How The Melting Pot Stirred America: The Reception of Zangwill's Play and Theater's Role in the American Assimilation Experience

Kraus, Joe

doi:10.2307/468036

Cited by 15 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…Boas’s report went viral—well, for its day—as Israel Zangwill’s influential play The Melting Pot concluded its four‐month run on Broadway. The Melting Pot followed George Cohan’s super‐patriotic musicals like Little Johnny Jones , featuring “Yankee Doodle Dandy,” in 1904, and The American Idea in 1908, each depicting recent immigrants becoming true‐blue, or more accurately true‐white, Americans (Kraus 1999, 9; Roberts 2007). Boas’s report also coincided with the incorporation of the North American Civic League for Immigrants.…”

Section: The Marvelous Power Of Amalgamationmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Racist Anti‐Racism of American Anthropology

Baker

2021

Transforming Anthropology

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In 1909 Franz Boas conducted a massive study entitled Changes in Bodily Forms of Descendants of Immigrants. In this study, he demonstrated that Eastern and Southern European immigrants to the United States were not racially different from other Europeans because of what he called "the marvelous power of amalgamation." Boas's study dealt a blow to scientific racism because he demonstrated the plasticity and instability of racial types. Boas chose to emphasize the enormous gulf between the white and non-white races. His research and advocacy were anti-racist, but the way he promoted assimilation was racist. The next year W.E.B. Du Bois invited Boas to give the final lecture at the conference where the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was officially incorporated. Boas presented "The Real Race Problem," in which he argued that the real problem was the "difference in type." To solve it, the Negro needed to amalgamate by "encouraging the gradual process of lightening up this large body of people by the influx of white blood." American anthropologists joined other Progressive Era reformers committed to assimilation, like the orphan train and Indian boarding school movements. They were each striving to be anti-racist but went off the rails, contributing to the consolidation of whiteness and the perpetuation of racism.

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Section: The Marvelous Power Of Amalgamationmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Racist Anti‐Racism of American Anthropology

Baker

2021

Transforming Anthropology

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“…'The Melting Pot' (Zangwill,1908) play praises the eradication of ethnicity as all peoples are melted together and unified. Initially accoladed as encapsulating the American absorption of immigrants (Krauss, 1999) the metaphor has been laterally rejected as an abhorrent denial of individual identity (Vecolli, 1995). I employ this term, not exalting any benefits of the metaphor but due to one teacher's use of the term.…”

Section: Melting Pot: Seeing and Identifying Worldviewsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Teachers’ personal worldviews and RE in England: a way forward?

Flanagan

2020

British Journal of Religious Education

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Teachers' worldviews may impact their practice in terms of pedagogy, curriculum choices, and the value they assign to, or enthusiasm for, a curriculum subject. In England, Religious Education (RE) involves the teaching of religious and non-religious worldviews. RE teachers often lack training, subject knowledge, confidence or even desire to teach the subject.This article develops a working definition of 'worldview' as an individual's frame of reference, held consciously and subconsciously, that evolves due to life experiences, enabling them to make sense of the world. Hermeneutical tools employed in training sessions with teachers enabled them to identify aspects of their worldviews and the narratives which have formed these. Research was undertaken through semi-structured interviews with 10 Primary school teachers in the South West of England.Findings revealed variations between teachers' worldview-consciousness and the impact of their worldviews on their teaching of RE: notions of 'good life' varied and determined their teaching of, choices within and rationale for RE alongside growing confidence. Depth of understanding was facilitated for some by overseas travel or working and living in an ethnically diverse area. Greater self-understanding for teachers was evident in their acknowledgement of the impact of their own worldviews on their teaching of RE.

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Ethnic Theatre in America

Shteir¹

2007

A Companion to Twentieth-Century American Drama

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How The Melting Pot Stirred America: The Reception of Zangwill's Play and Theater's Role in the American Assimilation Experience

Cited by 15 publications

References 12 publications

The Racist Anti‐Racism of American Anthropology

The Racist Anti‐Racism of American Anthropology

Teachers’ personal worldviews and RE in England: a way forward?

Ethnic Theatre in America

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