There is more than one sort of "multiculturalism"

and it is time we recognised this and discussed it.

Talking about "multiculturalism" and how wonderful it is has been one of those "big" issues recently. The government loves to tell us how wonderful it is. Others are being a bit more cautious.

I came across the idea that not everyone lived the way we did very early in life. One of my early memories is of being swung high in the air by a "black" man who, at least to me, appeared to be very big. He wore a "skirt" and he spoke a little differently.  He had "talked in church" and now he was with us for Sunday lunch.  He was of course a missionary. He came from Tonga. My brother and I thought he was fascinating. He was good with children, full of interesting stories. We met him several more times over the years as he came backwards and forwards for various purposes. He taught us a lot.  

The same church, of which Grandpa was an "Elder", sponsored a considerable number of migrants from Holland in the fifties and sixties. These were people who had been traumatised by war. They had very little. The role of the church was to see them provided with housing, the basics of life and work. Grandpa must have called in many favours in and around the docks.  

Their ability to speak English varied but, with adults, they made the effort. My paternal grandmother, with just three years of schooling herself, took on the role of accidental teacher of English as she introduced the women to the shops and other services.  That they needed to learn English and do it quickly was never questioned. At home they spoke Dutch. If we visited they would speak to our parents in English. We children were spoken to in Dutch, just as their own children were spoken to. We were permitted to respond in English of course - their own children did!  

The food was a little different. I remember staying with them and being given, as a very special treat, appelbeignets - apples fried in batter. There were other little things, like removing our shoes before going inside, that made them "different" but I simply accepted it all just as I accepted the Serbian woman who lived next door to us would point to something and ask "You say?" and I would tell her the English word. She always wore a headscarf. It would be tied behind her head at home and under her chin if she was going shopping. 

Those migrants kept their language at home. They expected to speak English at the shops or in the workplace. Their children "picked it up" at school. They had traditions. Our Dutch friends celebrated more on Christmas Eve than Christmas Day and we found that interesting but we were not expected to do it ourselves. Gradually they became part of daily life. There are still the occasional reminders of where their families come from but they have blended in.

And there is the other sort of "multiculturalism" brought in by people whose backgrounds are so very different from mine. They also speak a different language at home. Where I understood some Dutch simply because the language was so close to English I did not and still do not understand any Vietnamese or Chinese or any of the languages of the Indian sub-continent. Their food and their traditions are very, very different. It is all fascinating. We can buy some of those things in shops. Some of the most common items, such as rice noodles, can be bought in the supermarket. 

Middle Cat often goes to a Chinese grocery store because they stock a particular brand of soy sauce and several other items which are useful.  If you go in there you will rarely hear English spoken apart from what is absolutely essential in order to do business. These people are polite but it is clear their world is not our world. They see no need to speak English as our Dutch friends did. They do not need it. They have their festivals and family occasions and see no need to integrate the way the former migrants did.

And now we have more migrants from other places, many of them refugees. Some of them mix even less. There are some who speak no English, who rely on the many interpreter services. They are keeping as close as they can to their language, their traditions, their food and their old way of life.  For some of them I suspect it is because, for all they have been told they are welcome, they are homesick. This is still a strange country for them. They want it to be like "home" but it isn't.

I wonder how much allowing, even encouraging, them to keep all this is helping them. Should more be demanded of them? As someone asked me yesterday when we were trying to sort out a problem, "When does multiculturalism divide us?"