“A Quilt of a Country”, the argument presented by Anna Quindlen, she states that a quilt symbolizes America. For example, during Quindlen’s survey she found that most people think that America is a special place when she argues “One of the things that it stands for is this vexing notion that a great nation can consist entirely of refugees from other nations, that people of different, even warring religions and cultures can live, if not side by side side, then on either side of the country’s Chester Avenues”(Quindlen 5). This shows that people think that America is unique. Furthermore, the evidence implies that just like a quilt we are all different and we still manage to get along and work together. In addition, after Quindlen describes the…
A lot of culture combined in America. Nobody could call themselves only one thing since they were probably decedents of two or more cultures. Hector St. John Crevecoeur defines an American in Document H, Letters from an American Farmer. He said that an American is a person who left their culture and came to America.…
The different ideas of how the government was supposed to be set up and look separated the colonists greatly. The Federalists wanted a strong central government and the Antifederalists wanted just the opposite. With vague compromises, the framers of the Constitution aimed at settling controversies but they outlasted and later on continued to destroy the new government.…
Americans’ debates about the bases of our national identity reflect a larger contradiction in the Western traditions itself. For if the West, as we are frequently reminded, created the idea of ‘liberty’ as a universal human right, [West] also invented the concept of ‘race’ and ascribed to it predictive powers about human behavior (Foner 141).…
Since 1893, when Fredrick Jackson Turner announced that the American identity was not a byproduct of the first colonists, but that it emerged out of the wilderness and only grew with the surfacing of the frontier, America has placed a great emphasis on the notion of a national identity. However, the paradox of the American identity is that although the United States is a melting pot of many different traditions, motives, and ideals, there are nevertheless, distinctive qualities that define the "American." It usually takes a crisis to cause an individual, or a nation, to renew itself. However, sometimes it takes a fight for survival to induce it.…
There was a combining of culture in America that was unique and this mixing that occurred throughout the colonies made it so that the majority could not identify, fully, with the term "Englishmen" but identified themselves as Americans. In Europe most would call themselves French, Dutch, Irish, ect., but in the colonies there were so many people immigrating from not only England, but most other European countries and in America they were marrying and reproducing in a way that did not happen as often in Europe so they identified with the term "American" because they no longer could identify with only one European country. The descendents of an Irish woman and a French man born in America could not identify solely with the term Irish or French, and they were not born in Europe so the term European could not apply to them, but the word American described these unique people perfectly. The American was a mixture of many cultures and could identify with living in America and being a part of large web of different backgrounds. Hector St. John Crèvecoer explained this concept of an American in his "Letters from an American Farmer," composed in the 1770's. Here he explains that the descendent of many different cultures "is an American, who leaving behind him all his ancient prejudices and manners, receives new ones from the new mode of life he has embraced." Crèvecoer goes on to say that America is a place that people of many different races are combined and "melted into a new race of man," a race of man that will cause many changes…
In many parts of America, there have been the controversy of who should be considered American. After listening to “Who is an American?” podcast by LatinoUSA, it brought attention to many listeners like myself of what it is meant to be an American. As stated in the podcast, “as identity begin to continue to evolve, many are left out of the picture”, in other words, there are many identities that may once been a part of a specific culture, but as time progress, they may not affiliate themselves with that culture anymore. A great example would be China and Taiwan. Taiwan was once part of China; however, they decided to separate themselves from China and become a country themselves, yet speaking…
Hirsch mentions the "hyphenated American: the Italo-American, the Polish-American, the Afro- American, the Asian-American and so forth." He points out that he is in favor of each minority's protection, nurture, and respect; however, he strongly feels that people need to decide what "American' means on the other side of the hyphen... what national…
Before reading this article, what was your answer to the question “Who’s American?” How did you develop this concept of being an American? If you or your parents were born in another country, how would you define the National identity of that Country? (For example, what does it mean to be Dominican or Chinese?)…
In “Americanism,” Theodore Roosevelt describes the meaning of hyphenated Americans and their lives in the United States. There was no room in Roosevelt’s America for immigrants or sons of immigrants, who cling to the speech, the customs, the way of life, and the habits of thought from the old world which they have left. The hyphenated American is not an American at all. Those immigrants who hyphenated their Americanism, modifying it with the land of their or their parents’ birth, were and could not be true Americans. These Americans also can vote and be the primarily citizen of a foreign country. Roosevelt writes that the foreign-born population must be an Americanized population. They must talk the language of its native-born fellow-citizens; possess American citizenship, American ideas and maintain an American standard of living. The immigrants must not to be allowed to drift or to be put at the mercy of the exploiter. According to Roosevelt, America cannot afford to keep a lot of immigrants as industrial assets and not as human beings. We also cannot pay low wages to immigrants, and keep immigrants working on American mines, railways or working in our munitions plants because it is dangerous. All United States citizens must stand shoulder to shoulder for the elimination of race and religious prejudice. We must also improve maintenance of the American standard of living; direct every national resource, material and spiritual, and train our people to overcome difficulties. We can do all this work in a democratic country where all people have equal rights and hopes for a good future life.…
Lewis Lapham's essay, "Who and What is America?" raises the subject that all Americans share a "unified field of emotion" and how we disguise "the noun" American. This unified field of emotion is what connects all of the citizens' communities together, making the nation a stronger place. According to Lapham, the unified field of emotion helps Americans form communities and agree on similar ideas, such as religious, cultural and political beliefs. The field of emotion gives power and strength to the communities to agree and live with each other no matter what social class or race. There are factors that influence what Americans desire, what we believe, and how we identify others and ourselves. Friends, family and the media affect Americans' views and what we see ourselves as. Not all Americans can consider identifying themselves as "the noun" American. The media and the politicians try to categorize Americans and split us into groups turning one against another. Politics turn Democratic Americans against Republican Americans and the media turns white Americans against Americans of color. As a result, the sense of feeling as one nation is lost, causing prejudice, dishonesty, and hate. Christopher Edley, Jr. states in his essay "The New American Dilemma: Racial Profiling Post-9/11" that our diversity is what makes our nation strong, but this strength can be seen only when our diverse nation acts as one. Edley correctly emphasizes that when we identify ourselves as a plain American without a subordination, we are able to speak with candor and truth.…
During the development of the United States, there were specific ideas of what the country would represent. As laws and systems began changing in the country, things that should have naturally evolved did not. Overtime, America has become a country that is made up of people from different cultures and backgrounds. Properly accounting for the ethnicity of each individual would represent the uniqueness of the United States to the rest of the world and bring it closer together as a country. Until there is uniformity in the characterization of the citizens of America, equality cannot ever be truly attainable. Solutions to this problem are out there, but putting them into effect seems to be taking a back seat to issues that are deemed more essential. When defining race, having broad categories such as “white” or “other,” and then requiring others to be labeled so much more specifically, creates a perilous divide between citizens. Hyphenating only some races and then generally grouping others together is unfair for everyone.…
Most people would agree that being an American is living in the United States, but it is also more than that. It’s the feeling of freedom. Immigrants come to America because they want a better life for themselves and their families. Our country is great because citizens have many privileges that other countries don’t. Also, Americans are different, but get to live in the same country together. The American Identity is composed of working hard to live how you wish to live, standing up for your beliefs to make positive change, and coexisting peacefully with friends, family, and neighbors. This lifestyle was one of the many pull factors for immigrants in other countries.…
Being American doesn’t depend on one’s ethnicity anyone can classify themselves as an American, even if other people don’t see it that way. In Kesaya E. Noda’s “Growing up Asian in America” she explains that her identity was challenged when she says, “Sometimes when I was growing up, my identity seem to hurtle towards me and paste itself right to my face. I felt that way, encountering the stereotypes of my race perpetuated by non-Japanese people (primarily white) who may or may not have had contact with other Japanese in America”(Kesaya 32). In other words, the author showed us how she…
Part three: The author defines exactly what it means to be an American. According to his definition an American is a European or a descendent of an European. Therefore, America is the only place in the world where a person may have parents and grandparents all from different cultural backgrounds. The author then goes on to say that an American is one who has given up the old for the new and is motivated by hard work and opportunity to improve his…