American culture is rich,
complex, and unique. It emerged from the short and rapid European conquest of
an enormous landmass sparsely settled by diverse indigenous peoples. Although
European cultural patterns predominated, especially in language, the arts, and
political institutions, peoples from Africa, Asia, and North America also
contributed to American culture. All of these groups influenced popular tastes
in music, dress, entertainment, and cuisine. As a result, American culture
possesses an unusual mixture of patterns and forms forged from among its
diverse peoples. The many melodies of American culture have not always been
harmonious, but its complexity has created a society that struggles to achieve
tolerance and produces a uniquely casual personal style that identifies
Americans everywhere. The country is strongly committed to democracy, in which
views of the majority prevail, and strives for equality in law and
institutions.
Characteristics such as
democracy and equality flourished in the American environment long before
taking firm root in European societies, where the ideals originated. As early
as the 1780s, Michel Guillaume Jean de Crиvecoeur,
a French writer living in Pennsylvania who wrote under the pseudonym J. Hector
St. John, was impressed by the democratic nature of early American society. It
was not until the 19th century that these tendencies in America were most fully expressed. When French political writer Alexis de Tocqueville, an
acute social observer, traveled through the United States in the 1830s, he
provided an unusually penetrating portrait of the nature of democracy in America and its cultural consequences. He commented that in all areas of culture—family
life, law, arts, philosophy, and dress—Americans were inclined to emphasize the
ordinary and easily accessible, rather than the unique and complex. His insight
is as relevant today as it was when de Tocqueville visited the United States. As a result, American culture is more often defined by its popular and
democratically inclusive features, such as blockbuster movies, television
comedies, sports stars, and fast food, than by its more cultivated aspects as
performed in theaters, published in books, or viewed in museums and galleries.
Even the fine arts in modern America often partake of the energy and forms of
popular culture, and modern arts are often a product of the fusion of fine and
popular arts.
While America is probably most well known for its popular arts, Americans partake in an enormous
range of cultural activities. Besides being avid readers of a great variety of
books and magazines catering to differing tastes and interests, Americans also
attend museums, operas, and ballets in large numbers. They listen to country
and classical music, jazz and folk music, as well as classic rock-and-roll and
new wave. Americans attend and participate in basketball, football, baseball,
and soccer games. They enjoy food from a wide range of foreign cuisines, such
as Chinese, Thai, Greek, French, Indian, Mexican, Italian, Ethiopian, and
Cuban. They have also developed their own regional foods, such as California cuisine and Southwestern, Creole, and Southern cooking. Still evolving and
drawing upon its ever more diverse population, American culture has come to
symbolize what is most up-to-date and modern. American culture has also become
increasingly international and is imported by countries around the world.
FORCES THAT SHAPED AMERICAN
CULTURE
Imported Traditions
Today American culture often
sets the pace in modern style. For much of its early history, however, the United States was considered culturally provincial and its arts second-rate, especially in
painting and literature, where European artists defined quality and form.
American artists often took their cues from European literary salons and art
schools, and cultured Americans traveled to Europe to become educated. In the
late 18th century, some American artists produced high-quality art, such as the
paintings of John Singleton Copley and Gilbert Charles Stuart and the silver
work of Paul Revere. However, wealthy Americans who collected art in the 19th
century still bought works by European masters and acquired European decorative
arts—porcelain, silver, and antique furniture—. They then ventured further
afield seeking more exotic decor, especially items from China and Japan. By acquiring foreign works, wealthy Americans were able to obtain the
status inherent in a long historical tradition, which the United States lacked. Americans such as Isabella Stewart Gardner and Henry Clay Frick
amassed extensive personal collections, which overwhelmingly emphasized
non-American arts.
In literature, some
19th-century American writers believed that only the refined manners and
perceptions associated with the European upper classes could produce truly
great literary themes. These writers, notably Henry James and Edith Wharton,
often set their novels in the crosswinds of European and American cultural
contact. Britain especially served as the touchstone for culture and quality
because of its role in America's history and the links of language and
political institutions. Throughout the 19th century, Americans read and
imitated British poetry and novels, such as those written by Sir Walter Scott
and Charles Dickens.
The Emergence of an American
Voice
American culture first
developed a unique American voice during the 19th century. This voice included
a cultural identity that was strongly connected to nature and to a divine
mission. The new American voice had liberating effects on how the culture was
perceived, by Americans and by others. Writers Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry
David Thoreau proposed that the American character was deeply individualistic
and connected to natural and spiritual sources rather than to the conventions
of social life. Many of the 19th century’s most notable figures of American
literature—Herman Melville, Emily Dickinson, and Mark Twain—also influenced
this tradition. The poetry of Walt Whitman, perhaps above all, spoke in a
distinctly American voice about people’s relation to one another, and described
American freedom, diversity, and equality with fervor.
Landscape painting in the United States during the 19th century vividly captured the unique American cultural
identity with its emphasis on the natural environment. This was evident in the
huge canvases set in the West by Albert Bierstadt and the more intimate
paintings of Thomas Cole. These paintings, which were part of the Hudson River School, were often enveloped in a radiant light suggesting a special connection
to spiritual sources. But very little of this American culture moved beyond the
United States to influence art trends elsewhere. American popular culture,
including craft traditions such as quilting or local folk music forged by
Appalachian farmers or former African slaves, remained largely local.
This sense of the special
importance of nature for American identity led Americans in the late 19th
century to become increasingly concerned that urban life and industrial
products were overwhelming the natural environment. Their concern led for calls
to preserve areas that had not been developed. Naturalists such as John Muir
were pivotal in establishing the first national parks and preserving scenic
areas of the American West. By the early 20th century, many Americans supported
the drive to preserve wilderness and the desire to make the great outdoors
available to everyone.
Immigration and Diversity
By the early 20th century, as
the United States became an international power, its cultural self-identity
became more complex. The United States was becoming more diverse as immigrants
streamed into the country, settling especially in America’s growing urban
areas. At this time, America's social diversity began to find significant
expression in the arts and culture. American writers of German, Irish, Jewish,
and Scandinavian ancestry began to find an audience, although some of the
cultural elite resisted the works, considering them crude and unrefined.
Many of these writers focused
on 20th-century city life and themes, such as poverty, efforts to assimilate
into the United States, and family life in the new country. These ethnically
diverse writers included Theodore Dreiser, of German ancestry; Henry Roth, a
Jewish writer; and Eugene O'Neill and James Farrell, of Irish background.
European influence now meant something very different than it once had: Artists
changed the core of American experience by incorporating their various
immigrant origins into its cultural vision. During the 1920s and 1930s, a host
of African American poets and novelists added their voices to this new American
vision. Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Countee Cullen, among others,
gathered in New York City’s Harlem district. They began to write about their
unique experiences, creating a movement called the Harlem Renaissance.
Visual artists of the early
20th century also began incorporating the many new sights and colors of the
multiethnic America visible in these new city settings. Painters associated
with a group known as The Eight (also called the Ashcan school), such as Robert
Henri and John Sloan, portrayed the picturesque sights of the city. Later
painters and photographers focused on the city’s squalid and seamier aspects.
Although nature remained a significant dimension of American cultural
self-expression, as the paintings of Georgia O'Keeffe demonstrated, it was no
longer at the heart of American culture. By the 1920s and 1930s few artists or
writers considered nature the singular basis of American cultural identity.
In popular music too, the songs
of many nations became American songs. Tin Pan Alley (Union Square in New York City, the center of music publishing at the turn of the 20th century) was full of
immigrant talents who helped define American music, especially in the form of
the Broadway musical. Some songwriters, such as Irving Berlin and George M.
Cohan, used their music to help define American patriotic songs and holiday
traditions. During the 1920s musical forms such as the blues and jazz began to
dominate the rhythms of American popular music. These forms had their roots in
Africa as adapted in the American South and then in cities such as New Orleans,
Louisiana; Kansas City, Missouri; Detroit, Michigan; and Chicago, Illinois.
Black artists and musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Ella
Fitzgerald, and Count Basie became the instruments of a classic American sound.
White composers such as George Gershwin and performers such as Bix Beiderbecke
also incorporated jazz rhythms into their music, while instrumentalists such as
Benny Goodman adopted jazz’s improvisational style to forge a racially blended
American form called swing music.
Development of Mass Media
In the late 19th century,
Americans who enjoyed the arts usually lived in big cities or had the money to
attend live performances. People who were poor or distant from cultural centers
settled for second-rate productions mounted by local theater troupes or touring
groups. New technologies, such as the motion-picture camera and the phonograph,
revolutionized the arts by making them available to the masses. The movies, the
phonograph, and, somewhat later, the radio made entertainment available daily
and allowed Americans to experience elaborately produced dramas and all types
of music.
While mass media made
entertainment available to more people, it also began to homogenize tastes,
styles, and points of view among different groups in the United States. Class and ethnic distinctions in American culture began to fade as mass
media transmitted movies and music to people throughout the United States. Some people criticized the growing uniformity of mass culture for lowering
the general standard of taste, since mass media sought to please the largest
number of people by appealing to simpler rather than more complex tastes.
However, culture became more democratic as modern technology and mass media
allowed it to reach more people.
During the 20th century, mass
entertainment extended the reach of American culture, reversing the direction
of influence as Europe and the world became consumers of American popular
culture. America became the dominant cultural source for entertainment and
popular fashion, from the jeans and T-shirts young people wear to the music
groups and rock stars they listen to and the movies they see. People all over
the world view American television programs, often years after the program’s
popularity has declined in the United States. American television has become
such an international fixture that American news broadcasts help define what
people in other countries know about current events and politics. American
entertainment is probably one of the strongest means by which American culture
influences the world, although some countries, such as France, resist this influence because they see it as a threat to their unique national
culture.
The Impact of Consumerism
Popular culture is linked to
the growth of consumerism, the repeated acquisition of an increasing variety of
goods and services. The American lifestyle is often associated with clothing,
houses, electronic gadgets, and other products, as well as with leisure time.
As advertising stimulates the desire for updated or improved products, people
increasingly equate their well-being with owning certain things and acquiring
the latest model. Television and other mass media broadcast a portrayal of a
privileged American lifestyle that many Americans hope to imitate.
Americans often seek
self-fulfillment and status through gaining material items. Indeed, products
consumed and owned, rather than professional accomplishments or personal
ideals, are often the standard of success in American society. The media
exemplify this success with the most glamorous models of consumption: Hollywood actors, sports figures, or music celebrities. This dependence on products and on
constant consumption defines modern consumer society everywhere. Americans have
set the pace for this consumer ideal, especially young people, who have helped
fuel this consumer culture in the United States and the world. Like the mass media
with which it is so closely linked, consumption has been extensively
criticized. Portrayed as a dizzy cycle of induced desire, consumerism seems to
erode older values of personal taste and economy. Despite this, the mass
production of goods has also allowed more people to live more comfortably and
made it possible for anyone to attain a sense of style, blurring the most
obvious forms of class distinction.
WAYS OF LIFE
Living Patterns
A fundamental element in the
life of the American people was the enormous expanse of land available. During
the colonial period, the access to open land helped scatter settlements. One
effect was to make it difficult to enforce traditional European social
conventions, such as primogeniture, in which the eldest son inherited the
parents’ estate. Because the United States had so much land, sons became less
dependent on inheriting the family estate. Religious institutions were also
affected, as the widely spread settlements created space for newer religious
sects and revivalist practices.
In the 19th century, Americans
used their land to grow crops, which helped create the dynamic agricultural
economy that defined American society. Many Americans were lured westward to
obtain more land. Immigrants sought land to settle, cattle ranchers wanted land
for their herds, Southerners looked to expand their slave economy into Western
lands, and railroad companies acquired huge tracts of land as they bound a
loose society into a coherent economic union. Although Native Americans had inhabited
most of the continent, Europeans and American settlers often viewed it as
empty, virgin land that they were destined to occupy. Even before the late 19th
century, when the last bloody battles between U.S. troops and Native Americans
completed the white conquest of the West, the idea of possessing land was
deeply etched into American cultural patterns and national consciousness.
Throughout the 19th century,
agricultural settlements existed on large, separate plots of land, often
occupying hundreds of acres. The Homestead Act of 1862 promised up to 65
hectares (160 acres) of free land to anyone with enough fortitude and vision to
live on or cultivate the land. As a result, many settlements in the West
contained vast areas of sparsely settled land, where neighbors lived great
distances from one another. The desire for residential privacy has remained a
significant feature of American culture.
This heritage continues to
define patterns of life in the United States. More than any other Western
society, Americans are committed to living in private dwellings set apart from
neighbors. Despite the rapid urbanization that began in the late 19th century,
Americans insisted that each nuclear family (parents and their children) be
privately housed and that as many families as possible own their own homes.
This strong cultural standard sometimes seemed unusual to new immigrants who
were used to the more crowded living conditions of Europe, but they quickly
adopted this aspect of American culture.
As cities became more densely
populated, Americans moved to the suburbs. Streetcars, first used during the
1830s, opened suburban rings around city centers, where congestion was
greatest. Banks offered long-term loans that allowed individuals to invest in a
home. Above all, the automobile in the 1920s was instrumental in furthering the
move to the suburbs.
After World War II (1939-1945),
developers carved out rural tracts to build millions of single-family homes,
and more Americans than ever before moved to large suburban areas that were
zoned to prevent commercial and industrial activities. The federal government
directly fueled this process by providing loans to war veterans as part of the
Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, known as the GI Bill of Rights, which
provided a wide range of benefits to U.S. military personnel. In many of the
new housing developments, builders constructed homes according to a single
model, a process first established in Levittown, New York. These identical,
partially prefabricated units were rapidly assembled, making suburban life and
private land ownership available to millions of returning soldiers in search of
housing for their families.
American families still choose
to live in either suburbs or the sprawling suburban cities that have grown up
in newer regions of the country. Vast areas of the West, such as the Los Angeles metropolitan region in California, the area around Phoenix, Arizona, and the Puget Sound area of Washington state, became rapidly populated with new housing because of
the American desire to own a home on a private plot of land. In much of this
suburban sprawl, the central city has become largely indistinct. These suburban
areas almost invariably reflect Americans’ dependence on automobiles and on
government-supported highway systems.
As a result of Americans
choosing to live in the suburbs, a distinctly American phenomenon developed in
the form of the shopping mall. The shopping mall has increasingly replaced the
old-fashioned urban downtown, where local shops, restaurants, and cultural
attractions were located. Modern malls emphasize consumption as an exclusive
activity. The shopping mall, filled with department stores, specialty shops,
fast-food franchises, and movie multiplexes, has come to dominate retailing,
making suburban areas across America more and more alike. In malls, Americans
purchase food, clothing, and entertainment in an isolated environment
surrounded by parking lots.
The American preference for
living in the suburbs has also affected other living experiences. Because
suburbs emphasize family life, suburban areas also place a greater emphasis on
school and other family-oriented political issues than more demographically
diverse cities. At their most intense levels, desire for privacy and fear of
crime have led to the development of gated suburban communities that keep out
those who are not wanted.
Despite the growth of suburbs,
American cities have maintained their status as cultural centers for theaters,
museums, concert halls, art galleries, and more upscale restaurants, shops, and
bookstores. In the past several decades, city populations grew as young and
trendy professionals with few or no children sought out the cultural
possibilities and the diversity not available in the suburbs. Housing can be
expensive and difficult to find in older cities such as New York; Boston, Massachusetts; and San Francisco, California. To cope, many city dwellers restored
older apartment buildings and houses. This process, called gentrification,
combines the American desire for the latest technology with a newer
appreciation for the classic and vintage.
Many poorer Americans cannot
afford homes in the suburbs or apartments in the gentrified areas of cities.
They often rely upon federal housing subsidies to pay for apartments in
less-desirable areas of the city or in public housing projects. Poorer people
often live crowded together in large apartment complexes in congested
inner-city areas. Federal public housing began when President Franklin
Roosevelt sought to relieve the worst conditions associated with poverty in the
1930s. It accelerated during the 1950s and 1960s, as the government subsidized
the renewal of urban areas by replacing slums with either new or refurbished
housing. In the late 20th century, many people criticized public housing
because it was often the site for crime, drug deals, gangs, and other social
ills. Nevertheless, given the expensive nature of rental housing in cities,
public housing is often the only option available to those who cannot afford to
buy their own home. Private efforts, such as Habitat for Humanity, have been
organized to help the urban poor move from crowded, high-rise apartments. These
organizations help construct low-cost homes in places such as the South Bronx in New York City, and they emphasize the pride and autonomy of home ownership.