The French () are a nation and ethnic group who are identified with the country of France. This connection may be legal, historical, and/or cultural. Descending from peoples of Celtic origin, later mixing with Romance and Germanic origin, and having experienced a high rate of inward migration since the middle of the 19th century, modern French society can be considered a melting pot. France was still a patchwork of local customs and regional differences in the late 19th century, and besides the common speaking of the French language, the definition of some unified French culture is a complex issue. The French have equated their nationality with citizenship, regardless of ethnicity or country of residence. Thus, to be French is to be a citizen of France, regardless of one's origin, race, or religion, making France a generic territory where people are bound by the French language. Successive waves of immigrants during the 19th and 20th centuries were rapidly assimilated into French culture. Seeing itself as an inclusive nation with universal values, France has always valued and strongly advocated assimilation where immigrants were expected to adhere to French traditional values and cultural norms. However, despite the success of such assimilation, the French Government abandoned it in the mid-1980s encouraging immigrants to retain their distinctive cultures and traditions and requiring from them a mere integration. This "integrationist" policy has recently been called into question, for example, following the 2005 French riots in some troubled and impoverished immigrant suburbs. Most French people speak the French language as their mother tongue, but certain languages like Norman, Occitan, Corsican, Euskara, French Flemish and Breton remain spoken in certain regions (see Language policy in France). In addition to mainland France, French people and people of French descent can be found internationally, in overseas departments and territories of France such as the French West Indies (French Caribbean), and in foreign countries with significant French-speaking population groups or not, such as the United Kingdom (French Britons), the United States (French Americans), Canada (French Canadians), Argentina (French Argentines), Brazil (French Brazilians) or Uruguay (French Uruguayans), and some of them have a French cultural identity.