Why Have a Melting Pot When You Can Have a Mosaic? Don’t Melt the Mosaic!

When you think of what makes you you, what comes to mind? How do you describe yourself? You may think about profession, race, gender, religion, heritage, height, hobbies, or any number of factors. You may think of things you do, how you look, where you live, and how you live. 

Each of those elements can be at the forefront of our minds, or buried in the back depending on the circumstances in which we find ourselves. For example, among a crowd of sports fans celebrating until their voices give out when their team wins the championship, you probably aren’t thinking about your religion a fraction as much as when you are in your church, mosque, synagogue, or other place of worship. A family table set with the food of your ancestors may call up your heritage more pointedly than pizza at lunch with colleagues. 

As a tall woman with short blond hair and bright blue eyes, living in Costa Rica has me thinking more about identity than I did the many years I lived on the east coast of the United States – and about the many dimensions of identity, as well as assumptions we tend to make about identity. As the United States observed Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month a short while ago, I thought about how differently the same question I hear daily here in Central America – “Where are you from?” – felt to my friend Judy Tso, an Asian-American woman who was born and raised in the South in the U.S. Directed at me, the question is one of pure curiosity. Directed at her, the question suggested she wasn’t from the United States and more deeply reflects the idea of belonging. 

Amidst the increasingly divisive discussions about how to teach U.S. history in school, a concern repeatedly emerges: children should not be taught to feel shame (or guilt or discomfort) about their own identities. But what if I told you that, regardless of what we are taught in school, the vast majority of people experience what Brene Brown calls a “warm wash of shame” in thinking about our identity? 

The Cambridge Dictionary defines shame as, “...to make someone or something lose honour and respect.” Digging more deeply into how loss makes us feel, Brene Brown describes shame as “...the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging.” 

Historical and recent accounts leave no doubt that immigrants to a new country often experience shame. They feel shame for not speaking the language, for dressing, eating, or worshiping differently, and shame that comes from questions like, “where are you from?” that, regardless of intent, can have a negative impact when interpreted as one doesn’t belong. 

In Oklahoma, for example, the debate over history in schools is forcing community members across the state to experience this warm wash. In 1921, groups of largely White law officers and citizens looted and burned Black businesses, injured at least 800 people, killed at least 300 Black people, and destroyed a thriving Black community in what became known as the Tulsa Race Massacre. Over 100 years later, following decades of silence from politicians and many schools, Oklahoma State legislators recently adopted House Bill 1775, which reads: “No individual should feel discomfort, anguish, or guilt based on their race or sex.”

This legislation seeks to control how history is taught in public education. After a century of shame that manifests when we silently hide, skew, skirt, deny, and downplay the significance of atrocities like the Tulsa Race Massacre, legislation now seeks to loudly forbid shame’s existence. Brown’s phrase “warm wash of shame” may elicit the cozy feeling of a comforting bath. However, I’d argue, silence is not a comforting bath; it’s a seemingly subtle yet unmistakable contrast that we feel when we place our hand under a running faucet.

Legislation isn’t the cure for shame. Truth and respect are. 

Progress is discussing racial disparities, the impact of past and current laws, and understanding of different perspectives; these are ways to move beyond shame and toward reconciliation and healing.

My Family’s Story

As a person who went from never being asked where I’m from (unless people were looking for an answer like “New Jersey”), to being asked at least three times every day simply by taking a 5-hour flight south, I think about how quickly identity can change – not just over distance, but over decades. The story of my maternal grandmother, IvaNell Monson, illustrates what I mean:

IvaNell is 93 years old. Born in December 1929, she is a Midwesterner, a Lutheran, and a woman of German heritage. Her grandparents Johanna (Hanna) and Herman Gipp immigrated from Germany to the U.S. in 1879 and 1887 respectively. As she’s shared her memories, particularly over the last few years, I’ve come to better understand my family history, including aspects that may feel uncomfortable. 

In 2019, my Grandma IvaNell visited me in Washington, DC, and asked that I take her to the Holocaust Museum. As I pushed her in a wheelchair through exhibits I hadn’t seen since I was a young tween, we came to a section entitled Americans and the Holocaust. Through words and photos, this section examined the “motives, pressures, and fears that shaped [responses of those living in the Unites States] to Nazism, war, and genocide.” It was there, in front of images of newspaper headlines, images of protests, and a recounting of the government’s response that my Grandma recalled going to the movies and seeing newsreels about the war before the feature film. In that era, 80 million Americans went to the movies weekly and that was how many learned details about the war. 

The exhibit also addressed the complexities of being German in the U.S. during the 1930’s and 40’s. In 1938, while Americans were empathetic to the plight of Jews in Germany and disapproved of the Nazi’s treatment of them, American polls also showed that Americans did not want to allow more Jewish exiles from Germany into the U.S. By 1945, despite confirmation that the Nazi regime had established concentration camps and were killing millions of Jews, U.S. public opinion and willingness to support expanded immigration barely nudged. The exhibit stated – and my Grandma confirmed – German-Americans already living in the U.S. during this time experienced enormous feelings of shame. 

In 2021, my Grandma celebrated her 70th college reunion with long-time friends from Luther College in Decorah, Iowa. Because she could no longer drive long distances, I accompanied her for the journey. We set out from Minneapolis for the three-hour drive one crisp October morning to arrive in time for a luncheon with four other members of her graduating class of 1951.

During the event, everyone took turns sharing stories and memories, and I heard several themes emerge, including fond memories of the college’s well-renowned music program and finding love at Luther College. These were both true for my Grandma, a life-long pianist and vocalist, who met my Grandpa as a fellow member of Luther College’s Nordic Choir. Shortly after graduating, they married and started a family that would grow to six children.

After the luncheon, my Grandma and I cruised in her maroon sedan, windows down as the sun shone in, around the small farm town of Ossian, 15 miles away where she had grown up in close proximity to many family members, all of whom were people of deep faith, namely the Lutheran Church. In addition to numerous places from her childhood, we visited the gravesites of my Great Grandparents, Glen and Edna Mundt, and Great-Great Grandparents, Johanna (Hannah) and Herman Gipp. 

Headstone of my Great-Grandparents

As the headstones throughout the cemetery attested, the town’s residents were primarily people of Nordic and German descent. In Ossian, there stands an old Norwegian church that offered services in Norwegian and a Catholic Church that usually offered services in English. While my Great-Great Grandparents were born in Germany and immigrated to the U.S. when they were ages 4 (Hannah) and 16 (Herman), German was not spoken at home. 

By exposure to customs and traditions in the surrounding Ossian community, my Grandma shared that her early years included more Nordic influences than German. This was reinforced when she attended Luther College, my grandparents’ alma mater, which was, and still remains, a Nordic and Lutheran cultural epicenter. In addition, my Grandpa was from a Norwegian lineage. In other words, over decades, including the era of World War II, my family shed its German identity and moved toward a Norwegian one. 

Town of Ossian, Iowa

Generational Shape-Shifting

My Grandma’s family immigrated to the U.S. well before World War II, establishing roots in the Midwest a few decades earlier. This means I had generations of German ancestors living in the U.S. prior to the start of World War II; however, the stories told in the Holocaust Museum exhibit were also part of my family’s storyline as German-Americans in the U.S. From what I’ve gleaned through the stories and memories shared by my Grandma, research conducted by my Grandma on her family lineage, and my own lived understanding of my family’s history and traditions, there was a greater tendency to celebrate Nordic traditions of my Grandfather, versus the German traditions of my Grandmother. 

Things like Nordic traditions of Luther College and lutefisk and lefse at Christmas-time, these traditions were simply emphasized more. When I asked my Grandma why this was as we cruised around Ossian together, she said she didn’t quite know. It was just the way it was. While my Grandma and I may never actually know why, or how this came to be, I think about the role and power of assimilation, the destructive nature of shame, and the challenges that come with reconciling differences in a place like the U.S. 

I wonder: did my Great-Great Grandparents feel the hardship of shame during the 1930’s as German-Americans? Did they mute different aspects of family traditions? When did the German language fade into English only? 

The Melting Point

From where I sit, it’s become clear that there is a shame epidemic in the U.S. that is preventing our ability to fully see one another. When we aren’t able to examine and grapple with where we come from - to include the feelings of shame and discomfort it may provoke - we lose a part of our larger mosaic’s story. This includes an ability to understand and appreciate the dimension, depth, and subtleties of a mosaic including its contrasting shapes that tell the story of where we’ve been, and also where and how we are going. It doesn’t have to be this way: by sharing history in its beauty and progress and discomfort and shame, we can unpack and reconcile historic events, family history, and acknowledge and unlock our full shared humanity. While no one wants to feel shame - of course - no one benefits when only certain community members carry the burden of the past (Black people) while others (White people) never truly see and understand their Black neighbors. The warm wash of shame triggers a strong desire for assimilation and sameness (the melting pot). 

As I’ve shared before, the Intercultural Development Continuum is a powerful tool to understand and build intercultural awareness and competence - and to understand our current response to diversity and inclusion in our organizations. 68% of people who have taken this assessment fall into the category of minimization, meaning a tendency to prioritize assimilation and sameness. This isn’t surprising in a country that embraces the metaphor of a “melting pot.” On one hand, some see a melting pot as a way to say, “All are welcome! Join us and blend your life into the expanse of this country.” But what that perspective overlooks is the harms that can accompany assimilation - and that people carry when we don’t acknowledge or understand unique qualities and different lived experiences.

A healthier approach resembles a mosaic. I leave you with these final questions: when does a mosaic become a melting pot? What’s the temperature necessary to maintain our stitched mosaic-like textile? And when do the edges of our mosaic naturally meld in the frame? 

Dedication: 

This writing is dedicated to my Grandma, IvaNell Monson, an incredibly talented, tenacious, and fastidious woman who is nothing short of amazing. I feel both honored and lucky to share in her memories from generations past, and to have her in my life for the last 40 years. 

My Grandma IvaNell Monson sitting on the campus of her college alma-mater