Jessie Kichigin UGC Recitation Questions Week 4 1 Article 12 lays out a long history of cultural and ethnic strife in India First define multiculturalism Multiculturalism is a variety of religions ethnicities practices and cultural traditions within a region This usually happens when areas are combined or different people adopt different practices Like in India many people lived in a mixed society of Hinduism and Muslims which is multicultural because there is more than one culture abundantly Thus India was a multicultural society 2 I next want you to think about the United States another multicultural society Compare and contrast Indian society with the United States Do we face similar problems in the United States Are our problems of creating a sense of national unity different Come up with specific examples of comparison contrast As the article states a lot of tension in India is held in the mixed Muslim Hindu regions due to religion I would say we have a lot of racism because of religion also We constantly put Muslims down because we associate them with the September 11th attacks which is unfair The tension in India is a little understandable because they each have completely different beliefs and have to live near each other but I feel like a lot of our tension here in the states just don t have an underlying reason In India they are trying to educate people about their differences and all of the religions which we do here although not until a further age do we relate it to religion From elementary school we learn that picking on someone because of color or cultural clothing they wear or color skin etc is not appropriate not acceptable which I think is more or less of what India is doing also Also I liked how it mentioned that one of India s president s was previously an untouchable and that our president now is African American who s race used to be at the bottom of our societal hierarchy 3 Finally if you were in charge what type of policies would you suggest to try to minimize or reduce ethnic racial tensions in the United States Again be specific I would not allow tensions to get out of hand We have to be realistic and accept that the world will never live fully in peace and there will always be tension between certain groups of people However I would continue to educate kids at a young age about differences between each other and that it is in no way shape or form an excuse for hurting one s feelings or leaving them out I myself being Russian sometimes would get looked at weird or left out in elementary school and I know how hurtful it can be so I would do my best to help everyone out I would increase integration in schools As for adults I feel like it would be hard to change their already shaped opinions but there would be punishment for any kind of crime committed due to one s prejudice Also I like that we have the laws in act that ban an employer from discriminating employees based on cultural ethical and racial factors