A Nation Of Immigrants: Diversity In The United States

When you think about America as a whole what comes to mind? For me, America represents equality, freedom and most importantly a vast amount of diversity. America thrives on diversity; the different cultures, religions and races are what makes America exactly what it is—‘the melting pot’. Many people from all over the world dream of coming to ‘the land of the free and the home of the brave.’ Its very existence is what people desire to be a part of. “Often referred to as ‘A Nation of Immigrants’ (Kennedy, 1959) the Unites States is far more ethnically diverse than most other nations.” (Bello, 2009) Diversity has shaped and formed America and the people who reside within it. “The vision of the nation’s founding fathers established a government

For example, “new research has made it increasingly clear that companies with more diverse workforces perform better financially.” (Hunt, Layton, & Prince, 2015) “Immigrants have also developed new products, such as the Java computer language, that have created employment opportunities for millions of Americans.” (Griswold, 2002) Diversity also contributes to education. Diversity in classrooms allow students to explore different cultures, languages and religions first hand; not just provided from a text book. The vast amount of religions also provides diversity to individuals, communities and the country as a whole, “the practice of religion has a significant effect on happiness and an overall sense of personal well-being. Such evidence indicates clearly that religious practice contributes significantly to the quality of American life.” (Patrick F. Fagan, 1996) Nearly 2,000 religious denominations are found in the United States. (Diversity in America, n.d.) Making America one of the most religiously diverse countries to date. Politics have vastly changed since 2008 when America elected its first biracial president, Barrack Obama. Upon his election, he has even furthered diversity by opening up the Obama administration to members of the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered) community. (Eilperin, 2015) In an interview, White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett Obama said that “he wanted to make sure that everybody had an opportunity to serve in this administration and that its diversity reflected the diversity of our country.” (Eilperin,