial power that indigenous peoples’ demands for recognition have historically sought to transcend” (2007, 438–9; see also Coulthard 2014). There are several elements to Coulthard’s critique. First, he argues that the politics of recognition, through its focus on reformist state redistributionist schemes like granting cultural rights and concessions to aboriginal communities, affirms rather than challenges the political economy of colonialism. In this regard, the politics of recognition reveals itself to be a variant of liberalism, which “fails to confront the structural/economic aspects of colonialism at its generative roots” (2007, 446). Second, the contemporary politics of recognition toward indigenous communities rests on a flawed sociological assumption: that both parties engaged in the struggle for recognition are mutually dependent on one another’s acknowledgement for their freedom and self-worth. Yet, no such mutual dependency exists in actual relations between nation-states and indigenous communities: “the master—that is, the colonial state and state society—does not require recognition from the previously self-determining communities upon which its territorial, economic, and social infrastructure is constituted” (451). Third, Coulthard argues that true emancipation for the colonized cannot occur without struggle and conflict that “serves as the mediating force through which the colonized come to shed their colonial identities” (449). He employs Frantz Fanon to argue that the road to true self-determination for the oppressed lies in self-affirmation: rather than depending on their oppressors for their freedom and self-worth, “the colonized must initiate the process of decolonization by recognizing themselves as free, dignified and distinct contributors to humanity” (454). This means that indigenous peoples should “collectively redirect our struggles away from a politics that seeks to attain a conciliatory form of settler-state recognition for Indigenous nations toward a resurgent politics of recognition premised on self-actualization, direct action, and the resurgence of cultural practices that are attentive to the subjective and structural composition of settler-colonial power” (2014, 24).

Taylor, Kymlicka, and other proponents of the contemporary politics of recognition might agree with Coulthard that self-affirmation by oppressed groups is critical for true self-determination and freedom of indigenous communities, but such self-affirmation need not be viewed as mutually exclusive from state efforts to extend institutional accommodations. State recognition of self-government rights and other forms of accommodation are important steps toward rectifying historical injustices and transforming structural inequalities between the state and indigenous communities. Coulthard’s analysis redirects attention to the importance of evaluating and challenging the structural and psycho-affective dimensions of colonial domination, but by arguing that indigenous peoples should “turn away” (2007, 456) from settler-states and settler societies may play into the neoliberal turn toward the privatization of dependency and to risk reinforcing the marginalization of indigenous communities at a time when economic and other forms of state support may be critical to the survival of indigenous communities.

The set of critiques that has ignited perhaps the most intense debate about multiculturalism argues that extending protections to minority groups may come at the price of reinforcing oppression of vulnerable members of those groups—what some have called the problem of “internal minorities” or “minorities within minorities” (Green 1994, Eisenberg and Spinner-Halev 2005). Multicultural theorists have tended to focus on inequalities between groups in arguing for special protections for minority groups, but group-based protections can exacerbate inequalities within minority groups. This is because some ways of protecting minority groups from oppression by the majority may make it more likely that more powerful members of those groups are able to undermine the basic liberties and opportunities of vulnerable members. Vulnerable subgroups within minority groups include religious dissenters, sexual minorities, women, and children. A group’s leaders may exaggerate the degree of consensus and solidarity within their group to present a united front to the wider society and strengthen their case for accommodation.

Some of the most oppressive group norms and practices revolve around issues of gender and sexuality, and it is feminist critics who first called attention to potential tensions between multiculturalism and feminism (Coleman 1996, Okin 1999, Shachar 2000). These tensions constitute a genuine dilemma if one accepts both that group-differentiated rights for minority cultural groups are justifiable, as multicultural theorists do, and that gender equality is an important value, as feminists have emphasized. Extending special protections and accommodations to minority groups engaged in patriarchal practices may help reinforce gender inequality within these communities. Examples that have been analyzed in the scholarly literature include conflicts over arranged marriage, the ban on headscarves, the use of “cultural defenses” in criminal law, accommodating religious law or customary law within dominant legal systems, and self-government rights for indigenous communities that reinforce the inequality of women.

These feminist objections are especially troublesome for liberal egalitarian defenders of multiculturalism who wish to promote not only inter-group equality but also intra-group equality, including gender equality. In response, Kymlicka (1999) has emphasized the similarities between multiculturalism and feminism: both aim at a more inclusive conception of justice, and both challenge the traditional liberal assumption that equality requires identical treatment. To address the concern about multicultural accommodations exacerbating intra-group inequality, Kymlicka distinguishes between two kinds of group rights: “external protections” are rights that a minority group claims against non-members in order to reduce its vulnerability to the economic and political power of the larger society, whereas “internal restrictions” are rights that a minority group claims against its own members. He argues that a liberal theory of minority group rights defends external protections while rejecting internal restrictions (1995, 35–44;1999, 31).

But many feminist critics have emphasized, granting external protections to minority groups may sometimes come at the price of internal restrictions. They may be different sides of the same coin: for example, respecting the self-government rights of Native communities may entail permitting sexually discriminatory membership rules enacted by the leaders of those communities. Whether multiculturalism and feminism can be reconciled within liberal theory depends in part on the empirical premise that groups that seek group-differentiated rights do not support patriarchal norms and practices. If they do, liberal multiculturalists would in principle have to argue against extending the group right or extending it with certain qualifications, such as conditioning the extension of self-government rights to Native peoples on the acceptance of a constitutional bill of rights.

There has been a wave of feminist responses to the problem of vulnerable internal minorities that is sympathetic to both multiculturalism and feminism (see, e.g., Arneil 2006b, Deveaux 2006, Eisenberg 2003, Lépinard 2011, Phillips 2007, Shachar 2001, Song 2007, Volpp 2000). Some feminists have emphasized the importance of moving away from essentialist notions of culture and reductive views of members of minority groups as incapable of meaningful agency (Phillips 2007, Volpp 2000). Other feminists have sought to shift the emphasis from liberal rights towards more democratic approaches. Liberal theorists have tended to start from the question of whether and how minority cultural practices should be tolerated or accommodated in accordance with liberal principles, whereas democratic theorists foreground the role of democratic deliberation and ask how affected parties understand the contested practice. By drawing on the voices of affected parties and giving special weight to the voice of women at the center of gendered cultural conflicts, deliberation can clarify the interests at stake and enhance the legitimacy of responses to cultural conflicts (Benhabib 2002, Deveaux 2006, Song 2007). Deliberation also provides opportunities for minority group members to expose instances of cross-cultural hypocrisy and to consider whether and how the norms and institutions of the larger society, whose own struggles for gender equality are incomplete and ongoing, may reinforce rather than challenge sexist practices within minority groups (Song 2005). There is contestation over what constitutes subordination and how best to address it, and intervention into minority cultural groups without the participation of minority women themselves fails to respect their freedom and is not likely to serve their interests.

The biggest challenge to multiculturalism today may not be philosophical but political: a political retreat or backlash against immigrant multiculturalism in particular. Some scholars have diagnosed a “retreat” from multiculturalism in Europe and Australia, which they attribute to a lack of public support based partly on the limited success of such policies to foster the integration of minorities (Joppke 2004, McGhee 2008). But other scholars argue there is lack of evidence of any such retreat. Based on their analysis of British policies, Varun Uberoi and Tariq Modood find that legal exemptions for minority religious practices, anti-discrimination measures, and multicultural education policies remain in place, and there is no country-wide evidence suggesting that public services are no longer delivered in different languages (2013, 134). Further research is needed on whether and why there has been a retreat from multiculturalism policies.

Perhaps the claim about a “retreat” from multiculturalism has less to do with any actual changes in state policies and more with concerns about lack of social unity and increasing tensions among diverse groups in liberal democratic societies and the sense that multiculturalism is somehow to blame. Consider then-Prime Minister David Cameron’s 2011 speech: “Under the doctrine of state multiculturalism, we have encouraged different cultures to live separate lives, apart from each other and apart from the mainstream. We’ve failed to provide a vision of society to which they [young Muslims] feel they want to belong” (Cameron 2011). According to Cameron, multiculturalism stands for separation and division, not integration and unity. But the survey of different theories of multiculturalism above demonstrates that most theories of immigrant multiculturalism do not aim at separation but rather devising fairer terms of inclusion for religious and cultural minorities into mainstream society (Kymlicka 1995).

Going forward, public debate about immigrant multiculturalism should be pursued in a broader context that considers the politics of immigration, race, religion, and national security. Multiculturalism may become an easy rhetorical scapegoat for public fear and anxiety whenever national security is seen to be threatened and when economic conditions are bad. In Europe, concerns about the radicalization of Muslim minorities have become central to public debates about immigration and multiculturalism. This was especially true in the face of the European migration crisis as over a million people fleeing war and violence in Syria, Iraq, and elsewhere made perilous journeys by sea and land into Europe. This crisis tapped into fears about terrorism and security, especially after the November 2015 Paris and July 2016 Nice attacks; it also renewed concerns about the limits of past efforts to integrate newcomers and their descendants. Evidence from across Europe suggests that Muslims are struggling to succeed in education and the labor market in comparison to other religious and cultural minorities (Givens 2007).

Socioeconomic and political marginalization interacts with immigrants’ own sense of belonging: it is hard to imagine newcomers feeling integrated before they make significant steps toward socioeconomic integration. Integration is a two-way street: not only must immigrants work to integrate themselves, but the state itself must make accommodations to facilitate integration, as many multicultural theorists have emphasized. As Cecile Laborde observes, North African youth in France are “routinely blamed for not being integrated,” but this blame “confuses French society’s institutional responsibility to integrate immigrants with immigrants’ personal failure to integrate into society” (Laborde 2008, 208). The challenge of integrating immigrants has been heightened by increasing public acceptability of expressions of anti-Muslim sentiment. The rise of far-right political parties and their anti-Muslim publicity campaigns, coupled with the media’s willingness to report, often uncritically, their positions damage the prospects for integrating Muslims in Europe (Lenard 2010, 311). Muslim political leaders report that it is “part of mainstream public dialogue” to refer to the “menace of foreign cultures and the threat posed by immigrants in general, and Muslims in particular, to social solidarity and cultural homogeneity” (Klausen 2005, 123). Muslims have been, in Laborde’s words, “reduced to their presumed identity, culture, or religion, and consequently stigmatized as immigrant, Arab, or Muslim” (2008, 17). The challenges posed by integrating Muslims are thought to be more complex than the challenges of integrating earlier waves of immigrants, but as Patti Lenard argues, this alleged complexity derives from the simplistic and unfair elision between Islamic fundamentalism and the vast majority of Muslim minorities in Europe who desire integration on fairer terms of the sort that multiculturalists defend (Lenard 2010, 318).

In light of these concerns with immigrant multiculturalism, multicultural theorists need to continue to make the case that the ideal of multicultural citizenship stands for fairer terms of integration, not separation and division, and offer answers to questions such as: Why is multicultural citizenship more desirable than the traditional liberal ideal of common citizenship based on a uniform set of rights and opportunities for everyone? Are multiculturalism policies actually fostering greater integration of immigrants and their descendants? How should we think about the relationship between multiculturalism and struggles to address inequalities based on race, indigeneity, class, gender, sexuality, and disability? It is also important to study the development of multiculturalism beyond the West, including whether and how Western theories and practices of multiculturalism have traveled and been incorporated. For example, what lessons have states that only recently opened up to significant immigration, such as South Korea, drawn from the experiences of other states, and what sorts of multiculturalism policies have they adopted and why? (Lie 2014)

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What Is Multiculturalism? Definition, Theories, and Examples

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In sociology, multiculturalism describes the manner in which a given society deals with cultural diversity. Based on the underlying assumption that members of often very different cultures can coexist peacefully, multiculturalism expresses the view that society is enriched by preserving, respecting, and even encouraging cultural diversity. In the area of political philosophy, multiculturalism refers to the ways in which societies choose to formulate and implement official policies dealing with the equitable treatment of different cultures.

Key Takeaways: Multiculturalism

Multiculturalism is the way in which a society deals with cultural diversity, both at the national and at the community level.
Sociologically, multiculturalism assumes that society as a whole benefits from increased diversity through the harmonious coexistence of different cultures.
Multiculturalism typically develops according to one of two theories: the “melting pot” theory or the “salad bowl” theory.

Multiculturalism can take place on a nationwide scale or within a nation’s communities. It may occur either naturally through immigration, or artificially when jurisdictions of different cultures are combined through legislative decree, as in the case of French and English Canada.

Proponents of multiculturalism believe that people should retain at least some features of their traditional cultures. Opponents say that multiculturalism threatens the social order by diminishing the identity and influence of the predominant culture. While acknowledging that it is a sociopolitical issue, this article will focus on the sociological aspects of multiculturalism.

Multiculturalism Theories

The two primary theories or models of multiculturalism as the manner in which different cultures are integrated into a single society are best defined by the metaphors commonly used to describe them—the “melting pot” and the “salad bowl” theories.

The Melting Pot Theory

The melting pot theory of multiculturalism assumes that various immigrant groups will tend to “melt together,” abandoning their individual cultures and eventually becoming fully assimilated into the predominant society. Typically used to describe the assimilation of immigrants into the United States, the melting pot theory is often illustrated by the metaphor of a foundry’s smelting pots in which the elements iron and carbon are melted together to create a single, stronger metal—steel. In 1782, French-American immigrant J. Hector St. John de Crevecoeur wrote that in America, “individuals of all nations are melted into a new race of men, whose labors and posterity will one day cause great changes in the world.”

The melting pot model has been criticized for reducing diversity, causing people to lose their traditions, and for having to be enforced through governmental policy. For example, the U.S. Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 forced the assimilation of nearly 350,000 Indigenous peoples into American society without any regard for the diversity of their heritages and lifestyles.

The Salad Bowl Theory

A more liberal theory of multiculturalism than the melting pot, the salad bowl theory describes a heterogeneous society in which people coexist but retain at least some of the unique characteristics of their traditional culture. Like a salad’s ingredients, different cultures are brought together, but rather than coalescing into a single homogeneous culture, retain their own distinct flavors. In the United States, New York City, with its many unique ethnic communities like “Little India,” “Little Odessa,” and “Chinatown” is considered an example of a salad bowl society.

The salad bowl theory asserts that it is not necessary for people to give up their cultural heritage in order to be considered members of the dominant society. For example, African Americans do not need to stop observing Kwanzaa rather than Christmas in order to be considered “Americans.”

On the negative side, the cultural differences encouraged by the salad bowl model can divide a society resulting in prejudice and discrimination . In addition, critics point to a 2007 study conducted by American political scientist Robert Putnam showing that people living in salad bowl multicultural communities were less likely to vote or volunteer for community improvement projects.

Characteristics of a Multicultural Society

Multicultural societies are characterized by people of different races, ethnicities, and nationalities living together in the same community. In multicultural communities, people retain, pass down, celebrate, and share their unique cultural ways of life, languages, art, traditions, and behaviors.

The characteristics of multiculturalism often spread into the community’s public schools, where curricula are crafted to introduce young people to the qualities and benefits of cultural diversity. Though sometimes criticized as a form of “political correctness,” educational systems in multicultural societies stress the histories and traditions of minorities in classrooms and textbooks. A 2018 study conducted by the Pew Research Center found that the “post-millennial” generation of people ages 6 to 21 are the most diverse generation in American society.

Far from an exclusively American phenomenon, examples of multiculturalism are found worldwide. In Argentina, for example, newspaper articles, and radio and television programs are commonly presented in English, German, Italian, French, or Portuguese, as well as the country’s native Spanish. Indeed, Argentina’s constitution promotes immigration by recognizing the right of individuals to retain multiple citizenships from other countries.

As a key element of the country’s society, Canada adopted multiculturalism as official policy during the premiership of Pierre Trudeau in the 1970s and 1980s. In addition, the Canadian constitution, along with laws such as the Canadian Multiculturalism Act and the Broadcasting Act of 1991, recognize the importance of multicultural diversity. According to the Canadian Library and Archives, over 200,000 people—representing at least 26 different ethnocultural groups—immigrate to Canada every year.

Why Diversity Is Important

Multiculturalism is the key to achieving a high degree of cultural diversity. Diversity occurs when people of different races, nationalities, religions, ethnicities, and philosophies come together to form a community. A truly diverse society is one that recognizes and values the cultural differences in its people.

Proponents of cultural diversity argue that it makes humanity stronger and may, in fact, be vital to its long-term survival. In 2001, the General Conference of UNESCO took this position when it asserted in its Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity that “...cultural diversity is as necessary for humankind as biodiversity is for nature.”

Today, entire countries, workplaces, and schools are increasingly made up of various cultural, racial, and ethnic groups. By recognizing and learning about these various groups, communities build trust, respect, and understanding across all cultures.

Communities and organizations in all settings benefit from the different backgrounds, skills, experiences, and new ways of thinking that come with cultural diversity.

Sources and Further Reference

St. John de Crevecoeur, J. Hector (1782). Letters from an American Farmer: What is an America? The Avalon Project. Yale University.
De La Torre, Miguel A. The Problem With the Melting Pot . EthicsDaily.com (2009).
Hauptman, Laurence M. Going Off the Reservation: A Memoir . University of California Press.
Jonas, Michael. The downside of diversity . The Boston Globe (August 5, 2007).
Fry, Richard and Parker Kim. Benchmarks Show 'Post-Millenials" on Track to Be Most Diverse, Best-Educated Generation Yet . Pew Research Center (November 2018).
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Essay Samples on Multiculturalism

When one starts looking through the possible topics to write about multiculturalism, it quickly becomes one of the most interesting tasks to explore. You can write about the traditions, religious backgrounds of certain communities, discuss music, theater, and the movies that are well-known internationally. If you want to receive good grades for your paper, remember to keep within the academic writing structure of the “Introduction-Body-Conclusion” pattern. If this sounds odd to you, check out our free multiculturalism essay sample that explains it all in practice. Pay attention to how the sources have been used to support the ideas and replicate it as you write or compose an outline. Do not forget that writing about multiculturalism for an explanatory essay must keep a neutral tone unless your grading rubric tells otherwise!

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Negative Impact of Cultural Relativism in Zimbabwe

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To Be Or Not To Be Or Problem Of The Multicultural Society

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Analysis Of The Relevance And Impact Of A Multicultural Approach

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Multiculturalism in the USA Essay

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Multiculturalism in the USA is one of the main issues for the country as being inhabited by people from different ethnical groups it faces a number of difficulties. One of the main problem the USA faces is cultural assimilation. The USA seems not to have personal culture as the number of immigrants who have come to the country has affected the cultural destinations of the Native Americans and now it seems that the whole culture of the USA is a combination of different cultures which exist in the society.

There are many immigrants who have come to the USA and who have almost become native inhabitants of the country. Still, there are Americans who are considered as Native ones, and there are other ethnical groups who inhabit the country, Hispanic Americans, Mexican Americans, African American, Asian Americans and several groups which appeared recently as one more ethnical group in the USA. Hispanic Americans group is the most varied one as it comprises a number of ethnic groups.

Speaking about Hispanic Americans, it should be stated that this ethnic groups stands between Euro-Americans and African Americans, however, the social status of them is not too high than African Americans’ one. Being socially and economically unprotected in the USA, Hispanic Americans do not strive for better lives. Having escaped for a number of countries, from hunger and violence, many Hispanic Americans lead poor lives in the USA, however, they are sure that such life is much better than the life in their countries.

Hispanic American population is divided into the groups, Mexican Americans (67%), Puerto Rican Americans (9%), Cuban Americans (4%), Dominican Americans (2%), Central American Hispanics (7%), South American Hispanics (5%) and other Hispanic groups in the USA (8%). Depending on the specific belonging, Hispanic Americans live in different regions of the USA. Of course, it is possible to meet Mexican Americans all over the USA, however, their greatest concentration is in Los Angeles.

Considering the reasons why these people came to the USA, the first and the greatest wave of legal and illegal immigration of Hispanic Americans was because of the war regime in the countries of their origin. Various revolutions and civil wars made people run away from their countries.

Search for better education and job were other reasons for coming to a strange country. However, the life of Hispanic Americans in the USA is not that easy as it may seem. Even though the USA successfully fights with the remnants of discrimination, there are many prejudices in relation to Hispanic population. Unfortunately, those Hispanic Americans who have darker skin experience more ethnic discrimination than those whose skin in whiter. Poor Hispanic Americans are unable to achieve high success due to their social status.

As for me, all people are born equal and no one can treat them in accordance to their origin. However, I can understand Americans who live in the country and who consider it their homes that the more immigrants come of the USA and become its citizens, the less cultural peculiarities America has.

Looking at the USA it is impossible to state which nation predominates as according to its history and the waves of immigration, many foreigners have come to the place and they consider the country their native home. Thus, the cultures have mixed that created additional reasons to worry for Native Americans who begin to lose their country.

The Hispanic Population in the United States
European Americans Extension
Historical Distortion in Broken Arrow by Frank Manchel
The Concept of Multiculturalism in the Modern Society
Introduction to the Importance of Diversity and Culture
Five Cultural Dimensions for Understanding the Values
Cultural Relativism and Cultural Values
Creating a Theory of Cultural Literacy
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Positive Effects of Multiculturalism: Essay Example

Multiculturalism essay: introduction, multiculturalism essay: main body, multiculturalism essay: conclusion.

With the rise of trends towards the globalized world, the countries have become open welcoming people from all over the globe. Such openness could not but lead to the outbursts of migration and mixing of cultures. This issue is especially acute in the case of the developed states with higher standards of living and better conditions for employment, obtaining education, and self-expression. When a country is settled with people of mixed cultures, it means that it is multicultural. This phenomenon is known as multiculturalism. It is not long known but has already become a subject of fierce debates. Even though there is a standpoint that multiculturalism is a negative outcome of globalization, I do believe that the positive aspects of living in a multicultural state outweigh the negative ones.

First of all, it is vital to understand the essence of multiculturalism to detect its advantages and disadvantages. The origins of this phenomenon come from migration. It does not really matter what was the reason for it and whether it was forced or desired. The only thing that matters is that people moved from one country and settled down in another. The most significant feature of a multicultural country is not that its population consists of people who have different cultural backgrounds, but the fact that they are recognized and accepted. What is even more crucial is that the interests of minorities are represented in the institutions of power, these groups are integrated into society and public debate, and enjoy rights equal to those of the native people (Maciel, 2014). The primary idea of the multicultural ideology is that the society should strive to reduce intergroup conflicts and appreciate cultural uniqueness (Levin et al., 2012), thus, long for harmony and equality.

There are many positive outcomes of living in a multicultural society. First of all, when people live in a country settled by diverse ethnic groups, it leads to the elimination of prejudice and social dominance towards the representatives of cultural minorities (Kauff, Asbrock, Thörner, & Wagner, 2013). Such societies tend to be more friendly and safer in comparison to those that live in the condition of ethnic bias. It is true that if people stop seeing the difference in skin color or the background as a source of threat, they find it easier to cohabit and cease to fight for leadership. Moreover, they embrace cultural peculiarities of different minorities learning more about their traditions, habits, food, etc. It leads to broadening worldview and increasing knowledge together with learning to accept other people and their right to individuality (Dendy & Pe-Pua, 2010). Some may even see it as a way of finding out more about the world without traveling because the representatives of many cultures are gathered in one place and there is always an opportunity to get to know them.

Furthermore, multiculturalism is positive from the perspective of changing the culture itself. It is often criticized for lifting the boundaries between the cultures and erasing the uniqueness of ethnic minorities and, thus, creating a single globalized culture. It is true to some extent but, in fact, I do not think that it can be viewed as a negative outcome of existing multiculturalism. Instead, cultural diversity is a positive phenomenon in a way that it might help establish some new beautiful culture embracing the most fascinating elements of all the minorities’ traditions involved. It can become a tool for making people of different backgrounds have some things in common and lead to better understanding and deeper interconnectedness. The point here is that it is a choice of every representative of a minority whether he or she wants to forget about the historical past and move further ignoring the habits and traditions of the group.

Second, living in a multicultural society teaches tolerance and combats discrimination and racism (Taylor, 2012). We live in a world of bias based on gender, skin color, sexual orientation, cultural background, and any other kind of difference. I believe that recognizing that every ethnic group is unique is a first step to creating a society resting on the foundations of human dignity and tolerance. Of course, there may be a belief that discrimination is justifiable when it comes to equal rights to employment or gaining education, but I think that these are skills and intellectual abilities that should become the criteria for making such decisions, not the individual’s ethnic background. Eradicating this suspicion from the consciousness of the society is a vital step towards lifting discrimination and establishing harmony. It would also help create somewhat family-like relations in the community.

Finally, one should bear in mind that cultural diversity is beneficial not only for changing societal consciousness but also from the economic perspective. First of all, it is positive from the point of view that immigrants are more willing to fill low-paid positions, so that it leads to the drop in the level of unemployment. It is especially true in the case of the developed countries where the native people usually are more skilled and have higher levels of educational backgrounds. Multiculturalism also promotes creating new working places for the low-skilled workforce, increases the level of consumption and, as a result, the output. So, it motivates economic development (Dendy & Pe-Pua, 2010). What should not be ignored, however, is the fact that coming from an ethnical minority does not necessarily mean lower level of skills and knowledge. Today, involving people from different countries has become a practice that is broadly used by multinational corporations. The motivation for exercising it is that bringing together those who have diverse cultural backgrounds and experience has proved to be beneficial for developing a more effective problem-solving and decision-making mechanisms and improving the company’s overall performance.

Even though living in a multicultural society has many positive aspects, there are also some negative sides of this phenomenon. First of all, even if people of majority accept the ethnic minorities and their uniqueness, there is no guarantee that the same is true of these minor groups. That said, multiculturalism is often a source of conflicts among the representatives of different ethnic minorities (Kauff et al., 2013). It often leads to the creation of gangs, and the confrontation between them is bloody and cruel, so, it often affects innocent people not to mention the members of the groupings themselves. Moreover, openness to immigration and establishing cultural diversion might become a source of higher levels of crime because except for the possible intergroup conflicts and organized crime, it may lead to becoming involved in prostitution, drug dealing, etc. The reason for such negative outcomes of multiculturalism is evident – people from ethnic minorities often find it difficult to integrate into the society and find the jobs, especially if the level of their knowledge and skills is lower than the market demands, that is why choosing a criminal path of life is often their only option to make a living.

It should be said, however, that even if the representatives of cultural minorities do not form gangs or get involved in criminal or extremist activities, they still might break down into groups that do not want to get in contact with the rest of the society or follow the established rules (Christensen, 2012). Such developments in the multicultural society inevitably lead to the growth of isolation and mistrust, even though not necessarily entails the increase in the level of crimes. What is also troubling about living in a multicultural society is that people often do not understand each other not because of the differences in the ethnic backgrounds but because of speaking different languages. It is not a negative effect of multiculturalism in the first place, but it adds to the isolation of the smaller groups and makes them feel suppressed and worse than the members of the majority.

Together with the issue of language, there is also the matter of arrogance and ignorance that leads to building up barriers between the members of the minority groups and the rest of the society. Nevertheless, multiculturalism is, to my mind, a positive outcome of globalization, discrimination and bias were always present in the societal consciousness, that is why it is extremely difficult to eradicate them and make people believe in human’s dignity without regard to the ethnic background. So, what is significant about multicultural society is that the recognition and acceptance of cultural peculiarities and integration of ethnic minorities are the highest levels of the social relations evolution. At first, it is one of the additional sources of social inequality and intolerance, as these groups often suffer from suppression and discrimination because they are treated differently and usually occupy lower positions that those belonging to the natives, even if the newcomers are more skilled or educated. That is why the positive effects of multiculturalism are achieved later when people get used to the thought that the presence of ethnic minorities and their integration is inevitable. Moreover, developing institutions of power that would represent ethnic groups and mechanisms for involving them in the social debate also takes time.

In the conclusion I would like to say that even though the negative aspects of living in a multicultural society are significant, it is possible to deal with them through developing the robust dialogue and demonstrating the desire to reach harmony and mutual understanding. I believe that if people find the strength to overcome the difficulties in making ethnic minorities a part of the society, the outcomes will be fantastic because cultural diversity is the unlimited source of creativity and positive shifts in every sphere of social life. What is more crucial, embracing multiculturalism is a perfect way to make the world a better place to live because it decreases the level of hostility among the representatives of different ethnicities and leads to establishing peace and harmony not only in the streets but also in people’s minds.

Christensen, E. (2012). Revisiting multiculturalism and its critics. The Monist, 95 (1), 33-48.

Dendy, J., & Pe-Pua, R. (2010). Attitudes to multiculturalism, immigration and cultural diversity: Comparison of dominant and non-dominant groups in three Australian states. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 34 (1), 34-46.

Kauff, M., Asbrock, F., Thörner, S., & Wagner, U. (2013). Side effects of multiculturalism: The interaction effect of a multicultural ideology and authoritarianism on prejudice and diversity beliefs. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 39 (3), 305-320.

Levin, S., Matthews, M., Guimind, S., Sidanius, J., Pratto, F., Kteily, N., & Dover, T. (2012). Assimilation, multiculturalism, and colorblindness: Mediated and moderated relationships between social dominance orientation and prejudice. Journal of Experimental and Social Psychology , 48 (1), 207-212.

Maciel, R. (2014). The future of liberal multiculturalism. Political Studies Review, 12 (3), 383-394.

Taylor, C. (2012). Interculturalism or multiculturalism? Philosophy and Social Criticism, 38 (4-5), 413-423.

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StudyCorgi. (2020, May 13). Positive Effects of Multiculturalism: Essay Example. https://studycorgi.com/how-multiculturalism-is-a-good-thing/

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Home — Essay Samples — Social Issues — Discrimination and Prejudice — Multiculturalism

Essays on Multiculturalism

In the vibrant academic landscape, the exploration of multiculturalism stands as a critical area of study, reflecting the rich diversity of our global society. At GradesFixer, we understand the complexity and depth of multiculturalism as a subject matter. This is why we offer an extensive collection of essay samples on multiculturalism, each providing unique insights and perspectives on this multifaceted topic. Our essays serve as a beacon of inspiration and a practical guide for students embarking on the journey of writing their own pieces on multicultural identities, challenges, and contributions.

A Gateway to Diverse Perspectives

Our page dedicated to multiculturalism essays offers students a panoramic view of cultural diversity , its impacts, and its significance in today's world. From the examination of multicultural policies in educational settings to personal narratives of cultural integration, these essays encompass a broad spectrum of themes and discussions. Students can navigate through our collection to find essays that resonate with their academic needs and personal interests, using them as a springboard to develop their own arguments and viewpoints.

Crafting Your Multiculturalism Essay with Confidence

For students, the task of writing an essay on such a dynamic and expansive topic can be daunting. That's where our multiculturalism essay samples come into play. By exploring our repository, students can gain clarity on how to structure their essays, articulate complex ideas, and engage with the topic critically and creatively. Whether it's understanding the theoretical underpinnings of multiculturalism or analyzing its real-world applications, our samples provide a solid foundation for academic exploration and writing.

Enhancing Academic Research and Writing Skills

Beyond serving as models for essay writing, our multiculturalism essay samples are a valuable resource for enhancing research skills. Each essay demonstrates how to effectively incorporate evidence, make persuasive arguments, and address counterarguments, all while maintaining academic integrity. Students can learn how to critically assess sources, synthesize diverse perspectives, and contribute meaningfully to the discourse on multiculturalism.

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At GradesFixer, we're more than just an essay sample repository; we're a vibrant academic community committed to fostering learning, creativity, and academic excellence. We invite students, educators, and researchers to explore our multiculturalism essay samples, draw inspiration from them, and use them as a tool for academic success and personal growth.

The discourse on multiculturalism is ever-evolving, reflecting the dynamic interplay of cultures in our global society. By utilizing our multiculturalism essay samples, students are better equipped to engage with this discourse, offering fresh insights and contributing to a more inclusive and understanding world. Dive into our collection today and let it be the catalyst for your academic and personal exploration of multiculturalism.

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Cultivating Understanding: Embracing Cultural Sensitivity’s Essence

This essay about the significance of cultural sensitivity into the complexities of embracing diversity. It emphasizes the importance of transcending cultural biases and fostering genuine dialogue to build mutual respect. Highlighting the role of education, communication, and media, it advocates for a more inclusive future where diverse perspectives are celebrated. Ultimately, it envisions a world where the vibrant tapestry of cultures enriches our collective experience and fosters empathy and understanding.

How it works

In a symphony of global narratives, the pursuit of cultivating understanding and embracing the very essence of cultural sensitivity emerges as an odyssey of profound significance. Beyond the superficial layers of diversity lie the intricate patterns of human experience, each imbued with the vibrant hues of tradition, belief, and heritage. Within the rich tapestry of cultures, sensitivity beckons not just for passive acceptance, but for an active engagement with the kaleidoscope of perspectives that adorn our shared humanity.

At its core, this journey necessitates an earnest acknowledgment of the dynamic interplay between cultures and the fluidity of identity within them.

Cultural sensitivity invites us to transcend the confines of our comfort zones, venturing into realms where differences cease to be barriers and instead become bridges for connection and enrichment. It implores us to shed the cloak of ethnocentrism and approach the mosaic of human expression with humility and genuine curiosity.

Central to this endeavor is the recognition and interrogation of the cultural biases that lurk within the recesses of our minds. These biases, often ingrained through societal conditioning, distort our perceptions and hinder authentic dialogue. By confronting and challenging these preconceptions, we create space for genuine encounters that transcend stereotypes and cultivate mutual respect.

Education emerges as a beacon of hope in this pursuit, illuminating minds with the transformative power of knowledge and empathy. Through inclusive curricula and experiential learning, the next generation is empowered to navigate the complexities of a multicultural world with grace and compassion. By instilling the values of cultural literacy from an early age, we nurture a generation of global citizens poised to bridge divides and champion inclusivity.

Communication, both verbal and nonverbal, serves as the lifeblood of cultural exchange, weaving a tapestry of understanding that transcends linguistic barriers. Beyond words lie the subtle nuances of gesture, tone, and expression, each carrying profound cultural significance. By honing our skills in cross-cultural communication, we deepen our empathy and forge connections that bridge linguistic and cultural chasms.

In the realm of media and popular culture, the power to shape perceptions is wielded with profound responsibility. Authentic representation serves as a potent antidote to the poison of stereotypes, offering a nuanced portrayal of diverse cultures that celebrates their richness rather than diminishes it. By amplifying marginalized voices and challenging dominant narratives, media becomes a catalyst for social change, inspiring empathy and understanding on a global scale.

In the tapestry of humanity, the threads of cultural sensitivity are woven with intentionality and care, each contributing to the vibrancy of the whole. As we embark on this journey of exploration and discovery, let us embrace the diversity of our world with open hearts and open minds. For within the mosaic of cultures lies the promise of a more inclusive and compassionate future for all.

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6 Diversity College Essay Examples

What’s covered:, how to write the diversity essay after the end of affirmative action, essay #1: jewish identity, essay #2: being bangladeshi-american, essay #3: marvel vs dc, essay #4: leadership as a first-gen american, essay #5: protecting the earth, essay #6: music and accents, where to get your diversity essays edited, what is the diversity essay.

While working on your college applications, you may come across essays that focus on diversity , culture, or values. The purpose of these essays is to highlight any diverse views or opinions that you may bring to campus. Colleges want a diverse student body that’s made up of different backgrounds, religions, ethnicities, sexual orientations, and interests. These essay prompts are a way for them to see what students can bring to their school.

In this post, we will share six essays written by real students that cover the topic of culture and diversity. We’ll also include what each essay did well and where there is room for improvement. Hopefully, this will be a useful resource to inspire your own diversity essay.

Please note: Looking at examples of real essays students have submitted to colleges can be very beneficial to get inspiration for your essays. That said, you should never copy or plagiarize from these examples when writing your own essays. Colleges can tell when an essay isn’t genuine and they will not have a favorable view of students who have plagiarized.

In June 2023, the Supreme Court ruled that the use of race in college admissions was unconstitutional. In other words, they struck down the use of affirmative action in college admissions . This will affect college-bound students of color in a number of ways, including lowering their chances of acceptance and reducing the amount of direct outreach they’ll receive from colleges. Another change to consider is the ways in which students should tackle their diversity essays.

Although colleges can no longer directly factor race into admissions, students aren’t prohibited from discussing their racial backgrounds in supplemental application essays. If your racial background is important to you, seriously consider writing about it in your diversity essays. If you don’t, admissions officers are extremely limited in their ability to consider your race when making an admission decision.

As in the essays listed below, discussing your race is an excellent tool for showing admissions officers the person behind the grades and test scores. Beyond that, it provides admissions officers with an opportunity to put themselves in your shoes—showing them how your background has presented challenges to overcome, helped build important life skills, and taught you valuable lessons.

Diversity Essay Examples

I was thirsty. In my wallet was a lone $10 bill, ultimately useless at my school’s vending machine. Tasked with scrounging together the $1 cost of a water bottle, I fished out and arranged the spare change that normally hid in the bottom of my backpack in neat piles of nickels and dimes on my desk. I swept them into a spare Ziploc and began to leave when a classmate snatched the bag and held it above my head.

“Want your money back, Jew?” she chanted, waving the coins around. I had forgotten the Star-of-David around my neck, but quickly realized she must have seen it and connected it to the stacks of coins. I am no stranger to experiencing and confronting antisemitism, but I had never been targeted in my school before. I grabbed my bag and sternly told her to leave. Although she sauntered away, the impact remained.

This incident serves as an example of the adversity I have and will continue to face from those who only see me as a stereotype. Ironically, however, these experiences of discrimination have only increased my pride as a member of the Jewish Community. Continuing to wear the Star-of-David connects me to my history and my family. I find meaning and direction in my community’s values, such as pride, education, and giving—and I am eager to transfer these values to my new community: the Duke community.

What the Essay Did Well

Writing about discrimination can be difficult, but if you are comfortable doing it, it can make for a powerful story. Although this essay is short and focused on one small interaction, it represents a much larger struggle for this student, and for that reason it makes the essay very impactful.

The author takes her time at the beginning of the essay to build the scene for the audience, which allows us to feel like we are there with her, making the hateful comments even more jarring later on. If she had just told us her classmate teased her with harmful stereotypes, we wouldn’t feel the same sense of anger as we do knowing that she was just trying to get a drink and ended up being harassed.

This essay does another important thing—it includes self-reflection on the experience and on the student’s identity. Without elaborating on the emotional impact of a situation, an essay about discrimination would make admission officers feel bad for the student, but they wouldn’t be compelled to admit the student. By describing how experiences like these drive her and make her more determined to embody positive values, this student reveals her character to the readers.

What Could Be Improved

While including emotional reflection in the latter half of the essay is important, the actual sentences could be tightened up a bit to leave a stronger impression. The student does a nice job of showing us her experience with antisemitism, but she just tells us about the impact it has on her. If she instead showed us what the impact looked like, the essay would be even better.

For example, rather than telling us “Continuing to wear the Star-of-David connects me to my history and my family,” she could have shown that connection: “My Star-of-David necklace thumps against my heart with every step I take, reminding me of my great-grandparents who had to hide their stars, my grandma’s spindly fingers lighting the menorah each Hanukkah, and my uncle’s homemade challah bread.” This new sentence reveals so much more than the existing sentence about the student and the deep connection she feels with her family and religion.

Life before was good: verdant forests, sumptuous curries, and a devoted family.

Then, my family abandoned our comfortable life in Bangladesh for a chance at the American dream in Los Angeles. Within our first year, my father was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. He lost his battle three weeks before my sixth birthday. Facing a new country without the steady presence of my father, we were vulnerable—prisoners of hardship in the land of the free.

We resettled in the Bronx, in my uncle’s renovated basement. It was meant to be our refuge, but I felt more displaced than ever. Gone were the high-rise condos of West L.A.; instead, government projects towered over the neighborhood. Pedestrians no longer smiled and greeted me; the atmosphere was hostile, even toxic. Schoolkids were quick to pick on those they saw as weak or foreign, hurling harsh words I’d never heard before.

Meanwhile, my family began integrating into the local Bangladeshi community. I struggled to understand those who shared my heritage. Bangladeshi mothers stayed home while fathers drove cabs and sold fruit by the roadside—painful societal positions. Riding on crosstown buses or walking home from school, I began to internalize these disparities.

During my fleeting encounters with affluent Upper East Siders, I saw kids my age with nannies, parents who wore suits to work, and luxurious apartments with spectacular views. Most took cabs to their destinations: cabs that Bangladeshis drove. I watched the mundane moments of their lives with longing, aching to plant myself in their shoes. Shame prickled down my spine. I distanced myself from my heritage, rejecting the traditional panjabis worn on Eid and refusing the torkari we ate for dinner every day.

As I grappled with my relationship with the Bangladeshi community, I turned my attention to helping my Bronx community by pursuing an internship with Assemblyman Luis Sepulveda. I handled desk work and took calls, spending the bulk of my time actively listening to the hardships constituents faced—everything from a veteran stripped of his benefits to a grandmother unable to support her bedridden grandchild.

I’d never exposed myself to stories like these, and now I was the first to hear them. As an intern, I could only assist in what felt like the small ways—pointing out local job offerings, printing information on free ESL classes, reaching out to non-profits. But to a community facing an onslaught of intense struggles, I realized that something as small as these actions could have vast impacts.

Seeing the immediate consequences of my actions inspired me. Throughout that summer, I internalized my community’s daily challenges in a new light. I began to see the prevalent underemployment and cramped living quarters less as sources of shame. Instead, I saw them as realities that had to be acknowledged, but that could ultimately be remedied.

I also realized the benefits of the Bangladeshi culture I had been so ashamed of. My Bangla language skills were an asset to the office, and my understanding of Bangladeshi etiquette allowed for smooth communication between office staff and the office’s constituents. As I helped my neighbors navigate city services, I saw my heritage with pride—a perspective I never expected to have.

I can now appreciate the value of my unique culture and background, and the value of living with less. This perspective offers room for progress, community integration, and a future worth fighting for. My time with Assemblyman Sepulveda’s office taught me that I can be an agent of change who can enable this progression. Far from being ashamed of my community, I want to someday return to local politics in the Bronx to continue helping others access the American Dream. I hope to help my community appreciate the opportunity to make progress together. By embracing reality, I learned to live it. Along the way, I discovered one thing: life is good, but we can make it better.

This student’s passion for social justice and civic duty shines through in this essay because of how honest it is. Sharing their personal experience with immigrating, moving around, being an outsider, and finding a community allows us to see the hardships this student has faced and builds empathy towards their situation.

However, what really makes it strong is that the student goes beyond describing the difficulties they faced and explains the mental impact it had on them as a child: “Shame prickled down my spine. I distanced myself from my heritage, rejecting the traditional panjabis worn on Eid and refusing the torkari we ate for dinner every day.” The rejection of their culture presented at the beginning of the essay creates a nice juxtaposition with the student’s view in the latter half of the essay, and helps demonstrate how they have matured.

They then use their experience interning as a way to delve into a change in their thought process about their culture. This experience also serves as a way to show how their passion for social justice began. Using this experience as a mechanism to explore their thoughts and feelings is an excellent example of how items that are included elsewhere on your application should be incorporated into your essay.

This essay prioritizes emotions and personal views over specific anecdotes. Although there are details and certain moments incorporated throughout to emphasize the author’s points, the main focus remains on the student and how they grapple with their culture and identity.

One area for improvement is the conclusion. Although the forward-looking approach is a nice way to end an essay focused on social justice, it would be nice to include more details and imagery in the conclusion. How does the student want to help their community? What government position do they see themselves holding one day?

A more impactful ending might describe the student walking into their office at the New York City Housing Authority in 15 years. This future student might be looking at the plans to build a new development in the Bronx just blocks away from where they grew up that would provide quality housing to people in their Bangladeshi community. They would smile while thinking about how far they have come from that young kid who used to be ashamed of their culture.

Superhero cinema is an oligopoly consisting of two prominent, towering brands: Marvel and DC. I’m a religious supporter of Marvel, but last year, I discovered that my friend, Tom, was a DC fan. After a vociferous 20-minute quarrel about which was better, we decided to allocate one day to have a professional debate, using carefully assembled and coherent arguments.

One week later, we both brought pages of notes and evidence cards (I also had my Iron-Man bobblehead for moral support). Our impartial moderator—a Disney fan—sat in the middle with a stopwatch, open-policy style. I began the debate by discussing how Marvel accentuated the humanity of the storyline—such as in Tony Stark’s transformation from an egotistical billionaire to a compassionate father—which drew in a broader audience, because more people resonated with certain aspects of the characters. Tom rebutted this by capitalizing on how Deadpool was a duplicate of Deathstroke, how Vision copied Red Tornado, and how DC sold more comics than Marvel.

40 minutes later, we reached an impasse. We were out of cards, and we both made excellent points, so our moderator was unable to declare a winner. Difficult conversations aren’t necessarily always the ones that make political headlines. Instead, a difficult discussion involves any topic with which people share an emotional connection.

Over the years, I became so emotionally invested in Marvel that my mind erected an impenetrable shield, blocking out all other possibilities. Even today, we haven’t decided which franchise was better, but I realized that I was undermining DC for no reason other than my own ignorance.

The inevitability of diversity suggests that it is our responsibility to understand the other person and what they believe in. We may not always experience a change in opinion, but we can grant ourselves the opportunity to expand our global perspective. I strive to continue this adventure to increase my awareness as a superhero aficionado, activist, and student, by engaging in conversations that require me to think beyond what I believe and to view the world from others’ perspectives.

And yes, Tom is still my friend.

Diversity doesn’t always have to be about culture or heritage; diversity exists all around us, even in our comic book preferences. The cleverness of this essay lies in the way the student flipped the traditional diversity prompt on its head and instead discussed his diverse perspective on a topic he is passionate about. If you don’t have a cultural connection you are compelled to write about, this is a nifty approach to a diversity prompt—if it’s handled appropriately.

While this student has a non-traditional topic, he still presents it in a way that pays respect to the key aspects of a diversity essay: depicting his perspective and recognizing the importance of diverse views. Just as someone who is writing about a culture that is possibly unfamiliar to the reader, the student describes what makes Marvel and DC unique and important to him and his friend, respectively. He also expands on how a lack of diversity in superhero consumption led to his feeling of ignorance, and how it now makes him appreciate the need for diversity in all aspects of his life.

This student is unapologetically himself in this essay, which is ultimately why this unorthodox topic is able to work. He committed to his passion for Marvel by sharing analytical takes on characters and demonstrating how the franchise was so important to his identity that it momentarily threatened a friendship. The inclusion of humor through his personal voice—e.g., referring to the argument as a professional debate and telling us that the friendship lived on—contributes to the essay feeling deeply personal.

Choosing an unconventional topic for a diversity essay requires extra care and attention to ensure that you are still addressing the core of the prompt. That being said, if you accomplish it successfully, it makes for an incredibly memorable essay that could easily set you apart!

While this is a great essay as is, the idea of diversity could have been addressed a little bit earlier in the piece to make it absolutely clear the student is writing about his diverse perspective. He positions Marvel and DC as two behemoths in the superhero movie industry, but in the event that his reader is unfamiliar with these two brands, there is little context about the cultural impact each has on its fans.

To this student, Marvel is more than just a movie franchise; it’s a crucial part of his identity, just as someone’s race or religion might be. In order for the reader to fully understand the weight of his perspective, there should be further elaboration—towards the beginning—on how important Marvel is to this student.

Leadership was thrust upon me at a young age. When I was six years old, my abusive father abandoned my family, leaving me to step up as the “man” of the house. From having to watch over my little sister to cooking dinner three nights a week, I never lived an ideal suburban life. I didn’t enjoy the luxuries of joining after-school activities, getting driven to school or friends’ houses, or taking weekend trips to the movies or bowling alley. Instead, I spent my childhood navigating legal hurdles, shouldering family responsibilities, and begrudgingly attending court-mandated therapy sessions.

At the same time, I tried to get decent grades and maintain my Colombian roots and Spanish fluency enough to at least partially communicate with my grandparents, both of whom speak little English. Although my childhood had its bright and joyful moments, much of it was weighty and would have been exhausting for any child to bear. In short, I grew up fast. However, the responsibilities I took on at home prepared me to be a leader and to work diligently, setting me up to use these skills later in life.

I didn’t have much time to explore my interests until high school, where I developed my knack for government and for serving others. Being cast in a lead role in my school’s fall production as a freshman was the first thing to give me the confidence I needed to pursue other activities: namely, student government. Shortly after being cast, I was elected Freshman Vice-President, a role that put me in charge of promoting events, delegating daily office tasks, collaborating with the administration on new school initiatives, and planning trips and fundraisers.

While my new position demanded a significant amount of responsibility, my childhood of helping my mom manage our household prepared me to be successful in the role. When I saw the happy faces of my classmates after a big event, I felt proud to know that I had made even a small difference to them. Seeing projects through to a successful outcome was thrilling. I enjoyed my time and responsibilities so much that I served all four years of high school, going on to become Executive Vice-President.

As I found success in high school, my mother and grandparents began speaking more about the life they faced prior to emigrating from Colombia. To better connect with them, I took a series of Spanish language classes to regain my fluency. After a practice run through my presentation on Bendíceme, Ultima ( Bless me, Ultima ) by Rudolofo Anaya, with my grandmother, she squeezed my hand and told me the story of how my family was forced from their home in order to live free of religious persecution. Though my grandparents have often expressed how much better their lives and their children’s lives have been in America, I have often struggled with my identity. I felt that much of it was erased with my loss of our native language.

In elementary school, I learned English best because in class I was surrounded by it. Spanish was more difficult to grasp without a formal education, and my family urged me to become fluent in English so I could be of better help to them in places as disparate as government agencies and grocery stores. When I was old enough to recognize the large part of my identity still rooted in being Colombian, it was challenging to connect these two sides of who I was.

Over time I have been able to reconcile the two in the context of my aspirations. I found purpose and fulfillment through student council, and I knew that I could help other families like my own if I worked in local government. By working through city offices that address housing, education, and support for survivors of childhood abuse, I could give others the same liberties and opportunities my family has enjoyed in this country. Doing so would also help me honor my roots as a first-generation American.

I have been a leader my entire life. Both at Harvard and after graduation, I want to continue that trend. I hope to volunteer with organizations that share my goals. I want to advise policy-making politicians on ways to make children and new immigrants safer and more secure. When my family was at their worst, my community gave back. I hope to give that gift to future generations. A career in local, city-based public service is not a rashly made decision; it is a reflection of where I’ve already been in life, and where I want to be in the future.

Although this essay begins on a somber note, it goes on to show this student’s determination and the joy he found. Importantly, it also ends with a positive, forward-looking perspective. This is a great example of how including your hardship can bolster an essay as long as it is not the essay’s main focus.

Explaining the challenges this student faced from a young age—becoming the man of the house, dealing with legal matters, maintaining good grades, etc.—builds sympathy for his situation. However, the first paragraph is even more impactful because he explains the emotional toll these actions had on him. We understand how he lost the innocence of his childhood and how he struggled to remain connected to his Colombian heritage with all his other responsibilities. Including these details truly allows the reader to see this student’s struggle, making us all the more joyful when he comes out stronger in the end.

Pivoting to discuss positive experiences with student government and Spanish classes for the rest of the essay demonstrates that this student has a positive approach to life and is willing to push through challenges. The tone of the essay shifts from heavy to uplifting. He explains the joy he got out of helping his classmates and connecting with his grandparents, once again providing emotional reflection to make the reader care more.

Overall, this essay does a nice job of demonstrating how this student approaches challenges and negative experiences. Admitting that the responsibilities of his childhood had a silver lining shows his maturity and how he will be able to succeed in government one day. The essay strikes a healthy balance between challenge and hope, leaving us with a positive view of a student with such emotional maturity.

Although the content of this essay is very strong, it struggles with redundancy and disorganized information. He mentions his passion for government at the beginning of the student government paragraph, then again addresses government in the paragraph focused on his Colombian heritage, and concludes by talking about how he wants to get into government once more. Similarly, in the first paragraph, he discusses the struggle of maintaining his Colombian identity and then fully delves into that topic in the third paragraph.

The repetition of ideas and lack of a streamlined organization of this student’s thoughts diminishes some of the emotional impact of the story. The reader is left trying to piece together a swirling mass of information on their own, rather than having a focused, sequential order to follow.

This could be fixed if the student rearranged details to make each paragraph focused on a singular idea. For example, the first paragraph could be about his childhood. The second could be about how student government sparked his interest in government and what he hopes to do one day. The third could be about how he reconnected with his Colombian roots through his Spanish classes, after years of struggling with his identity. And the final paragraph could tie everything together by explaining how everything led to him wanting to pursue a future serving others, particularly immigrants like his family.

Alternatively, the essay could follow a sequential order that would start with his childhood, then explain his struggle with his identity, then show how student government and Spanish classes helped him find himself, and finally, conclude with what he hopes to accomplish by pursuing government.

I never understood the power of community until I left home to join seven strangers in the Ecuadorian rainforest. Although we flew in from distant corners of the U.S., we shared a common purpose: immersing ourselves in our passion for protecting the natural world.

Back home in my predominantly conservative suburb, my neighbors had brushed off environmental concerns. My classmates debated the feasibility of Trump’s wall, not the deteriorating state of our planet. Contrastingly, these seven strangers delighted in bird-watching, brightened at the mention of medicinal tree sap, and understood why I once ran across a four-lane highway to retrieve discarded beer cans.

Their histories barely resembled mine, yet our values aligned intimately. We did not hesitate to joke about bullet ants, gush about the versatility of tree bark, or discuss the destructive consequences of materialism. Together, we let our inner tree-huggers run free.

In the short life of our little community, we did what we thought was impossible. By feeding on each other’s infectious tenacity, we cultivated an atmosphere that deepened our commitment to our values and empowered us to speak out on behalf of the environment. After a week of stimulating conversations and introspective revelations about engaging people from our hometowns in environmental advocacy, we developed a shared determination to devote our lives to this cause.

As we shared a goodbye hug, my new friend whispered, “The world needs saving. Someone’s gotta do it.” For the first time, I believed that that someone could be me.

This student is expressing their diversity through their involvement in a particular community—another nice approach if you don’t want to write about culture or ethnicity. We all have unique things that we geek out over. This student expresses the joy that they derived from finding a community where they could express their love for the environment. Passion is fundamental to university life and generally finds its way into any successful application.

The essay finds strength in the fact that readers feel for the student. We get a little bit of backstory about where they come from and how they felt silenced— “Back home in my predominantly conservative suburb, my neighbors had brushed off environmental concerns” —so it’s easy to feel joy for them when they get set free and finally find their community.

This student displays clear values: community, ecoconsciousness, dedication, and compassion. An admissions officer who reads a diversity essay is looking for students with strong values who will enrich the university community with their unique perspective—that sounds just like this student!

One area of weakness in this essay is the introduction. The opening line— “I never understood the power of community until I left home to join seven strangers in the Ecuadorian rainforest” —is a bit clichéd. Introductions should be captivating and build excitement and suspense for what is to come. Simply telling the reader about how your experience made you understand the power of community reveals the main takeaway of your essay without the reader needing to go any further.

Instead of starting this essay with a summary of what the essay is about, the student should have made their hook part of the story. Whether that looks like them being exasperated with comments their classmates made about politics, or them looking around apprehensively at the seven strangers in their program as they all boarded their flight, the student should start off in the action.

India holds a permanent place in my heart and ears. Whenever I returned on a trip or vacation, I would show my grandmother how to play Monopoly and she would let me tie her sari. I would teach my grandfather English idioms—which he would repeat to random people and fishmongers on the streets—and he would teach me Telugu phrases.

It was a curious exchange of worlds that I am reminded of every time I listen to Indian music. It was these tunes that helped me reconnect with my heritage and ground my meandering identity. Indian music, unlike the stereotype I’d long been imbued with, was not just a one-and-done Bollywood dance number! Each region and language was like an island with its own unique sonic identity. I’m grateful for my discovery of Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, and Tamil tunes, for these discoveries have opened me up to the incredible smorgasbord of diversity, depth, and complexity within the subcontinent I was born in.

Here’s an entirely-different sonic identity for you: Texan slang. “Couldya pass the Mango seltzer, please, hon?” asked my Houstonian neighbor, Rae Ann—her syllables melding together like the sticky cake batter we were making.

Rae Ann and her twang were real curiosities to me. Once, she invited my family to a traditional Texan barbecue with the rest of our neighbors. As Hindus, we didn’t eat beef, so we showed up with chicken kebabs, instead. Rather than looking at us bizarrely, she gladly accepted the dish, lining it up beside grilled loins and hamburger patties.

Her gesture was a small but very well-accepted one and I quickly became convinced she was the human manifestation of “Southern hospitality”—something reflected in each of her viscous, honey-dripping phrases. “Watch out for the skeeters!” was an excellent example. It was always funny at first, but conveyed a simple message: We’ve got each other’s backs and together, we can overcome the blood-sucking mosquitoes of the Houstonian summer! I began to see how her words built bridges, not boundaries.

I believe that sounds—whether it’s music or accents—can make a difference in the ways we perceive and accept individuals from other backgrounds. But sound is about listening too. In Rice’s residential college, I would be the type of person to strike up a conversation with an international student and ask for one of their Airpods (you’d be surprised how many different genres and languages of music I’ve picked up in this way!).

As both an international student and Houstonian at heart, I hope to bridge the gap between Rice’s domestic and international populations. Whether it’s organizing cultural events or simply taking the time to get to know a student whose first language isn’t English, I look forward to listening to the stories that only a fellow wanderer can tell.

This essay does an excellent job of addressing two aspects of this student’s identity. Looking at diversity through sound is a very creative way to descriptively depict their Indian and Texan cultures. Essays are always more successful when they stimulate the senses, so framing the entire response around sound automatically opens the door for vivid imagery.

The quotes from this student’s quirky neighbor bring a sense of realism to the essay. We can feel ourselves at the barbecue and hear her thick Texan accent coming through. The way people communicate is a huge part of their culture and identity, so the way that this student perfectly captures the essence of their Texan identity with accented phrases is skillfully done.

This essay does such a great job of making the sounds of Texas jump off the page, so it is a bit disappointing that it wasn’t able to accomplish the same for India. The student describes the different Indian languages and music styles, but doesn’t bring them to life with quotes or onomatopoeia in the manner that they did for the sounds of Texas.

They could have described the buzz of the sitar or the lyrical pattern of the Telugu phrases their grandfather taught them. Telling us about the diversity of sounds in Indian music is fine, but if the reader can’t appreciate what those sounds resemble, it makes it harder to understand the Indian half of the author’s identity. Especially since this student emulated the sounds and essence of Texas so well, it’s important that India is given the same treatment so we can fully appreciate both sides of this essay.

More Supplemental Essay Tips

How to Write a Stellar “Why This College?” Essay + Examples

How to Write a Stellar Extracurricular Activity College Essay

Do you want feedback on your diversity essays? After rereading your essays countless times, it can be difficult to evaluate your writing objectively. That’s why we created our free Peer Essay Review tool , where you can get a free review of your essay from another student. You can also improve your own writing skills by reviewing other students’ essays.

If you want a college admissions expert to review your essay, advisors on CollegeVine have helped students refine their writing and submit successful applications to top schools. Find the right advisor for you to improve your chances of getting into your dream school!

Cultural Diversity Essay & Community Essay Examples

If you’ve started to research college application requirements for the schools on your list, you might have come across the “cultural diversity essay.” In this guide, we’ll explore the cultural diversity essay in depth. We will compare the cultural diversity essay to the community essay and discuss how to approach these kinds of supplements. We’ll also provide examples of diversity essays and community essay examples. But first, let’s discuss exactly what a cultural diversity essay is.

The purpose of the cultural diversity essay in college applications is to show the admissions committee what makes you unique. The cultural diversity essay also lets you describe what type of “ diversity ” you would bring to campus.

We’ll also highlight a diversity essay sample for three college applications. These include the Georgetown application essay , Rice application essay , and Williams application essay . We’ll provide examples of diversity essays for each college. Then, for each of these college essays that worked, we will analyze their strengths to help you craft your own essays.

Finally, we’ll give you some tips on how to write a cultural diversity essay that will make your applications shine.

But first, let’s explore the types of college essays you might encounter on your college applications.

Types of College Essays

College application requirements will differ among schools. However, you’ll submit one piece of writing to nearly every school on your list—the personal statement . A strong personal statement can help you stand out in the admissions process.

So, how do you know what to write about? That depends on the type of college essay included in your college application requirements.

There are a few main types of college essays that you might encounter in the college admissions process. Theese include the “Why School ” essay, the “Why Major ” essay, and the extracurricular activity essay. This also includes the type of essay we will focus on in this guide—the cultural diversity essay.

“Why School” essay

The “Why School ” essay is exactly what it sounds like. For this type of college essay, you’ll need to underscore why you want to go to this particular school.

However, don’t make the mistake of just listing off what you like about the school. Additionally, don’t just reiterate information you can find on their admissions website. Instead, you’ll want to make connections between what the school offers and how you are a great fit for that college community.

“Why Major” essay

The idea behind the “Why Major ” essay is similar to that of the “Why School ” essay above. However, instead of writing about the school at large, this essay should highlight why you plan to study your chosen major.

There are plenty of directions you could take with this type of essay. For instance, you might describe how you chose this major, what career you plan to pursue upon graduation, or other details.

Extracurricular Activity essay

The extracurricular activity essay asks you to elaborate on one of the activities that you participated in outside of the classroom.

For this type of college essay, you’ll need to select an extracurricular activity that you pursued while you were in high school. Bonus points if you can tie your extracurricular activity into your future major, career goals, or other extracurricular activities for college. Overall, your extracurricular activity essay should go beyond your activities list. In doing so, it should highlight why your chosen activity matters to you.

Cultural Diversity essay

The cultural diversity essay is your chance to expound upon diversity in all its forms. Before you write your cultural diversity essay, you should ask yourself some key questions. These questions can include: How will you bring diversity to your future college campus? What unique perspective do you bring to the table?

Another sub-category of the cultural diversity essay is the gender diversity essay. As its name suggests, this essay would center around the author’s gender. This essay would highlight how gender shapes the way the writer understands the world around them.

Later, we’ll look at examples of diversity essays and other college essays that worked. But before we do, let’s figure out how to identify a cultural diversity essay in the first place.

How to identify a ‘cultural diversity’ essay

So, you’re wondering how you’ll be able to identify a cultural diversity essay as you review your college application requirements.

Aside from the major giveaway of having the word “diversity” in the prompt, a cultural diversity essay will ask you to describe what makes you different from other applicants. In other words, what aspects of your unique culture(s) have influenced your perspective and shaped you into who you are today?

Diversity can refer to race, ethnicity, first-generation status, gender, or anything in between. You can write about a myriad of things in a cultural diversity essay. For instance, you might discuss your personal background, identity, values, experiences, or how you’ve overcome challenges in your life.

However, don’t feel limited in what you can address in a cultural diversity essay. The words “culture” and “diversity” mean different things to different people. Above all, you’ll want your diversity essays for college to be personal and sincere.

How is a ‘community’ essay different?

A community essay can also be considered a cultural diversity essay. In fact, you can think of the community essay as a subcategory of the cultural diversity essay. However, there is a key difference between a community essay and a cultural diversity essay, which we will illustrate below.

You might have already seen some community essay examples while you were researching college application requirements. But how exactly is a community essay different from a cultural diversity essay?

One way to tell the difference between community essay examples and cultural diversity essay examples is by the prompt. A community essay will highlight, well, community . This means it will focus on how your identity will shape your interactions on campus—not just how it informs your own experiences.

Two common forms to look out for

Community essay examples can take two forms. First, you’ll find community essay examples about your past experiences. These let you show the admissions team how you have positively influenced your own community.

Other community essay examples, however, will focus on the future. These community essay examples will ask you to detail how you will contribute to your future college community. We refer to these as college community essay examples.

In college community essay examples, you’ll see applicants detail how they might interact with their fellow students. These essays may also discuss how students plan to positively contribute to the campus community.

As we mentioned above, the community essay, along with community essay examples and college community essay examples, fit into the larger category of the cultural diversity essay. Although we do not have specific community essay examples or college community essay examples in this guide, we will continue to highlight the subtle differences between the two.

Before we continue the discussion of community essay examples and college community essay examples, let’s start with some examples of cultural diversity essay prompts. For each of the cultural diversity essay prompts, we’ll name the institutions that include these diversity essays for college as part of their college application requirements.

What are some examples of ‘cultural diversity’ essays?

Now, you have a better understanding of the similarities and differences between the cultural diversity essay and the community essay. So, next, let’s look at some examples of cultural diversity essay prompts.

The prompts below are from the Georgetown application, Rice application, and Williams application, respectively. As we discuss the similarities and differences between prompts, remember the framework we provided above for what constitutes a cultural diversity essay and a community essay.

Later in this guide, we’ll provide real examples of diversity essays, including Georgetown essay examples, Rice University essay examples, and Williams supplemental essays examples. These are all considered college essays that worked—meaning that the author was accepted into that particular institution.

Georgetown Supplementals Essays

Later, we’ll look at Georgetown supplemental essay examples. Diversity essays for Georgetown are a product of this prompt:

As Georgetown is a diverse community, the Admissions Committee would like to know more about you in your own words. Please submit a brief essay, either personal or creative, which you feel best describes you.

You might have noticed two keywords in this prompt right away: “diverse” and “community.” These buzzwords indicate that this prompt is a cultural diversity essay. You could even argue that responses to this prompt would result in college community essay examples. After all, the prompt refers to the Georgetown community.

For this prompt, you’ll want to produce a diversity essay sample that highlights who you are. In order to do that successfully, you’ll need to self-reflect before putting pen to paper. What aspects of your background, personality, or values best describe who you are? How might your presence at Georgetown influence or contribute to their diverse community?

Additionally, this cultural diversity essay can be personal or creative. So, you have more flexibility with the Georgetown supplemental essays than with other similar diversity essay prompts. Depending on the direction you go, your response to this prompt could be considered a cultural diversity essay, gender diversity essay, or a college community essay.

Rice University Essays

The current Rice acceptance rate is just 9% , making it a highly selective school. Because the Rice acceptance rate is so low, your personal statement and supplemental essays can make a huge difference.

The Rice University essay examples we’ll provide below are based on this prompt:

The quality of Rice’s academic life and the Residential College System are heavily influenced by the unique life experiences and cultural traditions each student brings. What personal perspective would you contribute to life at Rice?

Breaking down the prompt.

Like the prompt above, this cultural diversity essay asks about your “life experiences,” “cultural traditions,” and personal “perspectives.” These phrases indicate a cultural diversity essay. Keep in mind this may not be the exact prompt you’ll have to answer in your own Rice application. However, future Rice prompts will likely follow a similar framework as this diversity essay sample.

Although this prompt is not as flexible as the Georgetown prompt, it does let you discuss aspects of Rice’s academic life and Residential College System that appeal to you. You can also highlight how your experiences have influenced your personal perspective.

The prompt also asks about how you would contribute to life at Rice. So, your response could also fall in line with college community essay examples. Remember, college community essay examples are another sub-category of community essay examples. Successful college community essay examples will illustrate the ways in which students would contribute to their future campus community.

Williams Supplemental Essays

Like the Rice acceptance rate, the Williams acceptance rate is also 9% . Because the Williams acceptance rate is so low, you’ll want to pay close attention to the Williams supplemental essays examples as you begin the writing process.

The Williams supplemental essays examples below are based on this prompt:

Every first-year student at Williams lives in an Entry – a thoughtfully constructed microcosm of the student community that’s a defining part of the Williams experience. From the moment they arrive, students find themselves in what’s likely the most diverse collection of backgrounds, perspectives, and interests they’ve ever encountered. What might differentiate you from the 19 other first-year students in an Entry? What perspective would you add to the conversation with your peer(s)?

Reflecting on the prompt.

Immediately, words like “diverse,” “backgrounds,” “perspectives,” “interests,” and “differentiate” should stand out to you. These keywords highlight the fact that this is a cultural diversity essay. Similar to the Rice essay, this may not be the exact prompt you’ll face on your Williams application. However, we can still learn from it.

Like the Georgetown essay, this prompt requires you to put in some self-reflection before you start writing. What aspects of your background differentiate you from other people? How would these differences impact your interactions with peers?

This prompt also touches on the “student community” and how you would “add to the conversation with your peer(s).” By extension, any strong responses to this prompt could also be considered as college community essay examples.

Community Essays

All of the prompts above mention campus community. So, you could argue that they are also examples of community essays.

Like we mentioned above, you can think of community essays as a subcategory of the cultural diversity essay. If the prompt alludes to the campus community, or if your response is centered on how you would interact within that community, your essay likely falls into the world of college community essay examples.

Regardless of what you would classify the essay as, all successful essays will be thoughtful, personal, and rich with details. We’ll show you examples of this in our “college essays that worked” section below.

Which schools require a cultural diversity or community essay?

Besides Georgetown, Rice, and Williams, many other college applications require a cultural diversity essay or community essay. In fact, from the Ivy League to HBCUs and state schools, the cultural diversity essay is a staple across college applications.

Although we will not provide a diversity essay sample for each of the colleges below, it is helpful to read the prompts. This will build your familiarity with other college applications that require a cultural diversity essay or community essay. Some schools that require a cultural diversity essay or community essay include New York University , Duke University , Harvard University , Johns Hopkins University , and University of Michigan .

New York University

NYU listed a cultural diversity essay as part of its 2022-2023 college application requirements. Here is the prompt:

NYU was founded on the belief that a student’s identity should not dictate the ability for them to access higher education. That sense of opportunity for all students, of all backgrounds, remains a part of who we are today and a critical part of what makes us a world class university. Our community embraces diversity, in all its forms, as a cornerstone of the NYU experience. We would like to better understand how your experiences would help us to shape and grow our diverse community.

Duke university.

Duke is well-known for its community essay:

What is your sense of Duke as a university and a community, and why do you consider it a good match for you? If there’s something in particular about our offerings that attracts you, feel free to share that as well.

A top-ranked Ivy League institution, Harvard University also has a cultural diversity essay as part of its college application requirements:

Harvard has long recognized the importance of student body diversity of all kinds. We welcome you to write about distinctive aspects of your background, personal development, or the intellectual interests you might bring to your Harvard classmates.

Johns hopkins university.

The Johns Hopkins supplement is another example of a cultural diversity essay:

Founded in the spirit of exploration and discovery, Johns Hopkins University encourages students to share their perspectives, develop their interests, and pursue new experiences. Use this space to share something you’d like the admissions committee to know about you (your interests, your background, your identity, or your community), and how it has shaped what you want to get out of your college experience at Hopkins.

University of michigan.

The University of Michigan requires a community essay for its application:

Everyone belongs to many different communities and/or groups defined by (among other things) shared geography, religion, ethnicity, income, cuisine, interest, race, ideology, or intellectual heritage. Choose one of the communities to which you belong and describe that community and your place within it.

Community essay examples.

The Duke and Michigan prompts are perfect illustrations of community essay examples. However, they have some critical differences. So, if you apply to both of these schools, you’ll have to change the way you approach either of these community essays.

The Duke prompt asks you to highlight why you are a good match for the Duke community. You’ll also see this prompt in other community essay examples. To write a successful response to this prompt, you’ll need to reference offerings specific to Duke (or whichever college requires this essay). In order to know what to reference, you’ll need to do your research before you start writing.

Consider the following questions as you write your diversity essay sample if the prompt is similar to Duke University’s

What values does this college community have?
How do these tie in with what you value?
Is there something that this college offers that matches your interests, personality, or background?

On the other hand, the Michigan essay prompt asks you to describe a community that you belong to as well as your place within that community. This is another variation of the prompt for community essay examples.

To write a successful response to this prompt, you’ll need to identify a community that you belong to. Then, you’ll need to think critically about how you interact with that community.

Below are some questions to consider as you write your diversity essay sample for colleges like Michigan:

Out of all the communities you belong to, which can you highlight in your response?
How have you impacted this community?
How has this community impacted you?

Now, in the next few sections, we’ll dive into the Georgetown supplemental essay examples, the Rice university essay examples, and the Williams supplemental essays examples. After each diversity essay sample, we’ll include a breakdown of why these are considered college essays that worked.

Georgetown Essay Examples

As a reminder, the Georgetown essay examples respond to this prompt:

As Georgetown is a diverse community, the Admissions Committee would like to know more about you in your own words. Please submit a brief essay, either personal or creative, which you feel best describes you.

Here is the excerpt of the diversity essay sample from our Georgetown essay examples:

Georgetown University Essay Example

The best thing I ever did was skip eight days of school in a row. Despite the protests of teachers over missed class time, I told them that the world is my classroom. The lessons I remember most are those that took place during my annual family vacation to coastal Maine. That rural world is the most authentic and incredible classroom where learning simply happens and becomes exponential.

Years ago, as I hunted through the rocks and seaweed for seaglass and mussels, I befriended a Maine local hauling her battered kayak on the shore. Though I didn’t realize it at the time, I had found a kindred spirit in Jeanne. Jeanne is a year-round resident who is more than the hard working, rugged Mainer that meets the eye; reserved and humble in nature, she is a wealth of knowledge and is self-taught through necessity. With thoughtful attention to detail, I engineered a primitive ramp made of driftwood and a pulley system to haul her kayak up the cliff. We diligently figured out complex problems and developed solutions through trial and error.

After running out of conventional materials, I recycled and reimagined items that had washed ashore. We expected to succeed, but were not afraid to fail. Working with Jeanne has been the best classroom in the world; without textbooks or technology, she has made a difference in my life. Whether building a basic irrigation system for her organic garden or installing solar panels to harness the sun’s energy, every project has shown me the value of taking action and making an impact. Each year brings a different project with new excitement and unique challenges. My resourcefulness, problem solving ability, and innovative thinking have advanced under her tutelage.

While exploring the rocky coast of Maine, I embrace every experience as an unparalleled educational opportunity that transcends any classroom environment. I discovered that firsthand experience and real-world application of science are my best teachers. In school, applications of complex calculations and abstract theories are sometimes obscured by grades and structure. In Maine, I expand my love of science and renourish my curious spirit. I am a highly independent, frugal, resilient Mainer living as a southern girl in NC.

Why this essay worked

This is one of the Georgetown supplemental essay examples that works, and here’s why. The author starts the essay with an interesting hook, which makes the reader want to learn more about this person and their perspective.

Throughout the essay, the author illustrates their intellectual curiosity. From befriending Jeanne and creating a pulley system to engineering other projects on the rocky coast of Maine, the author demonstrates how they welcome challenges and work to solve problems.

Further, the author mentions values that matter to them—taking action and making an impact. Both facets are also part of Georgetown’s core values . By making these connections in their essay, the author shows the admissions committee exactly how they would be a great fit for the Georgetown community.

Finally, the author uses their experience in Maine to showcase their love of science, which is likely the field they will study at Georgetown. Like this writer, you should try to include most important parts of your identity into your essay. This includes things like life experiences, passions, majors, extracurricular activities for college, and more.

Rice University Essay Examples

The Rice University essay examples are from this prompt:

The quality of Rice’s academic life and the Residential College System are heavily influenced by the unique life experiences and cultural traditions each student brings. What personal perspective would you contribute to life at Rice? (500-word limit)

Rice university essay example.

Like every applicant, I also have a story to share. A story that makes me who I am and consists of chapters about my life experiences and adventures. Having been born in a different country, my journey to America was one of the most difficult things I had ever experienced. Everything felt different. The atmosphere, the places, the food, and especially the people. Everywhere I looked, I saw something new. Although it was a bit overwhelming, one thing had not changed.

The caring nature of the people was still prevalent in everyday interactions. I was overwhelmed by how supportive and understanding people were of one another. Whether it is race, religion, or culture, everyone was accepted and appreciated. I knew that I could be whoever I wanted to be and that the only limitation was my imagination. Through hard work and persistence I put my all in everything that I did. I get this work ethic from my father since he is living proof that anything can be accomplished with continued determination. Listening to the childhood stories he told me, my dad would reminisce about how he was born in an impoverished area in a third world country during a turbulent and unpredictable time.

Even with a passion for learning, he had to work a laborious job in an attempt to help his parents make ends meet. He talked about how he would study under the street lights when the power went out at home. His parents wanted something better for him, as did he. Not living in America changed nothing about their work ethic. His parents continued to work hard daily, in an attempt to provide for their son. My dad worked and studied countless hours, paying his way through school with jobs and scholarships. His efforts paid off when he finally moved to America and opened his own business. None of it would have been possible without tremendous effort and dedication needed for a better life, values that are instilled within me as well, and this is the perspective that I wish to bring to Rice.

This diversity essay sample references the author’s unique life experiences and personal perspective, which makes it one example of college essays that worked. The author begins the essay by alluding to their unique story—they were born in a different country and then came to America. Instead of facing this change as a challenge, the author shows how this new experience helped them to feel comfortable with all kinds of people. They also highlight how their diversity was accepted and appreciated.

Additionally, the author incorporates information about their father’s story, which helps to frame their own values and where those values came from. The values that they chose to highlight also fall in line with the values of the Rice community.

Williams Supplemental Essay Examples

Let’s read the prompt that inspired so many strong Williams supplemental essays examples again:

Every first-year student at Williams lives in an Entry—a thoughtfully constructed microcosm of the student community that’s a defining part of the Williams experience. From the moment they arrive, students find themselves in what’s likely the most diverse collection of backgrounds, perspectives and interests they’ve ever encountered. What might differentiate you from the 19 other first-year students in an entry? What perspective(s) would you add to the conversation with your peers?

Williams college essay example.

Through the flow in my head

See you clad in red

But not just the clothes

It’s your whole being

Covering in this sickening blanket

Of heat and pain

Are you in agony, I wonder?

Is this the hell they told me about?

Have we been condemned?

Reduced to nothing but pain

At least we have each other

In our envelopes of crimson

I try in vain

“Take my hands” I shriek

“Let’s protect each other,

You and me, through this hell”

My body contorts

And deforms into nothingness

You remain the same

Clad in red

With faraway eyes

You, like a statue

Your eyes fixed somewhere else

You never see me

Just the red briefcase in your heart

We aren’t together

It’s always been me alone

While you stand there, aloof, with the briefcase in your heart.

I wrote this poem the day my prayer request for the Uighur Muslims got denied at school. At the time, I was stunned. I was taught to have empathy for those around me. Yet, that empathy disappears when told to extend it to someone different. I can’t comprehend this contradiction and I refuse to.

At Williams, I hope to become a Community Engagement Fellow at the Davis Center. I hope to use Williams’ support for social justice and advocacy to educate my fellow classmates on social issues around the world. Williams students are not just scholars but also leaders and changemakers. Together, we can strive to better the world through advocacy.

Human’s capability for love is endless. We just need to open our hearts to everyone.

It’s time to let the briefcase go and look at those around us with our real human eyes.

We see you now. Please forgive us.

As we mentioned above, the Williams acceptance rate is incredibly low. This makes the supplemental essay that much more important.

This diversity essay sample works because it is personal and memorable. The author chooses to start the essay off with a poem. Which, if done right, will immediately grab the reader’s attention.

Further, the author contextualizes the poem by explaining the circumstances surrounding it—they wrote it in response to a prayer request that was denied at school. In doing so, they also highlight their own values of empathy and embracing diversity.

Finally, the author ends their cultural diversity essay by describing what excites them about Williams. They also discuss how they see themselves interacting within the Williams community. This is a key piece of the essay, as it helps the reader understand how the author would be a good fit for Williams.

The examples provided within this essay also touch on issues that are important to the author, which provides a glimpse into the type of student the author would be on campus. Additionally, this response shows what potential extracurricular activities for college the author might be interested in pursuing while at Williams.

How to Write a Cultural Diversity Essay

You want your diversity essay to stand out from any other diversity essay sample. But how do you write a successful cultural diversity essay?

First, consider what pieces of your identity you want to highlight in your essay. Of course, race and ethnicity are important facets of diversity. However, there are plenty of other factors to consider.

As you brainstorm, think outside the box to figure out what aspects of your identity help make up who you are. Because identity and diversity fall on a spectrum, there is no right or wrong answer here.

Fit your ideas to the specific school

Once you’ve decided on what you want to represent in your cultural diversity essay, think about how that fits into the college of your choice. Use your cultural diversity essay to make connections to the school. If your college has specific values or programs that align with your identity, then include them in your cultural diversity essay!

Above all, you should write about something that is important to you. Your cultural diversity essay, gender diversity essay, or community essay will succeed if you are passionate about your topic and willing to get personal.

Additional Tips for Community & Cultural Diversity Essays

1. start early.

In order to create the strongest diversity essay possible, you’ll want to start early. Filling out college applications is already a time-consuming process. So, you can cut back on additional stress and anxiety by writing your cultural diversity essay as early as possible.

2. Brainstorm

Writing a cultural diversity essay or community essay is a personal process. To set yourself up for success, take time to brainstorm and reflect on your topic. Overall, you want your cultural diversity essay to be a good indication of who you are and what makes you a unique applicant.

3. Proofread

We can’t stress this final tip enough. Be sure to proofread your cultural diversity essay before you hit the submit button. Additionally, you can read your essay aloud to hear how it flows. You can also can ask someone you trust, like your college advisor or a teacher, to help proofread your essay as well.

Other CollegeAdvisor Essay Resources to Explore

Looking for additional resources on supplemental essays for the colleges we mentioned above? Do you need help with incorporating extracurricular activities for college into your essays or crafting a strong diversity essay sample? We’ve got you covered.

Our how to get into Georgetown guide covers additional tips on how to approach the supplemental diversity essay. If you’re wondering how to write about community in your essay, check out our campus community article for an insider’s perspective on Williams College.

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Essay on Multiculturalism

Multiculturalism Essay Examples

Type of paper: Essay

Topic: Multiculturalism , Diversity , Culture , Society , Policy , Integration , Politics , Sociology

Words: 2000

Published: 02/20/2023

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Multiculturalism refers to a multidimensional term that defines the different racial, ethnical, and diverse aspects of society. From a personal perspective, multiculturalism helps individuals to enhance their personality regarding shaping their cultural identities thereby enhancing their ability to interact with society. On a high societal level, multiculturalism is used to define the different strategies that groups utilize to organize their activities (Malik 22). From a national perspective, multiculturalism outlines the policies the government employs to prohibit and support the diversity of different cultural groups in society. At the national level, aspects related to globalization, assimilation, and cultural competencies are considered when formulating policies that define the political, economic, and social activities aimed at promoting cultural diversity (Reidel 320). In the contemporary society, geographical boundaries define nation-states and within each nation lies great levels of cultural identities. Countries such as the US, Canada, UK, and Australia comprises of immigrants from a different part of the world. As such, tendencies to develop feelings of allegiance, patriotism, or nationalism to their original states are more likely to arise. If properly addressed, multiculturalism breeds cultural diversity and unity among different cultures that make up a particular nation state (Malik 25). On the contrary, lack of proper policies aimed at addressing multiculturalism is more likely to lead to the development of a racially or ethnically divided society. For this reason, government or national policies should be developed to include the needs and requirements of a multi-cultured and diverse society. Countries such as the United States have undertaken significant efforts that recognize the issues and needs of a multicultural society. Multiculturalism policies at the national level provide an exceptional platform for the government to promote friendship, overcome prejudices, understanding, and enable individuals to develop respect (Reidel 321). Finally, yet importantly, multiculturalism promotes democracy within the society where every individual is at liberty and has equality regarding rights and dignity.

Identity formation in a multicultural society

Individuals in a multicultural society have many options when it comes to the issue of identity formation. Interactional and discursive processes are embedded within the society, and it helps people to fit in sociopolitical contexts. For instance, social upbringing and type of parenting determine the manner with which an individual views and sees himself. It gives a person as a chance to analyze the diversity of particular groups and as well, select the networks that one aspires to belong. The same case applies to the issue of religion because belonging to a particular religious organization makes him/her identify with that particular religion.

History of Multiculturalism

As the ideological stand of Marxism started diminishing, it was rapidly succeeded by multiculturalism. Several factors generated this change, both internal and external. Among the external factors that propagated this change were, new perceptions all over the world about race and color and the era that came after the end of World War II. It was during this times that people started looking acrimoniously at the issue of race superiority and what racial supporters like the Nazi could do if they were allowed to continue with the racial discrimination (Zarate 377). This made it difficult for countries undergoing multiculturalism to support and defend their white superiority policies. Internally, activists and human rights groups such as churches, and other radical groups against racial discrimination from the minority groups started becoming vocal and soon after gained momentum against the then government supported white policies (Zarate 379). By the early 1950s, the voices against white supremacy and the acceptance of other races in the society had grown substantially to incorporate academics, journalists, university students, communal leaders and social workers who by then were working in the migrant settling service. The immigration policies were also changed as more countries accepted and supported more immigrants into their country to in building and growing the economy by providing the much-needed workforce but only that this time it was on a basis of agreement and not slavery or forced labor as it was before. For instance, in Australia, the white supremacy policies were slowly being changed as the assimilation policies were being made during this time. Some of the actions that took place at this stage that radically enhanced multiculturalism in Australia was the dropping of the dictation test for individuals who were interested in taking up the citizenship of Australia. There were further ratifications to the migrant program to incorporate non-Europeans in the year 1958; it was also in the year 1966 that the migrant program on skilled personnel was also expanded to include people who were not from Europe. The radical steps taken by the Australian government at this time helped push forward Multiculturalism (Zarate 385). By the end of the 1960s and the early 1970s, the Australian government also came up with the Colombo plan that gave Asians students a chance to study in the country with the option of settling in the country. It is important to note that all these changes happened in a relatively short period and were, in essence, a dramatic turnaround in the attitudes and belief that pre-existed in the early half of the century with minimum disquiet from the general public. By the beginning of the 1990s, Multiculturalism was a policy that most of the political parties and personalities supported.

Multiculturalism: Segregation or integration?

For many years, multiculturalism has become the ideal model of integration. Countries have in various techniques adopted multiculturalism as a guide to the development of similar communities where racial, religious or cultural equality are historical characteristics, where diversity has turned out to be the modern social reality. Although multiculturalism has enjoyed prolonged and remarkable success in some societies, it has come under immense pressure over the past few years from a practical and conceptual perspective over the realization of an integrated society. Even though, multiculturalism cannot be considered entirely as an instrument for integration. It can also be as well regarded as a tool for segregation, bringing about one or other forms of segregation though the preservations of religious, cultural, ethnic, racial and linguistic diversity (Banting 798). For instance, a society that seeks to maintain cultural diversity can provoke multiculturalism by nurturing diversity and depressing homogenizing processes. In essence, multiculturalism does not necessarily result in social integration. Integration needs cultural, and other social values considered universal and around which a society that is integrated is oriented. Some cultures lack these common universals, and the promotion of multiculturalism is in conflict with the requirement of these universal values if integration is to be realized. Either the outcome is a society that is cohesive or not cohesive in which the minority groups are disadvantaged. While not demanding universal values that persist through time, integration needs not to be in agreement with values, even if the arrangements are incessantly negotiated as social forces change the society. Nonetheless, if social inclusion is realized through negotiation, the manner in which multiculturalism works for integration cannot be realized. Rather, the integration is attained through negotiations that need not appeal to any theory of multiculturalism. However, it can be argued that specific values should guide negotiation or social arrangements. In essence, there is a conceptual clatter between integration and multiculturalism. If integration needs a set of integrating standards, universals, shared values that serve as a guide to which integration should be considered and effected. These standards might always conflict with some values that some cultures subscribe. Multiculturalism upholds cultural diversity; hence is likely to result in conflict between the cultural values and principles that define the society in context and what amounts to integration (Finney and Simpson 17). Multiculturalism celebrates diversity, to promote other people, to respect cultural diversity. Thus, multicultural societies are less harmonious, less cohesive and less capable of prospering due to the internal conflicts; feeble systems of integration.

The Economic Benefits of multiculturalism

Multiculturalism is based on individual’s freedom to enjoy their culture as well as enjoy equal participation in all aspects of their society way of living. Multiculturalism bestows various benefits on people from different cultural backgrounds. Any viable defense for multiculturalism looks at the significant gains people of a particular culture or country derive from having a multicultural society. Economic arguments focus on the economic advantages derived from the different range of skills and knowledge promoted by multiculturalism. The knowledge and the skills promoted by multiculturalism provide a country with a competitive edge on the global scale by expanding the worldwide market for labor, goods, and services exchange. Different empirical and statistical studies suggest that ethnic and cultural diversity increases the productivity of labor and private capital. Some of the studies indicate that multiculturalism is beneficial in the preservation of useful economic links with the global Diaspora. Multiculturalism assists an organization in their pursuit of an external market for their exports. An organization with a culturally diverse group is more experienced in dealing with different ethnic and cultural behaviors that are critical for a company aiming to expand globally. Multiculturalism promotes innovation and creativity in an organization because a diverse society facilitates critical thinking and informed decision making. This is mainly possible due to the additional skills and knowledge migrant workers add to the skills and knowledge already existing among local employees. According to an empirical test conducted by Spolaore and Wacziarg, multiculturalism boosts economic growth through an open policy of immigration that introduces a diversity of individual skills that ultimately improve the national output (Spolaore n.d). The economic benefits derived from multiculturalism are highly evident in high-income economies like the United States and Australia. High-income country derives huge benefits from multiculturalism due to the existent of stable institutions and high levels of democracy that reduces the negative impacts of ethical conflicts. High-income economies foster a favorable environment for innovation, creativity, and entrepreneurship for a multicultural workforce. Some researchers claim that multiculturalism can foster a highly effective formation of economic and social capital. It can accelerate entrepreneurship, innovation, and business development by providing entrepreneurs with an additional network of financial and social capital in broader society. The case for economic gains has also been criticized by scholars, who claim that multiculturalism is associated with various costs commonly connected with ethnic diversity such as cultural conflicts and lack of literacy skills (Galinsky 743). These challenges are highly unlikely to be found in a society without cultural diversity and workers can understand each other and work cohesively. Immigrant workers also experience problems with contractual frameworks and the rule of law on foreign countries which in most cases reduces their productivity. Despite the challenges identified, an ethnically diverse society accompanied by retention of cultural links and promotion of core institutional values has a huge potential to foster economic benefits in any country.

Works Cited

Finney, Nissa, and Ludi Simpson. 'Sleepwalking to Segregation'?: Challenging Myths about Race and Migration. Bristol: Policy Press, 2009. Print.Banting, Keith G. "Is there a progressive's dilemma in Canada? Immigration, multiculturalism and the welfare state." Canadian Journal of Political Science 43.04 (2010): 797-820. Malik, Kenan. "The Failure of Multiculturalism." Foreign Affairs 94.2 (2015): 21-32. Reidel, Laura. "Beyond A State-Centric Perspective On Norm Change: A Multilevel Governance Analysis Of The Retreat From Multiculturalism." Global Governance 21.2 (2015): 317- 336 Galinsky, Adam D. "Maximizing the Gains and Minimizing the Pains of Diversity A Policy Perspective." Perspectives on Psychological Science 10.6 (2015): 742-748. Spolaore, Enrico, and Romain Wacziarg. "War and relatedness." Review of Economics and Statistics. 2009. Print Zarate, Geneviève. Handbook of multilingualism and multiculturalism. Archives contemporaines, pg377- 387, 2011.print

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Policy Success in Canada: Cases, Lessons, Challenges

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10 Multiculturalism Policy in Canada: Conflicted and Resilient

Published: July 2022
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The year 2021 represents the 50th anniversary of the adoption of multiculturalism in Canada. Clearly, multiculturalism policy has stood the test of time. However, more than sheer longevity is involved. In programmatic terms, multiculturalism has advanced the goals that animated its introduction in 1971. It has helped to change the terms of integration for immigrant communities, laying to rest ideas of assimilation, and creating space for minorities to maintain and celebrate aspects of their culture and traditions while participating in the mainstream of Canadian life. In addition, multiculturalism has been part of a broad state-led redefinition of national identity, helping to build a more inclusive sense of nationalism. Judged by these original goals, the multiculturalism program has met with considerable success. However, multiculturalism has limits. It has not eliminated racial inequality, and the commitment to diversity seems fragile at times, most recently in the case of Muslims. In addition, multiculturalism has been a conflicted political success. The policy is not embedded in a comprehensive political consensus, and potent political challenges have emerged in the name of social conservatism and Québec nationalism. Nonetheless, the policy has had sufficient political support to survive at the national level for half a century. In effect, multiculturalism is a case of conflicted political success and resilient program success. Moreover, judged by the experience of democratic countries generally, Canadian multiculturalism seems even more successful. Perhaps most importantly, the policy has arguably helped to forestall the type of anti-immigrant backlash we have seen elsewhere.

Introduction

The year 2021 represented the 50th anniversary of the adoption of multiculturalism in Canada. Clearly, multiculturalism policy has stood the test of time. However, more than sheer longevity testifies to its success. In programmatic terms, the multiculturalism approach has clearly advanced the goals that animated its introduction in 1971. The immediate goal was to change the terms of integration for immigrants, laying to rest ideas of assimilation and creating space for minorities to celebrate aspects of their traditional culture and customs while participating in the mainstream of life in the country. Inherent in this immediate goal, however, was a larger, long-term mission. Multiculturalism was also part of a broad state-led redefinition of national identity, an effort to diversify the historic conception of the country as a British/French society, and to build a more inclusive nationalism reflective of Canada’s cultural complexity.

As we shall see, multiculturalism has met with considerable success in advancing these goals. It has changed the terms of integration for immigrants, which has helped strengthen their sense of attachment to the country, their embrace of a Canadian identity, and their engagement in political life. In terms of its implicit symbolic goal, the idea of multiculturalism has become deeply embedded in Canadian culture, at least in English-speaking Canada, and has contributed to a more inclusive form of Canadian national identity. Admittedly, multiculturalism has not eliminated racial discrimination in Canada, and the commitment to diversity seems fragile at times, most recently in the case of Muslims. Nonetheless, judged against the experience of other democratic countries generally, multiculturalism policies have succeeded in enhancing the attachment of immigrants to Canada and contributed to a more inclusive sense of national identity. More speculatively, multiculturalism has arguably helped forestall the type of anti-immigrant backlash we have seen elsewhere.

Multiculturalism has had sufficient political support to survive and adapt to change for over half a century. Unlike some European countries, Canada has never rejected the multicultural approach to diversity. However, multiculturalism is not embedded in a deep and comprehensive political consensus. Political challenges have emerged from several directions, the most potent of which have been rooted in social conservatism and Québec nationalism. The multicultural approach has largely survived social conservatism at the national level, but Québec nationalism proved potent. Canadian multiculturalism now lives in a secondary position in diversity management in that province.

To advance this assessment, this chapter proceeds in four sections. We first specify more clearly the nature of multiculturalism policies as they are understood in Canada. We then examine the political drivers and the policy process, which have been deeply entwined. Next, we assess the programmatic impact of multiculturalism policies, in terms of both immigrant integration and the wider terrain of Canadian culture and identity. The final section pulls the threads of the argument together.

Multiculturalism Policy: What is it and what is it not

How should states respond to growing ethno-racial and religious diversity? During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries states engaged in nation-building projects, seeking to reinforce their status in the international political order by nurturing a robust nationalism among their populations ( Weber, 1976 ; Hobsbawm, 1992 ). This process of nation-building left little room for minorities. In their efforts to build a common culture and identity, states sought to assimilate or marginalize internal ethnic minorities, and were hostile to immigration flows that would diversify their populations. Starting in the 1960s, however, we see a shift towards a more accommodating approach to state-minority relations. The new approach was part of a broader liberalization of the normative order in the West. World War II was a watershed in attitudes towards ethnicity, race, and human rights, as manifested in decolonization, the American civil rights movement, and similar movements elsewhere. This new normative order underpinned the widespread adoption of anti-discrimination instruments to protect the individual rights of citizens. It also gave life in many countries to a multicultural approach to diversity, including a more accommodating approach to immigrants ( Triadafilopoulos, 2012 ).

Historically, Canada, like many states, had an assimilationist approach to immigration. Immigrants were encouraged and expected to assimilate to the mainstream culture, with the hope that they would become indistinguishable from the native-born population over time. Indeed, groups that were seen as incapable of this sort of cultural assimilation (e.g. Asians, Africans) were prohibited from immigrating to Canada. This assimilationist approach was slowly discredited in the post-war period, and officially repudiated in the late 1960s and early 1970s ( Kelly and Trebilcock, 2010 ). The first step was the implementation of race-neutral admissions criteria in immigration policy in 1967, after which immigrants increasingly came from non-European and non-Christian societies. The second step was the adoption of a more multicultural conception of integration, one that expects that many members of immigrant communities will wish to visibly express their ethnic identity, and that accepts an obligation on the part of public institutions to accommodate their distinctiveness. This multicultural accommodation is afforded not only to recent immigrants, but to all members of minorities that owe their presence in the country to immigration, including those born in Canada.

The concept of multiculturalism is widely debated, and there is no universally accepted definition of the concept. For our purposes here, the defining feature of multiculturalism policies is that they go beyond the protection of the basic civil and political rights guaranteed to all individuals in a liberal-democratic state, to also extend some level of recognition, accommodation, and support for minorities to express their distinct identities and practices. Multiculturalism, therefore, is not just about ensuring the non-discriminatory application of laws in a diverse context, but about changing the laws and regulations themselves to accommodate the distinctive needs and aspirations of minorities.

Conceptually, multiculturalism policies for immigrants have three basic purposes: to recognize, accommodate, and support cultural diversity ( Banting and Kymlicka, 2006 ). Recognition implies that the state acknowledges immigrant minorities as legitimate components of the wider population, that the state ‘sees’ them as they see themselves and accepts them as part of ‘us’. Accommodation involves the adjustment of existing laws and policies to facilitate the participation of immigrants in economic, social, and political life. Inevitably, immigrants make the biggest adjustments during the integration process, but the idea of accommodation implies that the host society also makes adjustments in its institutions to facilitate their inclusion. Finally, support involves the provision of concrete services or regulatory changes that enable immigrant groups to preserve their distinctiveness.

These three purposes imply a whole-of-government approach. Too often, Canadians assume that federal multiculturalism policy is the small program of grants provided to immigrant groups. In fact, it is much broader. For example:

Recognition can be seen in section 27 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which directs that the rights guaranteed by the Charter are to be ‘interpreted in a manner consistent with the preservation and enhancement of the multicultural heritage of Canadians.’ Recognition can be seen at work in the educational curricula of schools that incorporate the history and contributions of immigrants to Canada. Recognition is also entrenched in the Broadcasting Act, which requires that broadcasters ‘reflect the multicultural and multiracial nature of Canada’. Minorities should see themselves, and be seen on television screens.

Accommodation involves changes in laws and regulations, such as acceptance of dual citizenship and exemptions from official dress codes. Such accommodations have always been the most controversial part of multicultural strategies, and have represented flashpoints in the last decade.

Support to assist immigrant minorities to preserve their distinctive cultures can be seen in the funding of ethnic organizations and associations, public funding to support mother-tongue instruction, or the inclusion of racialized immigrant minorities in employment equity programs to assist disadvantaged minorities.

Historically, Canada was a leader among countries in adopting such policies and initiatives, as can be seen with the help of the cross-national Multiculturalism Policy Index. This Index ranks the strength of multiculturalism policies across 21 democratic countries over the four decades between 1980 and 2020 (Appendix 1 provides details of the construction of the Index. For a fuller discussion, see Banting and Kymlicka, 2013 ).

Table 10.1 presents the ranking for the full set of countries. Two conclusions stand out. First, Canada, along with Australia, was an early leader in the adoption of a multicultural approach to immigrant diversity. Second, a range of other countries increasingly adopted a measure of multiculturalism policies, which suggests a process of emulation across countries.

Political and Process Assessment: A Contested Project

The political drivers of multiculturalism policy, and the policy process through which it evolved, have been deeply entwined from the outset. In the early years, a multi-party political consensus protected the program, allowing it to evolve through a relatively deliberative process. In the 1990s and 2000s, however, the multi-party consensus weakened. Since then, policy development has been driven increasingly by party ideology and partisan electoral objectives, with very different implications for the policy process. Over time the politics of the policy has become more conflicted ( McConnell, 2010 ).

At its origins, multiculturalism was an unanticipated by-product of efforts to accommodate the rise of Québec nationalism during the 1960s. When a royal commission recommended a policy of bilingualism and biculturalism, privileging people of British and French heritage, well-established immigrant minorities, including Ukrainians, Portuguese, Italians, and others, pushed back against a dualist definition of the country that did not include them. The result was the policy of multiculturalism within a bilingual framework, which was announced in 1971, embedded in the constitution in 1982, codified in legislation in 1988, and confirmed after a major review in 1997. Although the multiculturalism policy was adopted in response to pressure from groups who were largely European and Christian (with the addition of the Jewish community), it became a policy template that could be rolled forward to incorporate new immigrants who were racially and religiously more distinct from traditional Canada.

The initial policy was announced in 1971 by a Liberal prime minister, Pierre Elliot Trudeau. The integrationist intent of the initiative was clear in the four goals he outlined:

to ‘assist all Canadian cultural groups that have demonstrated a desire and effort to continue to develop a capacity to grow and contribute to Canada’;

to ‘assist members of all cultural groups to overcome cultural barriers to full participation in Canadian society’;

to ‘promote creative encounters and interchange amongst all Canadian cultural groups in the interest of national unity’;

to ‘assist immigrants to acquire at least one of Canada’s official languages in order to become full participants in Canadian society’. ( Trudeau 1971 ).

The traditional brokerage style of Canadian political parties provided considerable protection for both immigration and diversity in the late stages of the twentieth century. Debates over immigration proceeded within ‘an unprecedented political and public consensus’ on a generally liberal policy, a pattern highlighted by the near-unanimous passage of the 1976 Immigration Act ( Kelley and Trebilcock, 2010 , 379). This consensus largely extended to multiculturalism as well. It was the Progressive Conservative government led by Brian Mulroney that embedded multiculturalism in legislation in 1988. Political debates in this period tended to focus on program details rather than fundamentals.

In this politically protected context, the policy process engaged a relatively small sector, operating through interactions among bureaucratic officials and leaders of ethnic organizations, with external consultants providing occasional reviews and ministers providing intermittent direction ( Pal, 1993 ). This executive-dominated system facilitated a deliberative and consultative process and an evolutionary approach to policy change. Within a year of the announcement of the program in 1971, the Multiculturalism unit had rolled out nine programs, the most important of which was the grants program. Reviews and adjustments occurred in 1975 and 1981, without significant political conflict.

In these early days, the emphasis in the grants program was on cultural celebration and retention. However, tensions soon emerged between established ethnic organizations and groups representing new arrivals from Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean, who ‘were less interested in celebrating their cultures than in battling discrimination and racism’ ( Pal, 1993 , 137). Over time, the focus of the program shifted from cultural retention to equality, tolerance, and antiracism, an orientation codified when the Conservatives introduced the Canadian Multiculturalism Act the following year. However, this focus was soon short-circuited. During the 1990s and 2000s, a crisis in Québec-Canada relations and the prospect of a second Québec referendum on independence shifted priorities in the multiculturalism program from anti-racism and accommodation towards a more explicit focus on integration (Griffith, 2103; Abu-Laban and Gabriel, 2002 ).

Multiparty consensus clearly facilitated a deliberative policy process. However, that process also tended to insulate the program from growing latent unease. During the 1990s, criticisms of multiculturalism emerged in intellectual circles, media commentary, and parliamentary debates ( Ryan, 2010 ). More importantly, two serious political challenges, political challenges moved to centre stage, driven by social conservatism and Québec nationalism.

Challenges (I): Social Conservatism

Anxieties about multiculturalism burst into the political domain in the election of 1993, which saw the breakthrough of the populist Reform Party. The Reform Party articulated a potent social conservatism and a highly individualist approach to diversity. The party opposed ‘special’ status for Québec, spending on Aboriginal peoples, gender equality, multiculturalism and affirmative action, all of which they saw as catering to ‘special interests’ ( Harrison, 1995 ). Reform activists occasionally criticized the levels of non-white immigration that had emerged in the previous two decades, and in 1990 the party officially criticized immigration policy for changing the ethnic makeup of Canada ( Laycock, 2012 , 90). Following their electoral breakthrough, party leaders tried to tone down anti-immigrant views in official party positions ( Flanagan, 1995 , 197–198). However, the party did not hold back on multiculturalism. The Reform Party’s 1996–97 Blue Book of policies stated that the party ‘opposes the current concept of multiculturalism and hyphenated Canadianism pursued by the Government of Canada. We would end funding of the multicultural program and support the abolition of the Department of Multiculturalism’ (as quoted in Griffiths, 2013 , 8–9). Their 1997 election manifesto was less comprehensive, but pledged to lead a campaign to repeal the multicultural section of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which is part of the constitution of the country ( Reform Party, 1997 ).

Although the Reform Party did not last, its views on immigration and diversity became one stream of opinion that flowed into the restructured Conservative Party in the early 2000s ( Farney, 2012 ; Thomas and Sabin, 2019 ; Wilkins-Laflamme and Reimer, 2019 ). The result was a complicated balancing act. When the Conservatives came to power in 2006, they adopted a multi-track approach. For economic reasons, the government continued to support existing levels of immigration. However, in the domain of multiculturalism and citizenship, the government struggled with two conflicting imperatives: to build long-term electoral support among immigrant groups, and to appeal to social conservatives among its electoral base. This tension between these imperatives has been dubbed the ‘populists’ dilemma’ in Canada ( Marwah et al., 2013 ).

The arrival of a Conservative government at the federal level disrupted the policy process. The new government moved the multiculturalism program from the Department of Canadian Heritage to the department responsible for immigration, implicitly indicating that multiculturalism was about newcomers and not the multiple generations within minority groups, let alone the attitudes of all Canadians. The Conservatives also reduced funding for the grants program. More importantly, ideology became the primary driver of policy direction, and the role of public servants narrowed to issues of implementation, rather than broad policy ( Griffith, 2013 ). The new government distrusted research-based approaches and relied on opinion polls and personal contacts with their supporters. As a result, the principal connection with immigrant groups shifted from bureaucratic to political channels. The government’s determination to build electoral support among immigrant voters produced energetic ministerial engagement with immigrant groups across the country, and grants represented a useful political tool to realize this goal. In the cautious words of a former official, the program was reshaped in part to find ‘ways to deliver grants and contributions funding that met Ministerial requirements’ ( Griffith, 2013 , 18; see also Tolley, 2017 ).

Policy content also shifted. The Harper government never explicitly attacked multiculturalism, relying on a more stealthy strategy to shift the balance from accommodation to integration, and to send symbolic reassurance to social conservatives ( Abu-Laban, 2014 ; Carlaw, 2021 ). Symbolically, their 2009 revisions to the citizenship guide, given to immigrants preparing for the citizenship tests, sought to rejuvenate an earlier conception of Canada by downplaying multiculturalism in favour of Canada’s military history and its legacy of British institutions and traditions ( Citizenship and Immigration Canada, 2009 ). The Conservatives also questioned the loyalty of dual citizens, and toughened standards for the citizenship test, driving down the success rate, especially among immigrants with low family income, low proficiency in official languages, and low educational levels ( Hou and Picot, 2020 ). In addition, the Conservatives repeatedly targeted Muslims, the least popular minority in the country ( Triadafilopoulos and Rasheed, 2020 ). They symbolically denounced ‘barbaric cultural practices’ in the revised citizenship guide and countless ministerial speeches, and, in 2011, Jason Kenney, the then minister for citizenship, immigration, and multiculturalism, announced that those wishing to become Canadian citizens would have to uncover their face during the citizenship oath. In 2015, the government legislated on a range of its complaints in its Zero Tolerance for Barbaric Cultural Practices Act.

This complicated juggling act of appealing simultaneously to immigrant voters and to social conservatives seemed to work during the election of 2011 ( Bricker and Ibbitson, 2013 ; Kwak, 2019 ). However, the strategy fell apart during the election campaign of 2015. The pre-campaign period had been marked by the Syrian refugee crisis, and the Conservative government adopted a historically cautious policy of admitting only 10,000 refugees. This position imploded politically early in the election campaign when pictures of the lifeless body of three-year-old Alan Kurdi, washed up on a Turkish beach, flashed around the world. Conservatives pivoted quickly to an anti-Muslim trope, campaigning hard on a promise to protect Canadian values against the alleged threat posed by Muslim women wearing the niqab. In the middle of the campaign, the courts struck down their ban on the niqab during citizenship ceremonies. Rather than conceding, the Conservatives doubled-down, appealing the judgment to the Supreme Court, promising a ‘barbaric cultural practices’ tipline on which Canadians were encouraged to inform on their neighbours, and suggesting a ban on the niqab not only during the oath of citizenship but also in the civil service. These measures proved a step too far ( Kymlicka, 2021 ). Support for the Conservatives dropped in the last weeks of the campaign, and the Liberals won the election and immediately raised the target intake of Syrian refugees, with the new prime minister personally handing out winter coats to the first arrivals at the airport. Later, the former Conservative immigration minister admitted that their emphasis on ‘barbaric cultural practices’ made many immigrants, including non-Muslims, nervous. ‘It’s why we lost … we allowed ourselves to be portrayed in the last election as unwelcoming. That was a huge mistake.’ ( CTV News, 2016 ).

In time, the Liberal government also reversed a number of policies. They accepted the court’s decision on the niqab and amended the Canadian Citizenship Act to make it easier to gain citizenship and to eliminate revocation provisions introduced by the Conservatives. They modified the barbaric practices legislation, established several anti-racism initiatives, and launched a revision of the citizenship guide. In addition, they returned the multiculturalism program to the Department of Canadian Heritage and reversed the decline in funding. The most dramatic imprint of social conservatism was thus diluted. Nonetheless, while sympathetic to multiculturalism, the Liberal government also moved cautiously in the politicized environment, and it is notable that the revised citizenship guide did not emerge before the 2019 election. Indeed, it still had not appeared at the time of the 2021 election.

Challenges (II): Québec Nationalism

Meanwhile, Québec was developing its own approach to diversity, known as interculturalism, with two features that set it apart from the federal approach. First, while federal multiculturalism promotes the choice of two official languages, English and French, the Québec model defines French as the language of public life in the province. Beginning in the 1990s, Québec also developed a distinct approach to diversity, announced in a policy document entitled Let’s Build Québec Together: Policy Statement on Integration and Immigration ( Quebec, 1990 ). While federal multiculturalism assumes integration into either the English- or French-speaking language communities, it was seen as otherwise implying the equal recognition of all cultures, negating the centrality of any particular culture. In contrast, Québec’s intercultural approach defines the majority culture in the province as the central hub towards whichminority cultures are expected to move ( Gagnon and Iacovino, 2007 ; Labelle and Rocher, 2009 ).

In the early years, there was considerable debate about whether federal multiculturalism and Québec interculturalism actually differed much on the ground. In the 2000s, however, the differences were magnified by the growing salience of religion. Commentators in Québec increasingly define secularism as a central feature of Québec culture, and many Québecers fear that this commitment to laicité is undermined by the greater religiosity of some minorities, especially the Muslim and Sikh communities. The result has been a series of increasingly intense controversies around the wearing of religious symbols. In an attempt to calm the waters, the Liberal government of Jean Charest appointed a consultative commission led by two senior scholars of diversity, Gérard Bouchard and Charles Taylor. Their report failed to resolve the tensions ( Bouchard and Taylor, 2008 ). In 2013, a Parti Québécois government proposed a Québec Charter of Values that would restrict wearing all religious symbols in the public space, but the government was defeated in an election before their proposal passed. In 2017, a Liberal government passed milder legislation, which was quickly challenged in the courts. Finally, in 2019, the government of the Coalition Avenir Quebec succeeded in passing the Loi sur la laïcité de l’État , which prevents new employees in the public sector from wearing religious symbols, and requires members of the public to uncover their face when receiving public services. To preempt legal challenges, the government took the dramatic step of invoking the notwithstanding clause, which shields the legislation from review under the Charter of Rights for five years.

As a result, two diversity models prevail in the province of Québec, reflecting two distinct nation-building projects. The federal multicultural approach continues to apply in federal areas of jurisdiction in Québec with respect to the granting of citizenship and the conduct of citizenship ceremonies. However, Québec’s less accommodating model dominates most of the public space within which Québecers live.

Hence the assessment of multiculturalism as a conflicted political project. It has stood the test of time for half a century and has survived challenges from social conservatism that have proved potent elsewhere. But multiculturalism has had to concede ground to a different approach in Québec, home to one-quarter of the Canadian population. Although the implementation of Québec’s legislation limiting religious dress has resulted in a reduction in the overall ranking of Canada in the Multiculturalism Policy Index from 7.5 out of 8 in 2010 to 7 out of 8 in 2020, it is important not to overstate the impact of this one provincial dimension on an overall assessment of the multicultural experience. Other dimensions continue to apply across the country and, as Table 10.1 confirms, Canada remains one of the most multiculturalist members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

Programmatic Assessment: Resilient Success

In assessing the programmatic success of multiculturalism, we focus on its explicit and implicit goals: adjusting the terms of immigrant integration, and building a more inclusive conception of Canadian culture and identity. The assessment draws primarily on evidence about the impact of Canadian programs. However, given the problems inherent in drawing inferences about causality from a single case, the discussion also draws on studies that compare the experience of countries that adopted multicultural strategies with countries that rejected the approach.

Immigrant Integration

As we have seen, multiculturalism policies are designed to change the terms of integration, to enable immigrant minorities to participate in Canadian life without having to fully surrender their own culture. The underlying assumption has been that easing the cultural costs of integration will encourage immigrant minorities to embrace the country more fully. Some critics have worried that such policies have the opposite effect of encouraging social segmentation, with minorities living separately in parallel societies. The evidence, however, is consistent with the view that multiculturalism policies enhance the integration of immigrants in political and social life.

We begin with immigrant identity. Immigrants tend to retain their ethnic identity in virtually all countries, but the extent to which they also embrace the national identity of their host society varies. In the Canadian case, immigrants are comfortable with multiple identities and embrace a Canadian identity, with their levels of commitment to Canada on some measures higher than those of the population as a whole ( Soroka et al., 2007 ). Recently, Bilodeau and his colleagues (2019) found that the sense of belonging among first-generation immigrants is strong. They conclude that ‘immigrants’ perception of their relationship with Canada appears overwhelmingly positive and is thus consistent with the claim that Canada represents a success story when it comes to immigrant inclusion’ ( Bilodeau, 2019 , 5; see also Hou et al., 2016 , and White et al., 2015 ).

Feelings of acceptance and attachment enhance political engagement. The rate at which immigrants become citizens remains high by international standards. In her classic study of naturalization in Canada, Bloemraad argued that multiculturalism policies in Canada help immigrants to feel accepted, increasing their interest in formally joining the country’s national community ( Bloemraad, 2006 ). Bilodeau and his colleagues also find that feelings of attachment and acceptance are strongly related to political participation, including interest in politics, turning out to vote, and confidence in legislative institutions ( Bilodeau et al., 2019 ). Immigrant voter turnout is similar to the native born population, although turnout among racial minority immigrants is lower ( Gidengil and Roy, 2016 ), a point to which we return in the next section.

Many factors undoubtedly shape these patterns, and it is difficult to disentangle the distinct role of multiculturalism policies. However, comparative analysis provides supplementary support. An obvious comparison is between Québec and the rest of Canada, since the two parts of the country have different approaches to diversity. A study based on data from the early 2000s found a lower sense of belonging among racial-minority immigrants in Québec than elsewhere in the country, especially among the second generation ( Banting and Soroka, 2012 ). Additional evidence comes from a recent study examining the impact of major changes in integration policies in Québec, the proposed Québec Charter of Values in 2014, and the banning of religious dress in 2019. These policy shifts, and the divisive politics surrounding them, further weakened immigrants’ sense of attachment to Québec generally, but this effect was especially prevalent among Muslims ( Bilodeau and Turgeon, 2021 ).

Cross-national comparative analysis also finds that immigrant identification with the host country is stronger in countries that have adopted multiculturalism policies than in countries that have shunned the approach ( Wright and Bloemraad, 2012 ; Citrin et al., 2012 ). Social psychologists have long argued that there is no automatic trade-off between attachment to minority and majority identities, and that the benefits of hyphenated or nested identities are easier to achieve in multicultural settings ( Berry, 2005 ; Nguyen and Benet-Martinez, 2013 ; Guimond et al., 2014 ). Cross-national evidence on political participation points in the same direction. There is a strong positive relationship across democratic societies between multiculturalism policies and immigrant acquisition of citizenship ( Liebig and Von Haaren, 2011 , 27–28).

This relationship may reflect easier access to citizenship in countries that have also adopted strong multicultural policies, but it also likely reflects greater symbolic support for immigrants becoming citizens in more multicultural states. In addition, an early study by Koopmans and colleagues concluded that immigrants in more multicultural settings are more likely to engage in nonviolent activities, and their activism focuses more on the host country than the country of origin ( Koopmans et al., 2005 , 128, 137). Finally, the representation of immigrants and ethnic minorities in national legislatures is higher in multicultural countries. In a detailed analysis, Alba and Foner conclude:

In Britain, Canada and the United States, state models of multiculturalism or ethnic pluralism have reinforced the effects of the electoral, political and party systems in providing scope for ethnic minority candidates…. In contrast, the ways in which France and Germany have defined immigrants and their integration into the state have hindered ethnic minorities’ ability to gain electoral office. ( Alba and Foner, 2015 , 165).

Nonetheless, there are limits to multiculturalism policies. The approach has clearly not eliminated racial economic inequality in Canada. Although there are considerable differences across racial minorities, poverty levels among some racialized communities are much higher than across the population as a whole. Among Blacks, Arabs, and West Asian communities in particular, high poverty rates persist into the second and even the third-plus generations ( Banting and Thompson, 2021 ). There is also evidence that job applicants with foreign-sounding names face discrimination in the labour market ( Oreopoulos, 2011 ). Defenders of multiculturalism might reply that, as in the case of political representation, multiculturalism policies reduce the levels of discrimination that would otherwise prevail. Support for this view comes from a comparative study of the ‘ethnic penalties’ in the labour market faced by second-generation racial-minority individuals, that is, people who were born and educated in the country and speak the local language. Although racialized minorities in all of the countries included in the study earn less than one would expect given their levels of education, the penalties were considerably smaller in Canada; indeed, the authors conclude that in comparison with ten major democratic countries, racial minority groups tend to be most successful in Canada ( Heath, 2007 , 658). While a variety of factors are undoubtedly responsible for this outcome, the multiculturalist context is undoubtedly a part of the mix.

Defenders of multiculturalism might further argue that expecting multiculturalism to fully offset racial economic inequality inflates the original promise of multiculturalism, which was about the equality of cultures more than equality of incomes. The policy tools relevant to economic inequality, including income redistribution and labour market regulation, have seldom been defined as central to the multicultural mandate. However, critical race theorists worry that by focusing attention on cultural recognition, multiculturalism serves to reassure Canadians that their country has a progressive response to diversity, deflecting attention from the realities of racial discrimination and racial economic inequality ( Thobani, 2007 ; Galabuzi, 2006 ; Bannerji, 2000 ).

The debate over the impact of multiculturalism on racial inequality echoes broader debates about ‘recognition versus redistribution’, in which the central question has been whether focusing on cultural recognition deflects concern for material inequality ( Fraser, 1995 ). One form of this debate has asked whether multiculturalism undercuts support for redistribution and weakens the coalitions sustaining the welfare state. However, the accumulated cross-national empirical evidence is now clear that countries that adopted multiculturalism policies have not had greater difficulty in sustaining redistribution. Indeed, if anything, the relationship between multiculturalism and support for redistribution is positive (for a summary of the recent evidence, see Banting et al., 2022 ). We should, therefore, not assume too quickly that Canada’s policies of multicultural recognition have weakened efforts to reduce racial inequality. The politics of inequality are not necessarily zero-sum, and societies can tackle different forms of inequality at the same time.

In the end, the failure to eradicate racial inequality does point to the limits of multiculturalism. Nonetheless, when judged against its explicit goals, multiculturalism policies have been a comparative success. They have adjusted the terms of integration, helping immigrant minorities to retain elements of their culture and traditions while joining the social and political mainstream. Measured against experience in other countries on this dimension, the Canadian record suggests that multiculturalism represents part of a successful response to diversity.

Canadian Attitudes and Culture

Inherent in the multicultural goal of changing the terms of integration for immigrant minorities has been the implicit goal of redefining Canadian identity ( Uberoi, 2008 ). Multicultural norms were expected to help to ‘normalize’ diversity, especially for younger generations, slowly reshaping embedded collective memories ( Harell, 2009 ; also Esses et al., 2006 ).

For Canadians, especially younger Canadians, multiculturalism has become a defining feature of their national identity. As Figure 10.1 indicates, almost all Canadians consider multiculturalism to be very important or somewhat important to Canadian national identity. Of course, it is unclear how Canadians conceive of multiculturalism when answering such questions, and some respondents may simply be celebrating the ethnic diversity of the population. However, the import seems to go further. Support for multiculturalism reflects a culture of acceptance of diversity, which in turn undoubtedly contributes to the sense of acceptance registered by immigrants that we saw earlier.

How Important Is Multiculturalism to Canadian Identity?

This interpretation finds support in survey evidence about public attitudes towards the different types of multiculturalism policies. Using the terms of our earlier grouping of multiculturalism policies, Canadians seem strongly committed to policies that recognize diversity as a legitimate feature of Canadian life, as Table 10.2 suggests. In contrast, Table 10.3 suggests Canadians are less enthusiastic about changing policies or providing additional services to accommodate difference. The tables also highlight the differences between respondents in Québec compared to the rest of the country (ROC), especially on accommodation issues, although it should be noted that this survey was conducted in 2014 during an intense debate over the proposed Québec Charter of Values, which may have influenced responses in Québec.

The limits of multiculturalism are also evident in other ways. Despite the public’s embrace of multiculturalism as a symbol, racial discrimination persists. Since the early 2000s, comprehensive evidence has been available on immigrants’ sense of discrimination: 35 per cent of racialized minorities reported having experienced discrimination or unfair treatment, with Blacks, South Asians, and Chinese having the highest rates ( Statistics Canada, 2003 , 18–19; also Reitz and Banerjee, 2007 ). In the contemporary period, anti-Muslim sentiments have flourished, not just in Québec; data from 2014 found that 20 per cent of Muslims had experienced discrimination during that year ( Wilkins-Laflamme, 2018 ). The contradiction between broad public support for multiculturalism and considerable Islamophobia defies easy explanation ( Donnelly 2021 ). Muslims have emerged as the least-favoured religious minority in the country, and Islam has been framed internationally as an illiberal, intolerant, and at times, a violent religion. Evidence to the contrary about Muslims in Canada—a 2016 Environics Institute survey of Canadian Muslims revealed their relatively liberal outlook ( Environics, 2016 )—does not break through such perceptions. As discourse during the 2015 election campaign demonstrated, opposition to Islam is justified as protecting a tolerant, liberal-democratic order, leading Triadafilopoulos and Rasheed to speculate that ‘in a peculiar way,… support for multiculturalism may inform opposition to Islam’ (2020, 1).

Despite the limits to Canadians’ embrace of multiculturalism, the ethos remains important. Multiculturalism has helped sustain public support for one of the largest immigration programs among democratic countries. In the words of one analyst, ‘popular multiculturalism creates a positive political environment for the development of Canada’s expansionist immigration policy and helps immigrants integrate into the economy and society’ ( Reitz, 2014 , 108; see also Gonzalez-Barrera and Connor, 2019 ). Moreover, Canadian support for immigration has remained remarkably stable throughout the turmoil of the 2000s. Canada is not immune to the tensions that exist in other countries, and about 30 per cent of Canadians worry that immigrants do not embrace Canadian values. Moreover, in recent years attitudes have become more polarized between supporters of the Conservative Party and supporters of the Liberal and New Democratic parties ( Banting and Soroka, 2020 ). Nonetheless, the stability in general support for immigration is impressive, and the pervasive multicultural identity helps sustain this distinctive feature of Canada.

The implications likely go further. Canada also stands out as a country whose politics have not been transformed by anti-immigrant backlash and authoritarian anti-system politics. Certainly, there are populist strains in Canadian politics. A radical-right party, the People’s Party of Canada, participated in the 2019 and 2021 federal elections; and in the winter of 2022 truckers’ protest conveys pararalyzed the capital city for close to a month and blocked several border crossings. Nonetheless, Canadian popualism has a distinctive hue. Analysts of populist backlash elsewhere have debated the extent to which such reactions are driven by economic factors, such as growing precarity and inequality, or cultural factors such as immigration and diversity. The consensus seems to be that both are involved, but that cultural drivers predominate ( Norris and Inglehart, 2019 ; Bonikowski, 2017 ; Sides et al., 2018 ). Along with other democratic countries, Canada has experienced a growth of inequality and precarious employment. However, potential anti-system populists cannot also tap into a deep public hostility to immigration and are thereby deprived of a major ingredient that has fuelled backlash elsewhere. As a result, recent populist mobilization has centred on anti-government attitudes and opposition to public health manadates. The People’s Party of Canada received a derisory 1.6 per cent of the vote in 2019 when it ran on an anti-immgrant platform; but it captured almost 5 percent of the vote in 2021 when it ran on opposition to public health mandates. Similarly, despite xenophobic tinges to the trucker conveys, it was opposition to public health mandates, not immigration, that fueled the protest. Undoubtedly, other factors are important in explaining the limited electoral impact of populist backlash, including the electoral system, which punishes small protest parties whose support is evenly distributed across the country ( Triadafilopoulos and Taylor, 2021 ). Nevertheless, multiculturalism undoubtedly helps reduce the impact of anti-immigrant populism in Canada.

Conclusions

The strongest evidence of the success of Canadian multiculturalism lies in a programmatic assessment. The launch of the multiculturalism strategy was a highly ambitious initiative. Governments know how to transfer income and deliver services. By contrast, efforts to transform cultures, identities, and the symbolic ordering of a society represent sensitive and potentially dangerous political terrain. Yet the evidence suggests that multiculturalism policies have succeeded in their two major goals: facilitating the social and political integration of ethnic and racial minorities and contributing to a more inclusive sense of Canadian identity and culture.

Multiculturalism has programmatic limits. It may have reduced levels of racial inequality in political and economic life, but it has not eliminated racism’s corrosive effects. Nonetheless, the benefits of multiculturalism should not be discounted. Given the demographic realities of Canada, some form of multicultural identity would seem to be the only basis on which a reasonably integrated and peaceful society could persist on the northern half of the North American continent. Yet the emergence of such an identity was not inevitable. Experience elsewhere suggests that not all countries have transitioned as successfully to an identity consistent with contemporary diversity.

Any assessment of the policy process through which multiculturalism policies are shaped must be more qualified. In the early decades, multiculturalism policies evolved in a deliberative process of bureaucratic-group relations, with occasional political interventions. That process was able to adapt the program to successive changes in the demography of minorities and the problems they faced. However, the idea of an evidence-based, consultative policy process has been undermined by the politicization of multiculturalism in recent decades. Policy has been increasingly driven by ideological conflicts, and at times multiculturalism seems becalmed, too hot to touch even by a government that in principle is sympathetic.

In political terms, multiculturalism has been conflicted. It has persisted for half a century, including in recent decades when the concept became controversial in many other countries, especially in Europe. Despite its remarkable longevity, however, the policy strategy is not sustained by a deep and comprehensive political consensus. Elements in the conservative movement in Canada are uncomfortable with the celebration of difference implicit in the concept; and Québec has rejected multiculturalism in favour of a different conception of state-minority relations.

In the end, however, multiculturalism’s greatest political contribution may be found in what has not happened. Canada stands out in the international community, not only as a distinctly multicultural country but also as a country that has avoided the anti-immigrant backlash which has reshaped the political terrain in many countries, weakening the sinews of democracy as it goes. Radical-right populism exists in Canada, but it is not energized by anti-immigrant themes. While we may debate the relative importance of multiculturalism policies in that outcome, its role cannot be easily dismissed. That alone is a singular mark of success.

Appendix A The Multiculturalism Policy Index

The eight indicators used to build the MCP Index for immigrant minorities are:

constitutional, legislative, or parliamentary affirmation of multiculturalism, at the central and/or regional and municipal levels;

the adoption of multiculturalism in the school curriculum;

the inclusion of ethnic representation/sensitivity in the mandate of public media or media licensing;

exemptions from dress-codes, either by statute or by court cases;

allowing of dual citizenship;

the funding of ethnic group organizations to support cultural activities;

the funding of bilingual education or mother-tongue instruction;

affirmative action for disadvantaged immigrant groups.

These eight indicators capture the main ways in which states express multiculturalist commitments, which we earlier described as ‘recognition’ (indicators 1–3), ‘accommodation’ (indicators 4–5), and ‘support’ (indicators 6–8). To build the index, countries are scored on each indicator as 0 (no such policy), 0.5 (partial), or 1.0 (clear policy). The component scores are then aggregated, with equal weighting for each indicator, producing a country score ranging from 0 to 8. (For the empirical evidence supporting the rankings, see Wallace et al, 2021 .)

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Hold the French Fries! Paris Olympics Chart a New Gastronomic Course.

The environment will come first as France tries to revitalize the global image of its cuisine.

Charles Guilloy and Stéphane Chicheri in chefs’ clothing in front of a large, modern building.

By Roger Cohen

Reporting from Paris

There will be no French fries for the 15,000 athletes at the Olympic Games that open in France in July. Yes, you read that right.

In what is being called the biggest restaurant in the world — a 700-foot-long former electrical power plant at the heart of the Olympic Village — there will be no foie gras, either, but vegetarian hot dogs and quinoa muesli will abound.

Strolling the length of what is known as the nave, a light-filled vaulted space where some 45,000 meals a day will be served 24/7 throughout the Olympics and Paralympics, Stéphane Chicheri and Charles Guilloy, the chefs in charge, sang the praises of vegetarian shawarma, za’atar-spiced sweet potatoes with hummus, cabbage pickles, beetroot falafel and grilled eggplant with smoked paprika.

This is a far cry from the classic French cuisine of elaborate sauces and “enough melted butter to thrombose a regiment,” as A.J. Liebling once described a dish .

But these are 21st-century Games on a warming planet. Carbon imprint trumps cassoulet. Vegetable protein is the thing; and of course athletes have to perform in a country of a thousand epicurean delights that are no-noes to their exacting nutritionists.

“French fries are too risky because of fire-hazard concerns over deep-fat fryers,” Mr. Guilloy explained. “No to foie gras because animal well-being is on everyone’s mind, and no to avocados because they are imported from a great distance and consume a lot of water.”

So how French sans French fries can these ecological Games be?

“Don’t worry; we’ll have French cheeses, blanquette of veal but with a lightened sauce, and of course baguettes,” Mr. Chicheri said with a smile. “Athletes will even be able to learn to make bread with a master baker.”

About 500 different dishes will be served at the Olympic Village dining hall in Saint-Denis, just north of Paris. The building is itself a tribute to environment-conscious adaptation: an almost century-old power plant of wrought-iron skeleton that became a movie studio before being transformed over the past year into a giant restaurant.

The Olympic Village restaurant will open as a global campaign by the government to boost French gastronomic impact and appeal gathers pace. With some 15 million visitors expected at the games, two million of them foreigners, France itself will be on display, and in particular Paris, posing the challenge of how to energize a tradition-bound culinary culture.

This is a critical moment for French cuisine, whose pedigree is undisputed but whose image has languished. How many “likes” these days does beef Bourguignon get beside ceviche, tapas or an omakase dinner?

“We’re a country of centuries-old gastronomic tradition, but the truth is that if you have a talent and you don’t nurture it, it can fade,” Olivia Grégoire, the minister for tourism, said in an interview.

She visited New York this month to promote a new multimillion-dollar initiative designed to introduce young chefs and innovative French dishes in places that will initially include South Korea, Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. “Food is French soft power,” Ms. Grégoire said. “It is also hard money.”

More than 800,000 people are employed in the restaurant business in France, and the gastronomic sector, including wine and spirits, generates more than $55 billion a year in revenue.

In few countries is the ritual gathering around a table as important. In even fewer is pride so intense in the varied produce of “terroirs,” particular parcels of land with their own soil and climate, from the Alps to the Atlantic and from Normandy to the Mediterranean.

“The finest gastronomy is in our DNA; it’s a reference for all students of haute cuisine,” said Alain Ducasse, one of the most acclaimed French chefs who has been chosen to cater the July 26 Olympics opening dinner for heads of state, at which the chef has been asked to serve beef.

“But there is a new international challenge and we have been slow to be part of it,” he said. “Talent is everywhere. We need to wake up to that.”

With 34 restaurants, and 18 Michelin stars, in Europe, Asia and the United States, Mr. Ducasse is no slouch, and there are other French chefs, like Jean-Georges Vongerichten and Daniel Boulud, who have successfully seen the world as their market.

But even as French cuisine has changed — adding fusion touches to old dishes in ways that have spawned the “néobistrot” and introducing “le sharing” as a shockingly novel way of eating — its image has scarcely changed.

In this context, the repertoire at the Olympic Village could be an important game changer. There will be six “grab-and-go” outlets, Asian cuisine, Afro-Caribbean dishes, vegetarian shawarma, hamburgers (meat, vegetarian or a combination of the two), Middle Eastern food and halal cuisine. Kosher food will also be available on demand.

Patatas bravas will probably be the closest anyone gets to French fries.

Two fully fledged French restaurants are planned — but without such classics as steak tartare, blood sausage or choucroute. Wine, of course, is off limits because in the end the point of this 46,000-square-foot emporium with 3,623 seats is to ready athletes for top performance.

The other point is to underscore that France takes its environmental responsibilities seriously.

The French Olympic authorities banned throwaway cutlery and plates. They have not banished trash cans from kitchens, as some Paris restaurants have, but they do demand a zero-waste culture. Some 80 percent of ingredients will be French, and 25 percent from within 155 miles of Paris. Halving the carbon imprint of the Tokyo or London Olympics is the target.

The French company organizing this vast catering enterprise is Sodexo Live, a branch of the Sodexo company, which employs 420,000 people in food services and facility management worldwide. Sodexo Live, which has catered 15 Super Bowls as well as 36 Roland Garros tennis tournaments in France, knows its business, but the scale of this challenge is unique.

“We are hiring 6,000 people. Our aim is that everyone should feel at home and that we marry the nutrition an athlete needs with gastronomic pleasure,” Nathalie Bellon-Szabo, the chief executive of Sodexo Live, said in an interview.

To that end, three much-lauded chefs have been chosen, each of whom will appear for a couple of days every week at the Olympic Village and prepare the creative dishes that France wants the world to know better.

They are Alexandre Mazzia, who grew up in the Democratic Republic of Congo and has a restaurant in Marseille, AM, that bears a strong African influence and three Michelin stars; Akrame Benallal, who grew up in Algeria and runs Restaurant Akrame, a Paris restaurant with one star and some astonishing combinations of flavors — crab with gray shrimp and coffee, for example; and the French-born Amandine Chaignot, whose Café de Luce serves some of the most succulent frogs’ legs in the capital.

“French cuisine is emancipating itself. It has realized the need to change,” Mr. Mazzia, 47, said. “For me French cuisine is now multicultural, with different roots and spices, lighter, allied to a savoir-faire we must preserve.”

Mr. Benallal, 42, calls himself an “architect of taste,” forever sketching the presentation of new dishes because he believes “we eat first with our eyes.” His red and white quinoa muesli, topped with Parmesan, a little mascarpone and some smoked yogurt is typical of the inventiveness that has brought him a wide following.

“French cuisine is sometimes seen as boring,” he said. “It’s not boring. It’s singular. My restaurant is a cabinet full of curiosities, and that is what I will bring to the Games.”

As for Ms. Chaignot, 45, she has prepared a poached-egg croissant with artichoke cream, goat cheese and truffles to be eaten on the go at the Olympic Village. Another creation is a chicken dish with langoustines.

Even in a changing culinary world there are some constants. What, I asked her, defines French cuisine today?

“Butter is France,” she said. “And France is butter.”

Roger Cohen is the Paris Bureau chief for The Times, covering France and beyond. He has reported on wars in Lebanon, Bosnia and Ukraine, and between Israel and Gaza, in more than four decades as a journalist. At The Times, he has been a correspondent, foreign editor and columnist. More about Roger Cohen

2024 Paris Summer Olympics

The summer olympic games in paris are expected to draw millions of spectators..

Olympic Flame Arrives in Marseille: The flame will be carried on a 79-day journey across France and its territories, culminating in Paris with the start of the Olympic Games on July 26.

Did France Build the Olympics Safely: Undocumented workers played a larger and more dangerous role in delivering the Games than the Macron administration acknowledges.

World Anti-Doping Agency: Ahead of the Olympics, the global agency tasked with policing doping in sports is facing a growing crisis as it fends off allegations it helped cover up the positive tests of elite Chinese swimmers .

Friends Competing for Spots: Conner Mantz and Clayton Young had run side by side for more than 10,000 miles. Both vied for a place in the marathon at the Paris Games . Who would make it?

Dancing in the Louvre: The museum is joining in the Olympics celebration by opening up for dance and exercise classes early in the morning. Tickets sold out in a flash .

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Multiculturalism Essay
Multiculturalism Essay: The term multiculturalism refers to the cohabitation of different ethnic, racial, religious and language groups. In any culture, there are always differences in social backgrounds, religious affiliations, ethnicities, and socioeconomic factors. These differences are what make a culture unique. The term multiculturalism has shifted in meaning over time. It was first used ...
Multiculturalism
Multiculturalism's impact on education. Some examples of how multiculturalism has affected the social and political spheres are found in revisions of curricula, particularly in Europe and North America, and the expansion of the Western literary and other canons that began during the last quarter of the 20th century.Curricula from the elementary to the university levels were revised and ...
Essay on Multiculturalism
Benefits of Multiculturalism. When people from different cultures come together, they share their ways of life, their food, music, and stories. This sharing makes life more interesting for everyone. Imagine eating the same food every day; it would be boring. But in a multicultural place, you can try new foods, learn new dances, and hear ...
Multiculturalism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Multiculturalism. First published Fri Sep 24, 2010; substantive revision Wed Sep 9, 2020. The idea of multiculturalism in contemporary political discourse and in political philosophy reflects a debate about how to understand and respond to the challenges associated with cultural diversity based on ethnic, national, and religious differences.
Arguments For and Against Multiculturalism Essay
Multiculturalism can be defined as distinct and pertaining to a multifaceted society which is fueled by constant globalization. Environments within a country are constantly embracing change so as to be able to adapt and function in today's globalized world. We will write a custom essay on your topic. The 70s heralded multiculturalism in ...
Multiculturalism Free Essay Examples And Topic Ideas
24 essay samples found. Multiculturalism, a societal approach that celebrates and accommodates cultural diversity, holds considerable significance in today's globalized world. Essays might explore how multiculturalism shapes social, political, and economic interactions within diverse societies. Discussions could delve into the benefits of ...
The Challenges of Multiculturalism Essay (Critical Writing)
Multiculturalism results to the coining of identity labels that regard people as bound by a particular culture. However, people can manipulate it to deprive others of their basic rights or exploit them both politically and economically. This is in cases whereby certain people regard others as belonging to the minority groups, which define the ...
Multiculturalism Essay
Multiculturalism is diversity of two or more culture in some region or country. America is an immigrant country; most people in America are immigrants. They come from different countries and different ethnic groups; they have different languages, educational backgrounds, customs, values and religions. When they arrive America, they must ...
What Is Multiculturalism? Definition, Theories, and Examples
Multiculturalism is the way in which a society deals with cultural diversity, both at the national and at the community level. Sociologically, multiculturalism assumes that society as a whole benefits from increased diversity through the harmonious coexistence of different cultures. Multiculturalism typically develops according to one of two ...
Multiculturalism Essays: Samples & Topics
Essay Samples on Multiculturalism. Essay Examples. Essay Topics. When one starts looking through the possible topics to write about multiculturalism, it quickly becomes one of the most interesting tasks to explore. You can write about the traditions, religious backgrounds of certain communities, discuss music, theater, and the movies that are ...
Multiculturalism in the USA
Multiculturalism in the USA Essay. Multiculturalism in the USA is one of the main issues for the country as being inhabited by people from different ethnical groups it faces a number of difficulties. One of the main problem the USA faces is cultural assimilation. The USA seems not to have personal culture as the number of immigrants who have ...
Positive Effects of Multiculturalism: Essay Example for Free
The primary idea of the multicultural ideology is that the society should strive to reduce intergroup conflicts and appreciate cultural uniqueness (Levin et al., 2012), thus, long for harmony and equality. There are many positive outcomes of living in a multicultural society. First of all, when people live in a country settled by diverse ethnic ...
Multiculturalism Critical Essays
Multiculturalism. Late-twentieth-century literary, pedagogic, and social movement. A literary and social ideology that presupposes that all cultural value systems are equally worthy of study ...
Essays on Multiculturalism
Our page dedicated to multiculturalism essays offers students a panoramic view of cultural diversity, its impacts, and its significance in today's world. From the examination of multicultural policies in educational settings to personal narratives of cultural integration, these essays encompass a broad spectrum of themes and discussions.
Cultivating Understanding: Embracing Cultural Sensitivity's Essence
This essay about the significance of cultural sensitivity into the complexities of embracing diversity. It emphasizes the importance of transcending cultural biases and fostering genuine dialogue to build mutual respect. ... the next generation is empowered to navigate the complexities of a multicultural world with grace and compassion. By ...
6 Diversity College Essay Examples
What's Covered: How to Write the Diversity Essay After the End of Affirmative Action. Essay #1: Jewish Identity. Essay #2: Being Bangladeshi-American. Essay #3: Marvel vs DC. Essay #4: Leadership as a First-Gen American. Essay #5: Protecting the Earth. Essay #6: Music and Accents. Where to Get Your Diversity Essays Edited.
Multicultural Societies
The notion of societies and their populations as multicultural has at least three aspects. The first is that virtually all contemporary societies/countries are culturally diverse, in the sense that there are no societies/countries that have only one cultural or ethnic group in their population, none with only one language spoken by all members, and none in which all members share a single ...
Multiculturalism: Causes, Advantages and Disadvantages
Conclusion. In conclusion, there are three main causes of multiculturalism has been listed, they are international labour, international student and refugee. It is undeniable that multiculturalism has its advantages, it makes world colourful, demolish prejudice, enhance social creativity and benefit economy.
Cultural Diversity Essay
The cultural diversity essay also lets you describe what type of " diversity " you would bring to campus. We'll also highlight a diversity essay sample for three college applications. These include the Georgetown application essay, Rice application essay, and Williams application essay. We'll provide examples of diversity essays for ...
Essay About Multiculturalism
Words: 2000. Published: 02/20/2023. Multiculturalism refers to a multidimensional term that defines the different racial, ethnical, and diverse aspects of society. From a personal perspective, multiculturalism helps individuals to enhance their personality regarding shaping their cultural identities thereby enhancing their ability to interact ...
Multiculturalism Policy in Canada: Conflicted and Resilient
The year 2021 represented the 50th anniversary of the adoption of multiculturalism in Canada. Clearly, multiculturalism policy has stood the test of time. However, more than sheer longevity testifies to its success. In programmatic terms, the multiculturalism approach has clearly advanced the goals that animated its introduction in 1971.
Multiculturalism Essay
The definition of multiculturalism is 'the presence of, or support for the presence of, several distinct cultural or ethnic groups within a society'. Australia's amazing colourful and large variety of different ethnic and cultural groups play a huge role in australia's history and future. In australia there is around 6 million. 255 Words. 2 ...
Multiculturalisms: An overview of multicultural debates in western
Abstract. This article examines how debates about multiculturalism evolved in western societies. In the first part, it presents the different meanings of the term 'multiculturalism' when it applies to diverse types of cultural difference within society: native and sub-state national groups, discriminated groups within society and immigrants.
In defence of multiculturalism
Theories of multiculturalism in transition. According to Modood (Citation 2005), a significant change occurred in multicultural policies from the 1960s to the 2000s.In the 1960s, the right of assimilation and the tolerance of differences were on the agenda, whereas since the early 2000s the focus has been on the right to have one's differences recognized and supported in the public.
Hold the French Fries! Paris Olympics Chart a New Gastronomic Course
Reporting from Paris. May 29, 2024. There will be no French fries for the 15,000 athletes at the Olympic Games that open in France in July. Yes, you read that right. In what is being called the ...

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