“A Quilt of a Country: Out of Many, One?” was written by Anna Quindlen. She gives her thesis in the opening paragraph; “America is an improbable idea. A mongrel nation built of ever-changing disparate parts, it is held together by a notion, the notion that all men are created equal, though everyone knows that most men consider themselves better than someone.” Quindlen argues that our nation; the United States considers themselves as being equal and whole. However, that is not evident to how we live our lives every day. She uses the title to outline a question, to make us think about how we actually see our nation. Quindlen uses the first part of the title to say that our Country is made up of many pieces, like a quilt. The second part of her title expresses a question. In those quilt pieces, we only chose one to represent our Country. However, every piece of the quilt that she is referring to all symbolize something different.
In my preference, America is known as the “melting pot.” In which we add in different cultures, backgrounds, ethnicities, religion, and monetary status. The sense of a “melting pot” is important and indeed makes the United States who we are today. However, we tend to position people in different classes and this makes our “all men are equal,” imbalanced. I completely agree with Anna Quindlen, in that our Country still practices segregation but covers it up by saying we are all “equal.” She uses 9/11 as a perfect example to show how our nation came together in a time of need.
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I couldn't agree with you more! I used the melting pot example in my blog too! I do think that we try to say that "everyone is equal", but in reality it is not true. Most Americans do not feel that way. She even states in the beginning of the essay that "most men consider themselves better than someone". It's sad, but true. American arrogance has spun out of control!
ReplyDeleteYeah we're definitely a melting pot. My mother was born and raised in Panama, and at home she cooks Chinese, Italian, Mexican and so on, all learned while living in the United States. As for, we're all equal, I don't buy it for a minute. We're all different, very different. That is what makes a country great. Having people that do specific things better than some one else. At the same time, that some one else does something better that another person. We can't all be equal, it would make life dull. We do need to stop treating people differently because of a "class" or "group" they belong to. It is that kind of mind set that creates seperation between people.
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