There are many reasons for people of the same race or ethnicity to form (sometimes exclusive) social groups. They may have similar values, speak the same second language, go to the same church, eat the same food or simply do their hair the same way. There is nothing wrong with this, per se—after all, in America we have something called the freedom of association.

Whites do it all the time, at Harvard and beyond. They just don’t get called on it as often. I was never asked in middle school why I was self-segregating. No one accused me of not getting along well with others.

People cross cultural lines, or don’t, for all sorts of reasons. Some are personal, some are societal. It is the societal reasons that we can change, which we must change and which we all bear responsibility for changing.

Without cultural exchange, without some breaking down of cultural barriers, there can be no evolution of the broader American culture. This is a difficult process. It threatens the dissolution of core cultural values; it threatens the replacement of traditionally held values for non-traditional ones. Most of all, it means change for both cultures involved in the exchange.

We all bear part of the responsibility for forging a new American culture that better reflects our shared values, just as we all bear some responsibility for the perpetuation of cultural isolationism. Cultural isolationism is untenable. But cultural evolution can only happen through the dangerous, difficult task of integration.

Ending self-segregation is not as simple as putting people of different backgrounds into the same classroom. Even if we were broken down into randomized blocking groups of one, self-segregation would still happen at Harvard. You can’t legislate away the comfort of being with like-minded individuals. That is, after all, the reason we are all at Harvard to begin with. I am pessimistic that self-segregation will end in America even after 50 years have passed and there is no longer a white majority. The increase of the minority presence in America is not enough to guarantee cultural interchange. We must be at once more courageous in our individual acts, and more understanding of our individual choices.

No one person or group bears the responsibility for self-segregation. Rather the imperative to challenge our segregationist tendencies rests on us as individuals, uneasily but equally.

Meredith B. Osborn ’02 is a social studies concentrator in Leverett House. Her column appears on alternate Fridays.