The dominant culture in the United States has been that of white, middle-class Protestants whose ancestors emigrated from Western Europe. Today, the dominant culture is primarily that of an urban professional and business population, college educated, and increasingly characterized in the younger age groups by double incomes. Universal education and literacy for all citizens are valued. Ethnicity and race alone do not determine cultural identity. See figure 3.1 on page 74.
Individuals are members of multiple microcultural groups.
Diversity and education As an educator, you will encounter studen5s from diverse ethnic, racial, religious, age, physical or mental ability, and economic groups during your career. The translation of this reality into educational practice leads to different strategies and outcomes. Assimilation i s the process by which an immigrant group or culturally distinct group is incorporated into the mainstream culture. The group either adopts the culture of the dominant group as its own or interacts with it in a way that forges a new or different culture that is shared by both groups. At the beginning of the 2oth century, the melting pot theory emerged as a description of how immigrants contributed to the evolution of a new American culture.