Life in the United States

The culture of the United States of America is primarily of Western, and European origin, yet its influences includes the cultures of Asian American, African American, Latin American, and Native American peoples and their cultures. The United States has its own distinct social and cultural characteristics, such as dialect, music, arts, social habits, cuisine, and folklore. The United States is ethnically diverse as a result of large-scale European immigration throughout its history, its hundreds of indigenous tribes and cultures, and through African-American slavery followed by emancipation. America is an anglophone country with a legal system derived from English common law.

Origins, development, and spread

The European roots of the United States originate with the English and Spanish settlers of colonial North America during British and Spanish rule. The varieties of English people, as opposed to the other peoples on the British Isles, were the overwhelming majority ethnic group in the 17th century (population of the colonies in 1700 was 250,000) and were 47.9% of percent of the total population of 3.9 million. They constituted 60% of the whites at the first census in 1790 (%: 3.5 Welsh, 8.5 Scotch Irish, 4.3 Scots, 4.7 Irish, 7.2 German, 2.7 Dutch, 1.7 French and 2 Swedish). The English ethnic group contributed to the major cultural and social mindset and attitudes that evolved into the American character. Of the total population in each colony, they numbered from 30% in Pennsylvania to 85% in Massachusetts. Large non-English immigrant populations from the 1720s to 1775, such as the Germans (100,000 or more), Scotch Irish (250,000), added enriched and modified the English cultural substrate. The religious outlook was some versions of Protestantism (1.6% of the population were English, German and Irish Catholics).

Jeffersonian democracy was a foundational American cultural innovation, which is still a core part of the country's identity."Mr. Jefferson and the giant moose: natural history in early America"
Lee Alan Dugatkin. University of Chicago Press, 2009. , . University of Chicago Press, 2009. Chapter x. Thomas Jefferson's ''Notes on the State of Virginia'' was perhaps the first influential domestic cultural critique by an American and was written in reaction to the views of some influential Europeans that America's native flora and fauna (including humans) were degenerate.

Major cultural influences have been brought by historical immigration, especially from Germany in much of the country, Ireland and Italy in the Northeast, Japan in Hawaii. Latin American culture is especially pronounced in former Spanish areas but has also been introduced by immigration, as have Asian American cultures (especially in the Northeast and West Coast regions). Caribbean culture has been increasingly introduced by immigration and is pronounced in many urban areas. Since the abolition of slavery, the Caribbean has been the source of the earliest and largest Black immigrant group, a significant source of growth of the Black population in the U.S. and has made major cultural impacts in education, music, sports and entertainment.

Native culture remains strong in areas with large undisturbed or relocated populations, including traditional government and communal organization of property now legally managed by Indian reservations (large reservations are mostly in the West, especially Arizona and South Dakota). The fate of native culture after contact with Europeans is quite varied. For example, Taíno culture in U.S. Caribbean territories is nearly extinct and like most Native American languages, the Taíno language is no longer spoken. By contrast, the Hawaiian language and culture of the Native Hawaiians has survived in Hawaii and mixed with that of immigrants from the mainland U.S. (starting before the 1898 annexation) and to some degree Japanese immigrants. It occasionally influences mainstream American culture with notable exports like surfing and Hawaiian shirts. Most languages native to what is now U.S. territory have gone extinct, and the economic and mainstream cultural dominance of the English language threatens the surviving ones in most places. Some of the most common native languages include Samoan, Hawaiian, Navajo, Cherokee, Sioux, and a spectrum of Inuit languages. (See Indigenous languages of the Americas for a fuller listing, plus Chamorro, and Carolinian in the Pacific territories.) Ethnic Samoans are a majority in American Samoa; Chamorro are still the largest ethnic group in Guam (though a minority), and along with Refaluwasch are smaller minorities in the Northern Mariana Islands.

American culture includes both conservative and liberal elements, scientific and religious competitiveness, political structures, risk taking and free expression, materialist and moral elements. Despite certain consistent ideological principles (e.g. individualism, egalitarianism, and faith in freedom and republicanism), American culture has a variety of expressions due to its geographical scale and demographics.

The United States has traditionally been thought of as a melting pot, with immigrants contributing to but eventually assimilating with mainstream American culture. However, beginning in the 1960s and continuing on in the present day, the country trends towards cultural pluralism, and partisanship. Throughout the country's history, certain subcultures (whether based on ethnicity or other commonality, such as ghettos) have dominated certain neighborhoods, only partially melded with the broader culture. Due to the extent of American culture, there are many integrated but unique social subcultures within the United States, some not tied to any particular geography. The cultural affiliations an individual in the United States may have commonly depended on social class, political orientation and a multitude of demographic characteristics such as religious background, occupation, and ethnic group membership.

Regional variations

Semi-distinct cultural regions of the United States include New England, the Mid-Atlantic, the South, the Midwest, the Southwest, and the West—an area that can be further subdivided into the Pacific States and the Mountain States.

The west coast of the continental United States, consisting of California, Oregon, and Washington state, is also sometimes referred to as the Left Coast, indicating its left-leaning political orientation and tendency towards social liberalism.

The South is sometimes informally called the "Bible Belt" due to socially conservative evangelical Protestantism, which is a significant part of the region's culture. Christian church attendance across all denominations is generally higher there than the national average. This region is usually contrasted with the mainline Protestantism and Catholicism of the Northeast, the religiously diverse Midwest and Great Lakes, the Mormon Corridor in Utah and southern Idaho, and the relatively secular West. The percentage of non-religious people is the highest in the northeastern and New England state of Vermont at 34%, compared to 6% in the Bible Belt state of Alabama.

Strong cultural differences have a long history in the U.S., with the southern slave society in the antebellum period serving as a prime example. Social and economic tensions between the Northern and Southern states were so severe that they eventually caused the South to declare itself an independent nation, the Confederate States of America; thus initiating the American Civil War.

Language

Although the United States has no official language at the federal level, 28 states have passed legislation making English the official language, and it is considered to be the ''de facto'' national language. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, more than 97% of Americans can speak English well, and for 81%, it is the only language spoken at home. The national dialect is known as American English, which itself consists of numerous regional dialects, but has some shared unifying features that distinguish it from other national varieties of English. There are four large dialect regions in the United States—the North, the Midland, the South, and the West—and several dialects more focused within metropolitan areas such as those of New York City, Philadelphia, and Boston. A standard dialect called "General American" (analogous in some respects to the received pronunciation elsewhere in the English-speaking world), lacking the distinctive noticeable features of any particular region, is believed by some to exist as well; it is sometimes regionally associated with the Midwest. American Sign Language, used mainly by the deaf, is also native to the United States.

More than 300 languages nationwide, and up to 800 languages in New York City, besides English, have native speakers in the United States—some are spoken by indigenous peoples (about 150 living languages) and others imported by immigrants. English is not the first language of most immigrants in the US, though many do arrive knowing how to speak it, especially from countries where English is broadly used.Gambino, Christine P., Yesenia D. Acosta, and Elizabeth M. Grieco. 2018 August 3.
English-Speaking Ability of the Foreign-Born Population in the United States: 2012
" (revised). U.S. Census Bureau. This not only includes immigrants from countries such as Canada, Jamaica, and the UK, where English is the primary language, but also countries where English is an official language, such as India, Nigeria, and the Philippines.

According to the 2000 census, there are nearly 30 million native speakers of Spanish in the United States. Spanish has official status in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, where it is the primary language spoken, and the state of New Mexico; various smaller Spanish enclaves exist around the country as well. Bilingual speakers may use both English and Spanish reasonably well and may code-switch according to their dialog partner or context, a phenomenon known as Spanglish.

Indigenous languages of the United States include the Native-American languages (including Navajo, Yupik, Dakota, and Apache), which are spoken on the country's numerous Indian reservations and at cultural events such as pow wows; Hawaiian, which has official status in the state of Hawaii; Chamorro, which has official status in the commonwealths of Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands; Carolinian, which has official status in the commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands; and Samoan, which has official status in the commonwealth of American Samoa.

Art

In the late-18th and early-19th centuries, American artists primarily painted landscapes and portraits in a realistic style or that which looked to Europe for answers on technique: for example, John Singleton Copley was born in Boston, but most of his portraiture for which he is famous follow the trends of British painters like Thomas Gainsborough and the transitional period between Rococo and Neoclassicism. The later 18th century was a time when the United States was just an infant as a nation and as far away from the phenomenon where artists would receive training as craftsmen by apprenticeship and later seeking a fortune as a professional, ideally getting a patron: Many artists benefited from the patronage of Grand Tourists eager to procure mementos of their travels. There were no temples of Rome or grand nobility to be found in the Thirteen Colonies. Later developments of the 19th century brought America one of its earliest native homegrown movements, like the Hudson River School and portrait artists with a uniquely American flavor like Winslow Homer.

A parallel development taking shape in rural America was the American craft movement, which began as a reaction to the Industrial Revolution. As the nation grew wealthier, it had patrons able to buy the works of European painters and attract foreign talent willing to teach methods and techniques from Europe to willing students as well as artists themselves; photography became a very popular medium for both journalism and in time as a medium in its own right with America having plenty of open spaces of natural beauty and growing cities in the East teeming with new arrivals and new buildings. Museums in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C. began to have a booming business in acquisitions, competing for works as diverse as the then more recent work of the Impressionists to pieces from Ancient Egypt, all of which captured the public imaginations and further influenced fashion and architecture. Developments in modern art in Europe came to America from exhibitions in New York City such as the Armory Show in 1913. After World War II, New York emerged as a center of the art world. Painting in the United States today covers a vast range of styles. American painting includes works by Jackson Pollock, John Singer Sargent, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Norman Rockwell, among many others.

Architecture

Architecture in the United States is regionally diverse and has been shaped by many external forces. U.S. architecture can therefore be said to be eclectic. Traditionally American architecture has influences from English architecture to Greco Roman architecture. The overriding theme of city American Architecture is modernity, as manifest in the skyscrapers of the 20th century, with domestic and residential architecture greatly varying according to local tastes and climate, rural American and suburban architecture tends to be more traditional.

Theater and performing arts

Theater of the United States is based in the Western tradition. The United States originated stand-up comedy and modern improvisational theatre, which involves taking suggestions from the audience.

Minstrel show

The minstrel show, though now widely recognized as racist and offensive, is also recognized as the first uniquely American theatrical art form. Minstrel shows were developed in the 19th century and they were typically performed by white actors wearing blackface makeup for the purpose of imitating and caricaturing the speech and music of African-Americans. Stephen Foster was a famous composer for minstrel shows. Many of his songs such as "Camptown Races", "Oh Susanna", and "My Old Kentucky Home" surpassed the popularity of minstrel shows to become popular American folk songs. Tap dancing and stand-up comedy also have origins in minstrel shows.

Drama

American theater did not take on a unique dramatic identity until the emergence of Eugene O'Neill in the early twentieth century, now considered by many to be the father of American drama. O'Neill is a four-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize for drama and the only American playwright to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. After O'Neill, American drama came of age and flourished with the likes of Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams, Lillian Hellman, William Inge, and Clifford Odets during the first half of the 20th century. After this fertile period, American theater broke new ground, artistically, with the absurdist forms of Edward Albee in the 1960s.

Social commentary has also been a preoccupation of American theater, often addressing issues not discussed in the mainstream. Writers such as Lorraine Hansbury, August Wilson, David Mamet and Tony Kushner have all won Pulitzer Prizes for their polemical plays on American society.

Musical theater

The United States is also the home and largest exporter of modern musical theater, producing such musical talents as Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Loewe, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Leonard Bernstein, George and Ira Gershwin, Kander and Ebb, and Stephen Sondheim. Broadway is one of the largest theater communities in the world and is the epicenter of American commercial theater.

Music

American music styles and influences (such as country, jazz, blues, rock and roll, rock, techno, soul, hip-hop) and music based on them can be heard all over the world. Music in the U.S. is diverse. It includes African-American influence in the 20th century. The first half of the 20th century is notable for jazz music, developed by African-Americans. According to music journalist Robert Christgau, "pop music is more African than any other facet of American culture." There are also variations such as film music and musicals.

The best-selling male solo musicians in the United States are Elvis Presley, Michael Jackson, Garth Brooks and Billy Joel. The best-selling bands are the Eagles, Aerosmith, Metallica, and Van Halen. Female music artists of the 20th-century such as Whitney Houston and Madonna became global celebrities.

Cinema

The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has exerted a large influence upon the global film industry since the early 20th century. The dominant style of American cinema is classical Hollywood cinema, which developed from 1913 to 1969 and is still typical of most films made there to this day. While Frenchmen Auguste and Louis Lumière are generally credited with the birth of modern cinema, American cinema soon came to be a dominant force in the emerging industry. The world's first sync-sound musical film, ''The Jazz Singer'', was released in 1927, and was at the forefront of sound-film development in the following decades. Orson Welles's '' Citizen Kane'' (1941) is frequently cited in critics' polls as the greatest film of all time.

Broadcasting

Television constitutes a significant part of the traditional media of the United States. Household ownership of television sets in the country is 96.7%, and the majority of households have more than one set. The peak ownership percentage of households with at least one television set occurred during the 1996–97 season, with 98.4% ownership. As a whole, the television networks of the United States is the largest and most syndicated in the world.

As of August 2013, approximately 114,200,000 American households own at least one television set.

In 2014, due to a recent surge in the number and popularity of critically acclaimed television series, many critics have said that American television is currently enjoying a golden age.

Philosophy

Early American philosophy was heavily shaped by the European Age of Enlightenment, which promoted ideals such as reason and individual liberty. Enlightenment ideals influenced the American revolution and the Constitution of the United States. Major figures in the American Enlightenment included Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Paine.

Pragmatism and transcendentalism are uniquely American philosophical traditions founded in the 19th century by William James and Ralph Waldo Emerson respectively. Objectivism is a philosophical system founded by Ayn Rand which influenced libertarianism. John Rawls presented the theory of " justice as fairness" in ''A Theory of Justice'' (1971).

Willard Van Orman Quine, Saul Kripke, and David Lewis helped advance logic and analytic philosophy in the 20th century. Thomas Kuhn revolutionized the philosophy of science with his book ''The Structure of Scientific Revolutions'' (1962), one of the most cited academic works of all time, and he coined the term paradigm shift.

Artificial intelligence and the philosophy of mind have been heavily influenced by American philosophers such as Daniel Dennett, Noam Chomsky, Hilary Putnam, Jerry Fodor, and John Searle, who contributed to cognitivism, the hard problem of consciousness, and the mind-body problem. The Libet experiment created by American neuroscientist Benjamin Libet raised philosophical debate regarding the neuroscience of free will. The Chinese room thought experiment presented by John Searle questions the nature of intelligence in machines, and it has been influential in cognitive science and the philosophy of artificial intelligence.

Science and technology

There is a regard for scientific advancement and technological innovation in American culture, resulting in the creation of many modern innovations. The great American inventors include Robert Fulton (the steamboat); Samuel Morse (the telegraph); Eli Whitney (the cotton gin, interchangeable parts); Cyrus McCormick (the reaper); and Thomas Edison (with more than a thousand inventions credited to his name). Most of the new technological innovations over the 20th and 21st centuries were either first invented in the United States, first widely adopted by Americans, or both. Examples include the lightbulb, the airplane, the transistor, the atomic bomb, nuclear power, the personal computer, the iPod, video games, online shopping, and the development of the Internet.

This propensity for application of scientific ideas continued throughout the 20th century with innovations that held strong international benefits. The twentieth century saw the arrival of the Space Age, the Information Age, and a renaissance in the health sciences. This culminated in cultural milestones such as the Apollo moon landings, the creation of the Personal Computer, and the sequencing effort called the Human Genome Project.

Throughout its history, American culture has made significant gains through the open immigration of accomplished scientists. Accomplished scientists include Scottish-American scientist Alexander Graham Bell, who developed and patented the telephone and other devices; German scientist Charles Steinmetz, who developed new alternating-current electrical systems in 1889; Russian scientist Vladimir Zworykin, who invented the motion camera in 1919; Serb scientist Nikola Tesla