American Socioeconomic Situations and Culture in the Early 20th Century

After reading several articles about American socioeconomic situations and culture in the early 20th century, the United States seemed like they are somewhat isolationist with some things, but open to many other things. As some say, “America isolationism is a myth” (Mcdougall 137) is slightly true when it came to cultures and foreign policy in the beginning of the 20th century. The leaders of the United States wanted to keep the United States out of war, but at the same time increase the economy and establish the United States into a world power. The United States has always been involved in affairs with foreign countries. In the 20th century the United States was doing many things that involved the rest of the world. One thing the United States did was start the study abroad program where colleges sent students to foreign countries to get an understanding of what school was like in another country and to better the students education. The colleges wanted to be able to confront “national stereotypes, accommodating a foreign language and education system, and apprehending the effects of World War I on French people and politics” (Walton 5). With the United States being involved in foreign economies it helped the United States become closer of being a world power. The United States was not involved heavily with in culture in foreign countries, but did try to influence countries around the world to help make the economy stronger. With the economy strong, some foreign countries were weary of the United States, but on the other hand the United States was wary of being pulled into a foreign war. On the other hand, some foreign countries respected the United States when it came to angering or provoking the United States into war. This helped because United States leaders did not want to get in a war after what had happened in the Spanish-American War. We saw this in one of the required videos, because the United States knew that Cuba was getting missiles but feared the