America and Individualism

A question from "Jacob Riis: Shedding Light On NYC's 'Other Half'" article: 
"If different "races" and nationalities possess inherent moral and cultural characteristics, how can that be reconciled with the American creed of individualism?"


I LOVE this question, because I struggle with the idea of American "individualism".  It seems to me as though society wants us to conform to the 'norm'.  Yet there is this strive, this American Dream to be individualistic, to stick out.   How can these two ideals coexist?  I have a hard time with this.  


I think of Perfect Cities, and how different jobs, the upward mobility of Chicago as a whole, and the emergence of women's and men's rights caused this city to be individualistic. But then I find myself kind of clumping together all the people of Chicago into little groups and just assuming they were all the same; it is just that simple.   But then this defeats the "individualistic" vision I have of Chicago.  Can a city have individualism itself, even if the people are not all individualistic?   Can individualism naturally exist in a person, or does the idea of individualism have to be planted in his head?  Is it even individualism if someone before him thought of it?


Inherent moral and cultural characteristics will always be a part of America.  We are a big hodge-podge pish-posh of different cultures and morals.  This makes these different morals and cultures individualistic.  They are defined, they stick out.  But do the people?  Or are they just swallowed up into the group?  Does individualism of a group or a city cancel the possibility that a member of that group or city can achieve individualism?