In my opinion, Civ I and II were all about trying to define what is American. This semester we continued that discussion, focusing on groups of people who were certainly recognized as “other” initially.America from Reconstruction through WW1 was not the melting pot that it is rumored to be. The decades surrounding the turn of the century saw a number of divisions in America. Following Union Victory in 1865, African Americans officially became free citizens of the United States. However, they clearly were not accepted among white society, especially in the American South. Faulkner’s 1932 novel, Light in August, conveyed just how deep black racism ran. What strikes me as being the most disturbing is that race is so much a social construct that if a person was even suspected to have “black blood” (as Joe did in Faulkner’s novel) they were automatically hurled to the bottom of the social ladder. Immigrants also faced great difficulty integrating into American society. Though they were not black, western European immigrants were labeled “non-whites”. They were stereotyped and mocked in the media, and filled the least desirable job positions. Even among the immigrants there were divisions. For example, Irishmen were at the forefront of anti-Chinese propaganda in the west. Also, northern Italians segregated themselves from southern Italians, who had darker complexion and whom white Americans automatically associated with blacks. It took decades for immigrant groups to achieve “whiteness” and acceptance in America. Gender division was ubiquitous in society, even though gender roles changed. Concepts of masculinity turned around the turn of the century. The workplace gave working class women the opportunity to take part in a consumer society for the first time. However, even with women’s expanding rights, they were never on equal ground with men.