The Modern Day American Culture

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.

Since its inhabitance, competition and dominance has been a concept that remains prevalent throughout American life. Past ideologies such as Manifest Destiny, Cultural Imperialism, and Ethnocentrism are all practices and beliefs comprising what it means to be American for many citizens, while also continually shaping outside perception of Americans today. On one hand, many countries have and continue to fully embrace American culture, globalization, and the rise of capitalism. In contrast, many countries have and continue to reject America’s stride for world assimilation regarding their ideals and values.

For years America has been seen as the world’s hero swooping in and saving the day from foreign bad guys, or at least that’s America sees itself as. To many other countries however America is often seen as the world’s bully or just a nuisance. The United States has had many positive impacts on the world and those seem to over shadow the large number of negative impacts it has imposed as well. The world has been changed by the U.S. in both positive and negative ways, and this is due to the alternating use of internationalism and isolationism. Throughout the United States’ existence both foreign polices have existed, but rarely have them been used at the came time. In the present day the U.S. has mainly focused on internationalism. This has

Why would America want a bad image, as a people and as a country? Some would believe that the U.S. is trying to flex its muscles to show its power. (Richman) However, many would agree that America doesn’t have the money or men to keep this up for much longer. The U.S. is in debt and the average American is now poorer than the average Canadian. That doesn't say much, does it? "The U.S. government is now responsible for more than a third of all the government debt in the entire world." (Snyder) Why can't America just let other countries take care of themselves and be more independent?

No matter what I tried, I could never truly have an objective mindset if I continued defining the term American as I was. If I clung to my own preconceived notion that there was something unique about Americans, I could never be objective. So instead, I began to look at other countries, trying to find parallels. To my shock and dismay, I found that America is actually similar to North Korea in some ways: citizens of both countries are raised on nationalistic pride and are told that they live in the greatest country in the world, that there is no place better. This corrupts one’s ability to look at their country with a truly objective eye. From this, I discerned a troubling fact: all people are the same, regardless of nationality or personal beliefs. There is no true separation between individuals of different countries, helping to develop my current belief that the term American holds no special regard in comparison to the rest of the world. It is simply a term used to allow an individual to feel

As a native born American citizen, I am blessed. Blessed with freedom of speech, with freedom of religion, and with the ability to pursue happiness. Because of this American privilege, I am grateful, but I am ignorant. America is a great nation, but because we cannot fully comprehend what it may be like to be born without privilege, we have become selfish. If it is beneficial, America severely chastises and punishes any for the commitment of atrocities against ourselves and others, but when not directly affected, America ignores atrocities committed in other countries, even when committed by us.

Many Americans seem to be anxious about how the world perceives them, and are disturbed by what seems to be its declining image and position in many countries. Some wonder if the end is near for U.S. dominance or influence. The following are some quotations from recently published materials that are worth considering.

This essay will examine the rise of “modern America”, there were economic, religious, and aspect of life changes took place and it was greatly changed the Americans society’s perceptions, specifically, the north and the south. The rise of “modern America” was greatly motivated immigrants to come to the United States for economic opportunity, industrialization in the North after the civil war created new businesses and job regulations, and the demand for social changes; all of these factors shaped America socially, politically, and economically.

For example, in the Syrian Refugee, one website called “New U.S. Assistance to Respond to Syria Crisis” explained that, “We also see the plight of refugees fleeing the region to European countries and are reminded of the need to provide humanitarian assistance and to promote inclusion and self-reliance in countries of first asylum”. Even though other countries are helping the Refugees but the countries have to make room for the people and make sure that the kids get education. Europe is being nice and letting these people stay in their country but then there are also going to be issues. Another example is from Darfur Genocide, one website called “American Response to Darfur” showed that “However, the US government does not act independently of the social current, and non- profit world lies in the background of official US politics”. America is feeling bad in for the people that are facing hard time in this Darfur Genocide problem and so they help them in this problem and later the realize that they are going to need to give lots of support to the people and realize that they have some weakness too. To sum it up, sometime when we help someone, we need to give them more than what they need. We have to make sure that everything will be fine and normal for the

With this being said, I would describe the culture of America, to be entirely obscure. The government has concealed the truth about our country by masking it. Allowing citizens of the country to believe that we have nothing to worry about in comparison to civil unrest in countries like Syria and Somalia. We are expected to be bystanders. In the US, we are constantly being persuaded to just stay positive and allow the government to run its course. Being positive despite our obscure culture is not the solution to ignorance in this country. I believe that the medium that most successfully influences public opinion in the United States of America is the

America’s foreign policy affects each and every person in the world in terms of prices, taxes, supply of gasoline, and the lives of our soldiers also depends on how we associate with US. This country can bring hope to the lives of the poorest people in the world. It is because of their persona that they are able to respect the lives of others who are not even their own. Most American citizens believe in embracing their values, justice, fairness, democracy, a helping hand when there is need and hard work. Their values are applied from their households, to

“America was conducting business as usual, but others were joining the game.” (Zakaria, 221). All this time we thought we were on top, we were actually slowly becoming less and less of leader and more a bystander as the rest of the world is slowly rising around us. Zakaria shows in that quote that as America has been continuing business like always, and because of this we have failed to realize our standing with the world around us. In the book The Post-American World, Zakaria shows us the challenges that America faces today. I believe the United States is most affected by our ignorance, competition, and worldly participation.

Some would say that the U.S. centric history taught in public schools presents a one-sided perspective, encourages over-nationalism, and impedes U.S. foreign relations. Those who carry these beliefs have coined the term “Americentrism”. Americentrism is defined as “the idea or perceived bias to judge other cultures and nations by American standards or to center around America in news” (Rationalwiki). This in turn is derived from the concept of “ethnocentrism,” or the “idea of judging another culture solely by the values and standards of one’s own culture” (Wikipedia). One cannot deny that the United States centers everything it possibly can around itself. This includes everything from the nation’s curriculum taught in public schools to its day-to-day news. However, that is exactly what happens in every country across the globe. It is only normal for a country to center things around itself because its audience is its own population. This is not necessarily a negative thing either. The majority of people are not interested in the world as a whole. Instead, they want to know what is happening around them on a local, state or national level because that is what applies to them personally. In the case of the United States, there is a definite focus on all things American in the classroom, but due to numerous external and internal factors, the effects of this focus are negligible in the grand scheme of things. Nevertheless, that does not mean that people’s perspectives cannot be

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.