Read together, novels from a contemporary world writer (Salman Rushdie) and two modern American authors (Faulkner and Ellision) depict a century-long transformation of how American identity and experience have been conceived and imagined; these changes are revealed in the fiction of encounters between immigrants and natives.

Nothing happening in America today will do more to affect our children's future than the wave of new immigrants flooding into the country, mostly from the developing world. Already, one in ten Americans is foreign-born, and if one counts their children, one-fifth of the population can be considered immigrants. Will these newcomers make it in the U.S? Or will today's realities -- from identity politics to cheap and easy international air travel -- mean that the age-old American tradition of absorption and assimilation no longer applies? Reinventing the Melting Pot is a conversation among two dozen of the thinkers who have looked longest and hardest at the issue of how immigrants assimilate: scholars, journalists, and fiction writers, on both the left and the right. The contributors consider virtually every aspect of the issue and conclude that, of course, assimilation can and must work again -- but for that to happen, we must find new ways to think and talk about it. Contributors to Reinventing the Melting Pot include Michael Barone, Stanley Crouch, Herbert Gans, Nathan Glazer, Michael Lind, Orlando Patterson, Gregory Rodriguez, and Stephan Thernstrom.

Essay from the year 2017 in the subject Didactics for the subject English - Literature, Works, , language: English, abstract: "The Namesake" is the first novel from Pulitzer-winner Jhumpa Lahiri, focusing on the division between assimilated American children and Indian migrants. The author analyzes Ganguli family, beginning with Ashoke’s close confrontation with death when he gets through a train crash in his homeland, India. Apparently, this took place when he was reading his cherished novel by Nikolai Gogol. During his stay in the United States of America with his wife, he chooses to name his newborn child Gogol, which was a pet name. Later, this turns out to be his official name, and Gogol is oblivious of the importance behind it. Thus, this piece analyses the American identity in the novel, The Namesake by exploring the role of family, culture, and environment in shaping American identity