Sam Francis and the Triple Melting Pot

Sam Francis and the Triple Melting Pot

It was sheer coincidence, which of course does not exist in the mind of God, that allowed me to take part in this year’s Arbaeen march organized largely by Iraqi Shi’a in Dearborn, Michigan. My opportunity to go on the real Arbaeen pilgrimage from Najaf to Karbala in Iraq to mourn the death of Hussein ibn Ali at the hands of the wicked Khalif Yazid had been thwarted by an unexpected surgery three years ago. Participating in the American replication of that march was more interesting from a sociological point of view because it allowed me to ponder one of the fundamental pillars of ethnic life in America, namely, the Triple Melting Pot. For those who are unaware of its existence, the Triple Melting Pot is “a metaphor that describes a pattern of assimilation in which various nationality groups merge through intermarriage, but with a strong tendency to do so within the three major religious groupings: Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish.” The Triple Melting Pot argues that “as immigrants assimilated into American culture, religious boundaries would replace ethnic boundaries as the main point of differentiation among people of European descent in the United States.”

Read More

The Hispanic Challenge and the Logic of Empire

The Hispanic Challenge and the Logic of Empire

When the hijacked airliners flew into the World Trade Center twin towers in New York city, the need for explanation was almost as urgent and almost as immediate as the need for firemen. Since no one had time to do the research and be on that night’s six o’clock news, the need for explanation was filled by taking already-written books off the shelf, dusting them off and promoting them as if they had been written with an uncanny prescience. One such book, probably the most oft-cited book in this regard, was Samuel Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations.

Read More