Armenian culture and traditions

American culture and IDENTITY

Who is an American? What is American identity or what is American culture for that matter? These questions as important as they may be are elusive in nature since a definite answer would involve various complex concepts. An average American is not a white person, he is not black, he is not even yellow or brown-in fact he is a little of all these and more because he represents a unique amalgamation of various cultures and ethnic backgrounds.

Naylor (1997) explains this complex nature of American culture and identity very effectively in his book 'Cultural Diversity in the United States':

Culture lies at the heart of almost everything humans think and do. A cultural group exists whenever a human grouping learns a particular set of beliefs and behaviors that distinguishes it from other groups. The United States is an identifiable nation-state culture group, for all of its members do share a core set of ideal beliefs, adhere to a set of prerequisite behaviors, and share the social/cultural systems that organize the culture's activities. At the same time, there are groupings in the United States that have their own set of beliefs and practices that designates them as cultural groups and distinguishes them within the larger nation-state context. Each of these represents a part of the whole that is the United States. Each is a constituent part of what is American Culture." (x - xi)

United States, many would say, doesn't have a culture to begin with. But that is not true. While it may not have a homogenous culture like Europe does or Asian countries boast of, but it certainly has a culture of its own which is still in its infancy. We need to understand that compared to Europe and Asia which have cultural legacy spanning several centuries, our country is still very young with an equally young culture. Our culture, characterized by MTV, McDonalds and baseball, is going through its teething period where it is trying to find its place in the world which is already full of very old and well established cultures. American culture, despite its youth, is definitely powerful. In a very short span of time it has come to dominate many other cultures and is spreading its wings to far corners of the world. It is the sheer power and strength of this culture which has turned into such a sore point for other cultures of the world. Many nations today complain that their children are becoming more Americanized. By this they refer to youth in other nations copying American trends and styles-eating McDonalds, playing football and wearing Nike. They are also watching the same shows like American youth. This goes to show that American culture, however young it may be, is still one of the most powerful cultures of the world. In a negative sense, this power along with youth has given American unprecedented influence over the world and may have contributed to the growth of many social ills.

Abrahamsen (1960) observed this negative trait of American culture in his book 'The Psychology of Crime':

But what is American culture? One salient factor stands out, and that is that life in the United States is basically complicated. Our country is very young and may be compared with an adolescent who feels he is powerful and at the same time is unsure of himself because he is still a child. Then there are many immigrants from many countries, and on the whole people here do not remain situated in any one location for any great length of time; they move from place to place rather frequently, thereby not establishing roots and without a feeling of permanence and stability. Also, because of this country's great size and heterogeneous population, resulting in various kinds of customs, habits, and living conditions in general, tension and unrest are bound to grow, and friction and violent reactions, often of a criminal nature, frequently follow. No group is immune to the effects of such sociological phenomena." (p.18)

It is for this reason that while on the one hand our culture is powerful and influential, at the same time, this very power has given it negative traits. Americanization has thus become a huge problem in the world as it is considered synonymous with globalization. American identity has also changed and developed with changes in the cultural fabric. Since American is basically a multicultural society, its people cannot boast of one homogenous source for their identity. American identity is not produced or generated by one specific source but comes from a vast variety of sources including different cultures, backgrounds, languages, attitudes, beliefs and values.