The Culture Of The American Society

1. How can an understanding of the complexities of culture help us make sense of the day-to-day world which we live? Give an example from your life to illustrate your answer.

American culture has been referred to as a “melting pot.” Different cultures have added their own distinct aspects to society, making America a diverse country. Despite the plethora of cultures, certain norms, mores, and folkways are evident in American society. These ideas are vital to the function and stability of America. They provide guidelines for what is acceptable and not. In virtually every society, there are people who engage in deviant behavior and do not abide by the values that the rest of society follows. Theorists have debated if people are socialized into acting this way and if it is a social or personal problem. The sociological study of culture focuses on norms, mores, and folkways.

Contemporary American culture is defined as common themes of political attitudes, religious beliefs and news events that lead trends during the present time. Today, we see contemporary American culture portrayed in many more ways than that. We see it through art, music, and literature. In literature, for example, The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas by Ursula Le Guin, contemporary American culture is portrayed throughout. The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas represents contemporary American culture by portraying the exploitation of others, the symbolism of Americas political systems and oppression of the lower classes, and the lacking of moral responsibility.

Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin was born on January 20, 1930 in New Jersey. He and Armstrong were both young men when they joined NASA. Both young men went to college and finished all of the necessary courses needed to enroll into the facility. “Buzz” had one of the most successful space walks in the world. He was in space for 5 hours before being returned to the planet. Buzz like Armstrong like to do

“What’s the worst that can happen?” I think as I push myself into a 10-foot deep pool without any certainty that I would float. This is the manner in which I do things: opening my mouth with no idea of what would happen next, and as one can imagine, this requires a step out of the comfort zone. I tell myself that though I am not the most confident in my abilities, I at least have the courage to begin somewhere. This keeps me motivated to continue putting myself into deep holes and finding my way out along the way. Robert Lipsyte’s “Jock Culture” has helped me to decide what these qualities meant in terms of my place in society. His classification of Jocks: people who were “brave, manly, ambitious, focused, patriotic and goal-driven” and

Picture this: A fair sized home including running water and electricity with a somewhat recent model car in the driveway. At least a high school diploma under your belt, and if you really wanted to, you could open up your own business with the right idea and a loan from the bank; even if you were born into an impoverished family. Does this scenario sound familiar? It should, because it is the summarized and generalized version of the American lifestyle. We tend to take for granted everything we have, especially if we are born into certain societies where these things mentioned above are considered a given. However, not all countries share the same luxuries as Americans, for these possessions are indeed luxuries for those who were born and

This paragraph relates to the social interaction and described in the Chapter 3 about language and Chapter 5 that include group and social structure. We can see the characteristic of social interaction among persons, means response to someone behavior and can reflect the norms an values of the dominant culture and our socialization experiences within that culture (page 106). The social reality reflects a group’s power within a society and they are who define the values in that society. In Manchester we observed a diverse culture that has interaction between them and with people out of their own boundaries. That is why maintain respect to the values and norms of the American culture. In relation to the cultural variation we identify the language

One of the most prominent components of American culture is to be the best that we can be due to our individualistic based mindset. Although this can be viewed as a weakness, I see it as a strength when it comes to expressing my own emotions and opinions in writing. However, I comprehend that I am limited to only what I have learned thus far in high school level writing classes, and need to expand my horizons by taking more advanced level education courses. The American culture I have been surrounded by and writing education system has pushed me to pursue betterment in my literary langue skills and critical thought process, and that is what I intend to continue on doing while I am taking this course. Without a continued stream of information and teaching, I would be unable to advance from my current views and ideas and be placed at a standstill with no room for growth, but plenty for ignorance.

How does American society define one’s self-worth? By how they look, what they drive or simply what they buy? In today’s consumer centric American culture, our goods represent us as Americans as well as the American cultural identity that revolves around materialistic goods. In which a typical American works from 9am-5pm to earn a sufficient amounts of money to buy and display his self-worth through a variety of cleverly advertised goods. In which the advertisement depicts a perfect world that is free of pain, suffering, where the typical American can escape his routine life and experience ephemeral “freedom”. To this very purpose of freedom that our founding fathers wrote the constitution to which today’s conformities ideals and societal norms have suppressed.

Long before there were grocery stores, cars or electricity, humans had the same essential survival needs that we have today – oxygen, food, water, shelter and sleep. For humans today, we can find everything we’d ever need in a store, but without the technology to make life easy, a lot of cultures around the world adopted a nomadic lifestyle. These cultures didn’t have the luxury of living in the same house or a neighborhood their entire lives, and the environments they lived in were harsh. In order to find their five basic survival needs, these nomadic cultures instead had to travel from one new location to the next in search of their next set of resources.

In the story of Samir, he illustrates that globalization and local culture wrestle with each other to determine what people deem correct. In his account, Samir portrays the westernized medicine’s dominance over an indigenous Costa Rican medicine man. In addition, Samir highlights many benefits that globalization opens the door to. For example, globalization has opened him to other cultures and languages allowing him to become more understanding of other people and to notice a unity among all people (Culture and Globalization, n.d.).

On the topic of culture, ethnocentrism should be mindful as it refer to culturally biased judgement of an individual’s perspective of their own culture is superiors than another (Levines 2001). This is not to be confused with racism as to be an ethnocentric often relates to how we individuals view another culture from our own. For example it is considered norm in China for fellow co-workers to ask each other’s how much they earned whereas in European country it is considered rude and inappropriate.

The society of America today is total different for most Americans then what it was during the 1950s , 1960s , 1970s and on into the 80s. America today is one were black people have the vote and have the same rites as white men and women. Today the leader of the free world is Black some thing that many though would never happen in there generation. But there are still inequality in America today. Urban ghettos are still mostly full of uneducated black people. Black men in America are four times more likely to go to prison. Drop out rates for black students are higher then white and those going on to collage and university is lower then whites. This problem goose back centres. The problem is not because of today issue ( but they don’t help

The United States is made up of different cultural groups that often been Americanized, due to the cultural dominance. The dominant culture in a society is seen in a group of members that are the majority or has more power over other culture groups. American culture dominances is seen through their values. America is materialized culture; their culture is seen through the value American dream, style, food and political values. The diffusion of cultural dominance in America has been causing negative effect for other cultures. The dominant culture in America has been increasing and influencing other cultures ever since the 3rd agricultural revolution in the 19th century, it is seen through the way food is mainly process, the distribute and available to the people, and how food is mostly consume.

American culture refers to the traditions and practices of the people of the United States. Culture comprises of the nature of buildings, religion, music language and marriage. The population of the United States is more than 320 million people making it the most culturally diverse country in the globe. Books such as Crabgrass Frontier, Manifest Destination and Muscular Christianity are important sources of information about American culture. This paper is a reflection on the methods that these books use in providing information about the evolution of the US culture. The paper examines the relationship between these three sources and ways they challenge or inform an understanding of the American society during the late 19th and early 20th century. There is an analysis of the efficiency of the issues tackled by these books in influencing the contemporary discourse surrounding American culture. The major argument of this paper is that Crabgrass Frontier, Manifest Destination and Muscular Christianity provide reliable information about the evolution of the US culture and they supplement each other through the use of relevant examples.