Melting Pot Presented by Tateh in Ragtime
Doctorow’s Ragtime literature is a historiographical metafiction’ in which real historical information and incidents from 1902 and 1914 are combined with fictional characters and acts. By intertwining stories of different Americans, particularly in terms of race and ethnicity, Doctorow portrays the melting pot of New York, allegorized in the novel as “a wild quilt of humanity” (Doctorow 16). Three fictional families participate in this human mad quilt: the Whites Anglo-Saxon Protestants family, the Jewish Refugee, and an African American. The three families members live in a rapidly changing country, portraying different fates depending on each family’s ability to adapt.
The word “melting pot,” most frequently related to America and New York, discusses the notion that immigrants from a diversely cultural society will “fuse” and become one uniform group through assimilation with the prevailing American culture. In 1908, Israel’s play Zangwill made the Melting Pot a popular term, which entails a Jew immigrating to New York and accepting their norms (Booth 1). The theory derives from the fact that America has undergone an enormous influx of people over the centuries: European colonies, African slaves, Jews, and refugees worldwide, all of whom have united in an American community.
The convergence of these people of different races, sects, or ethnicities evokes the notion that one can become American regardless of who they are (Branigin 1). This idea is closely connected to the American dream that everyone in America will survive and prosper with hard work. Immigrants who come as adults to escape hardship prefer to consider their lives to improve over what they left behind. Still, their children often equate their conditions to other Americans and find themselves disjointed from American children (Washington Post 1).
In Ragtime, the idea of a melting pot is demonstrated through a Jewish immigrant’s life experience, Tateh, who, throughout the novel, undergoes suffering and struggles to live with his family in America. Tateh represents those initially left out of the melting pot theory due to poverty, religion, and ethnicity. The book reveals that Tateh’s family of three lived in one room, struggling each day to survive; each person in the family struggled to improve their living conditions (Doctorow 202). Tateh toiled in the streets while Mameh and The Little Girl worked in their room from morning to evening.
In addition to the low living standards, Tateh and his family had Jewish clothes, appearances, and Yiddish accents, contrary to the white and Christian religion, making it difficult for the Jewish family to integrate with American Society. For instance, the Jewish family faces police discrimination during a walk on Madison Avenue and Fifth Avenue, the white man’s hatred against people of a different race, religion, or culture. In Ragtime, the authors mention that “The police stared at them in their tall helmets. The police did not want to see immigrants on those wide empty sidewalks in this part of the city” (Doctorow 14).
It, therefore, demonstrates that in the ‘white’ and wealthy parts of the town, Americans did not want the Jewish family. Also, the desire of New Yorkers to engage with him is illustrated when he creates his art in the street: “While often people pause to watch the old man’s work, very few people asked to have his portraits done” (Doctorow 39). The melting pot theory failed to apply in their case due to the social dissimilarities in New York.
Attitudes about Race and Rights Expressed in the Exchange of Coalhouse Walker, Jr. and Booker T. Washington in Ragtime
Coalhouse is a character in Ragtime belonging to an African American family comprising three people: Sarah, Coalhouse, and their son. In a period filled with racial segregation, Coalhouse represents the troubles faced by a black man in the transformation process of becoming an American citizen. The exchange between Coalhouse and Bookers provided in Ragtime shows the level of difficulty faced by African American people when integrating into the American culture.
Coalhouse exchanges portray the problems faced by African American people racially segregated to achieve the American dream. Coalhouse alterations show the American culture’s arrogance in disregarding and discriminating against other people based on skin color, ethnicity, and religion. The exchange reveals the African American community’s innocence in succeeding in life (Doctorow 182). The use of rhetorical questions helps cultivate the needed attention to the social problem and demonstrates the struggles of a person of color in the American community.
In both literature materials, Contemporary United States and Ragtime, a reader can quickly identify racial discrimination. American culture is portrayed as proud, discriminative, and ardent in its interrelations with other cultures. American people are disgruntled by the behaviors of people from different societies. For instance, Coalhouse, despite being a conventional African American, faces discrimination due to the mode of dressing, speech, and skin color.
Police harassment against African American people affirmed the high racism level of racism in American Society. In Ragtime, Coalhouse, while traveling by car from his visit to a Whites Anglo-Saxon Protestants family, moving towards New York, is harassed by policemen demanding a toll payment (Doctorow 148). The policemen insulted and threatened Coalhouse and later wrecked his car. Due to his race, Coalhouse’s rights are violated and insensitively treated by the white policemen.
Throughout the book, characters of African origin are characterized by poverty, working hard to change their low financial position. For instance, Tateh’s family struggles to live in America amid the mistreatment and racism that they face. Coalhouse, in his statement, reveals that American culture is ironic in advocating for the American Dream for its citizens. In contrast, the same culture suppresses the opportunities of a Black person to succeed in life.
However, Tateh scales the social hierarchy as he grows into the acting industry and generates high revenues from his film books, released by Franklin Newty Group. As a result of the rise in the social hierarchy, Tateh surrenders his socialism, denouncing capitalism. He assimilates into the American culture, leaving behind his old identity. Due to his transformation, Tateh can make friends in Atlantic City with a white couple mom and dad (Doctorow 33). However, Tateh then marries a lady from a stylish family in California once Father and Mameh are gone, and they still live happily after them.
White people perceive themselves as superior to other races, thus disregarding African American people’s interests. Despite the continued attempts of people from a foreign culture to reform and adapt to the American system, the exchanges indicate discrimination against people of African origin. Coalhouse’s life experience, narrated in Ragtime, depicts African Americans’ struggles to search for better living in America. Literature from Ragtime and Contemporary United States affirms the difficulties faced by immigrants coming to America in search of better living conditions (Duncan and Goddard 137).
The American culture is rigid to accommodate new immigrants’ norms, and new people coming to America face numerous struggles before being incorporated into the American Society. Social menaces of police discrimination, social isolation, racism, rights violation, torture, and murder portray people’s struggles with diverse cultures in America.
Works Cited
Booth, William. “Washingtonpost: Myth of the Melting Pot: America’s Racial and Ethnic Divides.”. 2019.
Branigin, William. “Washingtonpost.com: Myth of the Melting Pot: America’s Racial and Ethnic Divides.” 1998. Web.
Doctorow, E L. Ragtime. Penguin, 2011.
Duncan, Russell, and Joseph Goddard. Contemporary United States : An Age of Anger and Resistance. Palgrave, 2018.
Washington Post. “Washingtonpost.com: Myth of the Melting Pot: America’s Racial and Ethnic Divides.”. 1998. Web.