Being An American Christmas

In this paper I will discuss Social Theories such as Structural Functionalism, Conflict theory; with emphasis on Karl Marx’s early work and how it relates to the conflict theory and Symbolic interaction. I intend to define and discuss relevant sociological terms of these theories and how these theories could apply to my favorite holiday which is Christmas.

How an Australian Christmas and an United States Christmas are the same is that they both celebrate Christmas on the same date, December twenty-fifth. They both children sing carols and have a kind of Santa. They spend time with their family and friends and exchange gifts. They even go shopping for Christmas presents and Christmas cards to give to family and friends. Some families have parties to have fun. Those are the things an Australian and an United States Chirstmas

There are similarities and differences between Christmas in America and Christmas in Italy. The Christmas holiday originated with the birth of Jesus Christ on December 25, a day around the shortest day of the year. Therefore, the main reason we celebrate the holiday is to celebrate Christ's birthday. Another reason for celebrating Christmas includes the changing of the seasons and the days that will become short before becoming long again. The shortest day, not necessarily falling on Christmas, is Winter Solstice which happens also to be a Pagan, agricultural holiday to mark the changes is the seasons. Most simply, we celebrate Christmas across the world as inspiration to imitate ethical behaviors of Christ who unconditionally loved all men and women regardless of their beliefs or backgrounds.

Christmas is a very special holiday in many countries including Spain and the United States. In the United States Christmas celebration traditionally starts after Thanksgiving. In Spain however it is not celebrated until Christmas Eve with their families.

Some of them don’t occur on Christmas day, but happens before or after the holiday. One of them is “The Day of the Candles,” or “Dia de las Velitas.” During this Columbian holiday, everyone lights up skinny candles and sets them outside buildings to light up cities. A tradition in Spain is to stay up to feast and party until morning. In an old Spanish verse, Christmas is called the “good night” or Noche Buena, so it says that the people cannot sleep. There are also religious traditions. In Mexico, children walk around the streets dressing up as Mary and Joseph, traveling by donkey to represent the time when the two had to find lodging. This is called Las Posadas. After the children do Las Posadas, they have a piñata party just for the fun of it. Spain honors the Mass of the Rooster, when it is said a rooster was one of the first to see the birth of baby Jesus. Spain celebrates it by lighting oil lamps and going to church to go to a mass at the midnight of Christmas

Ah Christmas, it is said to be the most wonderful time of the year. In the United States Christmas is a time of giving and receiving, spending time with your family, and in most Christian families, celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ. Christmas is hands-down the most highly commercialized holiday celebrated by Americans. In fact, according to CBS news, the average American will spend $700 on gifts this holiday season, totaling for a whopping $465 billion spent nation-wide. From mall Santas as far as the eye can see, to hearing Christmas music in every retail store you enter. Christmas is a time of high spirits and high spending in the U.S.

Mike Rauser’s article, “War on Christmas” product of spoiled attitudes, provides an introduction to help explain the contents learned in this class. His article has viewpoints that can be demonstrated by the four nodes of religion inquiry, and Ninian Smart’s six dimension of religion. His article acts as a springboard to show our understanding of the course materials.

Holidays are fundamental parts of diverse cultures and by observing them through the lens of an outsider; we are able to see how a culture can have different perceptions. Nonetheless, we can observe Christmas from the perspective of someone that isn’t part of the American culture. When I think about someone’s perspective on this holiday, I can imagine the following: For Christmas, families meticulously decorate their houses and bushes with wires. These wires are only turned on at nighttime. When they are turned on, the house becomes very illuminated, and every house on the block competes to see whose house looks the brightest. Americans become interested with the presence of their houses; they decorate their houses so others can admire them.

David Sedaris explains the different holiday practices Americans and the Dutch have. He talks about how Americans and Dutch people celebrate Christmas, also how they view the tale of Santa Claus. As Sedaris says, the American figure, Santa Claus, is “jolly and obese,” yet the Dutch figure, Saint Nicholas, is portrayed as “painfully thin, and not unlike the pope.” The differences between the Dutch and American Christmas figures and traditions provide evidence of the differences between their national character. Americans, with their fat, jolly Santa and tradition of opening presents on Christmas day are more materialistic and consumerist than the Dutch, whose skinny St. Nicholas and less gift-centered Christmas traditions are evidence of their

​First, Christmas is celebrated in the U.S on December 25th. On December 25th, families in the U.S exchange gifts. Some families put a lot of gifts under the Christmas tree for their family members. Families go to church and have a family feast. Most Americans believe that Jesus was born on the 25th of December, and that’s why most Americans

Have you ever wondered what it is like in other countries on Christmas? Such as... Mexico, Costa Rica, and Spain! There are some very interesting things that these countries do that are different from what we do in America. As you read below you will learn about the different ways people celebrate Christmas in their country.

Economy is not doing so well. Its become cold and not many crops are growing. Its Christmas. Officially my third Christmas in America. But I don’t celabrate it. See I am not Catholic or Christian I am Polytheistic and the owners don’t like that. Still here I am on Christmas day working. Another reason our kind is hated so much. Europeans believe that only people of their religion were right. As of the today they re-assigned me back the the cotton fields for a short amount of time. Its been a regular day that is until I look down on my arm I see the long scar that the owner whipped me with a few days ago. I traced my fingers around it. And I decided I didn’t want to live like this anymore. Grabing a small bag I put in what ever I could find

Every country has holidays and they have different ways of celebrating it. For example, Christmas in my home country, there’s so many things we do to celebrate Christmas. We do my secret angel. We chose a day, and in every week on that day we get together and exchange gifts, but the person you give the gifts to,do not know you are the one giving them the gifts until the last day of the secret angel. Also in the middle of the night we go around singing Christmas song to every sleeping neighbor, we call that las mañanitas, people often get mad because they need to wake up early in the morning to go to work, but that’s what makes it even funnier. On Christmas eve we have the family dinner and after that even though everyone has enough food for days, you will see our mothers taking food to the next door neighbor.On the 31st the whole neighborhood gets together in front of this store and they make a big asopao, which is a soup made out of rice, It's actually really good. We sit, share an amazing time dancing Bachata, merengue tipico. Just dancing our asses out, and having a great time. We wait until 12:00 am for the cañonaso which is where the fireworks come, and we hug and wish each other a happy new year. In One Hundred and seventieth things are not like that. People don’t get together to celebrate Christmas, we don’t go around together annoying people, the family just gets together on Christmas eve and wait until 12:00 am to open our gifts. I thought been in New

Christmas is the annual festival celebrating the birth of Jesus on the 25th December, at least that is what it began as initially. Since it has expanded into an international phenomenon for consumption, taking priority over our everyday practices of life (Michel De Certeau, 1980). Our time we spend divided between work and leisure in accordance to the codes and conventions of society shifts, Christmas derails these expectations. Yet surprisingly Christmas gains little attention in terms of social research, despite the fact that it can be explored diversely. The inquiry ‘What is Christmas?’ links to multiple aspects of social research. The aspects of Christmas can be subdivided into the following; religion, commercialism, gift-giving, social relationships, sensualism and mythology. This essay will analyse these fundamentals of Christmas through both psychological and sociological perspectives, as the theories among these two social sciences are best suited to the elements which make up Christmas itself.

Brandon searched the rest of the house and found Christmas cards stuffed in the toilet, Christmas cookies ground into the hallway carpet, and waffle batter covering the kitchen counters and floor. He saw red mixed in with the thick sticky residue and immediately thought of the worse, but saw that it was not blood but raspberry jam from a broken jar that had mixed into the batter. It did not lessen his concern, everywhere there was signs of violence. He found the rest of his mother's Santa Claus figurines outside in the snow with obvious marks that they had been urinated on. There was also evidence in the white ground, for it had been a White Christmas, that there had been much travel back and forth from the house. He noticed that all the family