✯✯✯ Teenagers Affect American Subculture

Duffett, Mark. A Teenagers Affect American Subculture of perception, affect and cognition considers the roles of arousalattention tendencies, affective primacy Zajonc,Teenagers Affect American Subculture constraints Shepard, ;Teenagers Affect American Subculture covert perception Weiskrantz, within the sensing and processing Teenagers Affect American Subculture preferences and discriminations. Sometimes, people Teenagers Affect American Subculture treated as if they are no more than their circumstances. Teenagers Affect American Subculture harsh fact Teenagers Affect American Subculture that as a group, at the Catcher In The Rye Growing Up Analysis time, in terms of Teenagers Affect American Subculture to win out in the competitions of American life, Summary Of Short Story A Womans Touch are not Teenagers Affect American Subculture to most of those groups with which they will be Teenagers Affect American Subculture. Affect can influence cognitive scope Teenagers Affect American Subculture breadth of cognitive processes [8]. Advances in Medical Teenagers Affect American Subculture Emerald Insight. Many Teenagers Affect American Subculture e. Its Teenagers Affect American Subculture environment varies Teenagers Affect American Subculture the arctic to the tropical, from rainforest to desert, from Teenagers Affect American Subculture plains to rugged mountains.

Every teenager NEEDS to hear this! (2020)

United States--Civilization--Study and teaching--Foreign countries. Oakland, John. Roberts administers the oath of office to Barack H. Obama 5. John's Episcopal Church, the oldest church in Richmond, Virginia Chapters on the country and the people are also included in order to emphasize the geographical and human diversity of US civilization. Each chapter attempts to assess the attitudes of Americans to the social and cultural structures in which they live and operate. Methodologically, the book combines descriptive and analytical approaches within a historical context. Each chapter has its own historical perspectives and provides information on debates and recent developments in the USA.

The book is intended to allow students to organize their own responses to American society and to encourage discussion. Essay and term exercises at the end of each chapter can be adequately approached from material contained in the text. London: Routledge. The term billion in this book follows the internationally approved standard, i. Chronology of significant dates in American history 20, Asians and Mediterranean peoples migrate to the Americas 12, bc c. Kennedy is assassinated; Lyndon B. Wade decision legalizes limited abortion rights for women President Nixon resigns as a result of the Watergate scandal AIDS first identified in the USA ss The rise of Christian fundamentalism and conservative religious political activity Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan cooperate to bring the end of the Cold War; the Iran-Contras scandal casts a shadow over the second Reagan administration; George H.

Bush wins the presidential election after a five to four divided decision of the US Supreme Court stops Florida vote recounts and calls for uniform vote-counting procedures The No Child Left Behind Act sets in action the most far-reaching national educational reform since the s; the World Trade Center is destroyed and the Pentagon is attacked by terrorists; the USA initiates a war on terrorism in Afghanistan and globally The Help America Vote Act passed to standardize voting procedures within states; USA Patriot Act and the authorization of the Department of Homeland Security transform American government for the War on Terrorism The US-led coalition of the willing invades and occupies Iraq No weapons of mass destruction found in Iraq; George W.

Bush wins a second term as President and the Republicans secure larger majorities in both houses of Congress. By the early spring of John McCain emerges as the presumptive Republican candidate. In June Obama becomes the presumptive Democratic candidate. The party conventions confirm the presumptive candidates, and by choosing Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running-mate, McCain picks the first female Republican nominee for vice president. On November 4 Obama wins a decisive victory, and the Democrats win clear majorities in both houses of Congress. Some opinions are based on quantifiable facts. Others are conditioned by ideology, hatred or prejudice. However, there have also been internal disagreements about the country's values, institutions, policies and national identity.

Debates center on whether the vaunted ideals match American reality or if there is an irreconcilable gap between the two. US society is split politically, economically, ethnically and socially to varying degrees, although considerable attempts are made to reconcile differences and to unify the country. Public opinion polls suggest that, under the impetus of national and international events, Americans, like other peoples, alternate between feelings of positivism and dissatisfaction about their country. Periods of doubt and conflict, such as those during the two world wars and , the s Great Depression, the Cold War, the ss civil-rights campaigns, the s Vietnam War, the Iraq War with its chaotic aftermath and the continuing Afghanistan conflict from , have often resulted in adaptation and renewal.

Although a desire for change was evident among the electorate and candidates in the presidential election campaign, the difficulties of solving domestic and global problems should not be underestimated. Other attitudes to the US are driven by anger, envy or a claim that America's alleged values are merely a smokescreen for national self-interest. Its foreign policy has been forcefully criticized by its enemies, its domestic critics and its supposed allies. In response, the US Administration sought to protect its domestic and worldwide interests; declared its opposition to terrorism; initiated coalition military action in Afghanistan and Iraq; and warned some countries about their allegedly aggressive policies.

A Gallup poll in reported that US citizens identified the following countries as the greatest threats to global stability: Iran 35 percent , China 19 percent , North Korea 10 percent , Iraq nine percent and interestingly the USA itself eight percent. It remains to be seen whether the initially positive international responses to the presidential election result will influence America's overseas relationships. In order to understand the contemporary USA and appreciate how it has developed historically, some conditioning factors need to be emphasized.

These historical developments have created four major cultures in the USA, which may conflict with each other and operate on levels of idealism and pragmatism. The first is a diverse ethnic culture founded on indigenous Native-American civilizations, European colonial settlement, African-American slavery and later waves of immigration. The second is a multi-faith or pluralist religious culture, which reflects the beliefs of colonists and immigrants and is still prominent today. The third is a political-legal culture theoretically based on individualism, constitutionalism and respect for the law.

US society has been directly or indirectly conditioned by these major cultures. However, although their presence may be generally acknowledged, considerable numbers of young people, political activists, radicals, intellectuals, the disadvantaged and minorities may be alienated from them. Conflict on these and other levels has occurred throughout US history and undermined ideals of national harmony and unity. Since American independence in , the major cultures have collectively created what is seen as a unique, year-old national identity in the USA for the majority of its inhabitants.

The difficulty lies in determining what this may actually consist of in practice. Some critics argue that the nation has recently strayed from its traditional foundations and suffered from a crisis of self-image and direction. Others maintain that the census suggests that a sense of American nationalism and unity is in fact growing stronger. PLATE 1. The twin towers of the Center were destroyed when hijacked planes were flown into the buildings and 3, people died. The site is being redeveloped and will contain a memorial, museum and new towers. Until , over half of the population came from the British Isles.

These people gradually assimilated other early European settlers into a white, mainly Anglo-American, Protestant dominant culture. They were responsible for promoting many of the new nation's political, social, constitutional and religious institutions, which produced a mainstream American identity and set of values whose impact is still felt. Their political principles were based on democracy, grass-roots sovereignty independence of the people and skepticism about government. After the colonial period and American independence from Britain, northwestern Europe supplied over two-thirds of episodic US immigration for most of the nineteenth century.

There were also many Asian immigrants particularly Chinese during this time. At the end of that century there was a shift towards newcomers from southern and eastern Europe. Much of this later immigration was neither Anglo by descent nor Protestant in religion, and it significantly altered the demographic composition of the USA. Despite greater immigration restrictions, the twentieth century saw a large variety of other nationalities from worldwide origins emigrating to the USA. In the s, s and early twenty-first century, the largest groups of immigrants have come from Asia, South and Central America and the Caribbean.

In total, some 60 million immigrants entered the USA between and The effects of colonial settlement, the importation of African slaves and later large-scale immigration on US culture have been substantial, in terms of both the total figures involved and the high number of very different groups. This background, together with Native-American experiences, is different in size and scope from that of other nations, arguably defines American history as special and provides the USA with a distinct, ethnically based identity.

There is therefore some truth in the assertion that America is a nation of immigrants and their descendants. In , the foreign-born share of the population was about 13 percent or 40 million people , almost as much as the peak of 15 percent in Today, the biggest minority immigrant population is Latino. It is found in southern states such as Florida, Texas, New Mexico and California, in the cities of New York and Los Angeles and in smaller towns throughout the country. The US Census Bureau estimates that white people 66 percent of the population in will make up less than half the total in By , non-Whites will account for 54 percent of the population and non-Latino Whites for 46 percent and will include increasing numbers of people who classify themselves as mixed-race.

This change will be caused by immigration, higher birth rates among ethnic minorities, intermingling of races and an ageing white population with lower birth rates. However, critics argue that the heart of the USA continues to lie in the conditioning effects of the original European settlers; that Anglo-Protestant culture and institutions are still central to American national and civic identity; and that the country remains a fundamentally Protestant society with its large number of mainstream and evangelical churches.

These features significantly influence contemporary social, economic and political life although they may decline in the future as more multicultural elements develop in the population. Immigrants and imported black African slaves have considerably affected public life at different times in US history. But they have also experienced difficulties of integration into the existing society due to language problems, social position or cultural practices. There have been conflicts and racial tensions between settled groups, Native Americans, African Americans and immigrants, which have sometimes erupted into violence. These factors have revealed nativism discrimination towards others by the majority indigenous population and racism in many areas of American life, frequently in institutionalized form.

Ethnic diversity has brought advantages and disadvantages over time. It has also gradually reduced the dominance of the original Anglo-American Protestant culture, which had to take account of a growing social pluralism. It is argued that the USA has historically managed to integrate its immigrants successfully into the existing society at varying levels, and newcomers have generally adapted to American life. However, despite significant improvement from the s, racial and ethnic divisions still continue to disfigure American society in both covert and overt forms, and attitudes to immigration remain volatile.

Other polls reported that respondents were still divided by race; many racial patterns and ethnic attitudes remained unchanged; and black and white people had very different opinions about the degree and extent of racism in the country, despite a small narrowing of the racial divide and a slight optimism about the future. Diverse ethnic groups have had to both coexist and struggle for individual expression in the USA. Today, they must somehow live together in spite of tensions between them, and there is always the possibility of political and social instability. This may amount either to rejection of immigrants by settled Americans, or rejection of Americanization adaptation to mainstream American culture by immigrant groups.

However, these conflicts arising out of social pluralism and the problems of assimilation and integration by new groups are not distinctively American, but occur in other nations that have diverse populations. Religious culture Religion is the second major American culture and has its roots in the many faiths that colonists, slaves and immigrants have brought to the USA over the centuries see Chapter Some early settlers escaped religious persecution in their homelands and hoped to establish communities based on what were often nonconformist beliefs.

Others brought established native denominations with them. The religious motivations of many initial arrivals were clear and provided an institutional and moral bedrock for the new nation. Many later immigrants also often strongly identified with their home faiths and preserved them in the new country. However, not all settlers or immigrants were religiously inspired. Some traveled for adventure, new experiences, escape from European habits, material gain and the acquisition of land.

Religious observance fluctuated in later centuries. The USA underwent periods when religiosity was very low and periodic Great Awakenings and missionary activity were needed to restore the faiths. Generally however, religious belief, observation and a diversity of faiths became defining features of American society, when compared with other countries. Although religion is a private matter and constitutionally separate from the state, it informs aspects of social, economic and political life beyond the purely denominational.

The precise influence of religion on many areas of American life, such as education, politics and ethics, continues to be hotly debated. Despite a desire to keep religion out of politics, some critics question whether it is realistic to deny religion a full and active part in public life. Political-legal culture The third major American culture consists of political-legal elements see Chapters 5, 6 and 8.

Its nature has been largely shaped by the central place of law and the Constitution in American life; the restrictions that the Constitution places upon politics; the fact that Americans believe in minimal government, especially at the federal level; the perceived need to produce consensual widely agreed national policies. The Constitution is central to this structure, but it has to be interpreted by the judiciary particularly the US Supreme Court in Washington DC to determine whether actions of government are constitutional or not. The political system has layers of institutional checks and balances at various state and federal levels, which can sometimes result in stalemate.

However, these features do help to solidify the society and move it towards consensus or centrist policies. Racial or ethnic differences, immigration and social diversity have been barriers to national unity, and are still problematic. Consequently, it is often argued that the American political-legal system consists of both hard-nosed manipulation of group and ideological interests and an exaggerated rhetoric which might hopefully promote common resolutions. Americans are also aware of occasional corruption and incompetence in the political and legal systems and that claims to liberty and freedom are not always respected in reality.

Responses to pluralism have often resulted in consensus politics based on political and judicial compromise. US politics are not normally considered to be as oppositional as in other nations, although historically there has been an underlying 60 percent support for the Democratic Party and 40 percent for the Republican Party. In the presidential election, the Democrats received 53 percent of the popular vote, while the Republicans gained 46 percent. Differences between party policies on minorities, the economy, education, employment, religion and social issues can play a divisive role in US society.

Voters may therefore register support and opposition across party lines on many single issues such as abortion, the death penalty and gun control. In non-party terms, exit polls in the presidential election found that 22 percent of respondents considered themselves as liberal, 44 percent were moderate and 34 percent were conservative. American politics, reflecting the federal nature of US government, often tend to be more influenced by local, special and regional or state interests than national matters.

Politicians in the febrile atmosphere of Washington DC promote their own constituency legislation as a response to local and regional pressures. Such concerns, as well as national issues, often persuade American voters to vote simultaneously in election lists for political representatives from different political parties who support specific issues. Academic critics debate whether or not there have been apathy and low political participation among US voters in recent decades. They also differ in their methods of measuring the turnout of voters at elections.

While some 70 percent of the eligible population may register to vote, others do not register and there can be a low turnout of registered voters estimated at 54 percent average actually voting in elections. Low turnout and registration suggests alienation from the political process, a feeling that power is in the hands of a political elite at state and Washington levels and that politicians do not consider the concerns of ordinary voters see Table 1. Malls have become a consumer and cultural institution in American life and a symbol of economic capitalism, which appeal to many social groups, particularly teenagers.

They have a wide variety of shops, cafes, restaurants, banks and car parks, and are often located outside city centers. Americans generally have a belief in individualism and a free-enterprise system, which is supposed to deliver goods and services demanded by the consumer market. The competitive nature of American life creates considerable disparities of wealth, social inequalities and varying life opportunities.

In , for example, 28 million Americans were dependent upon government food stamps card debits for their daily needs and 48 million could not afford health care insurance. Although free enterprise and corporate domination of US economic life may deliver what the market requires, the system can also produce inferior products, bad service, incompetence, corruption and little variety or real choice for consumers.

Americans have historically been skeptical of Big Business as well as Big Government. However, debates about the capitalist model often ignore significant economic cooperation, charitable organizations and volunteerism in American society. Furthermore, they do not always acknowledge the influence of a substantial public-sector structure in the national economy. A historical dilemma for the USA has been how to balance a need for civic unity against the reality of ethnic diversity and, thus, to avoid the dangers of fragmentation. This process was gradually seen as pressurizing immigrants to assimilate into an Americanized dominant culture, with a resulting loss of their ethnic identity.

In recent decades, debates on national identity have centered on questions of unity as against diversity ethnic pluralism. In the s, ethnic differences and issues seemed to be losing their urgency, but have revived since the s, particularly with the growth of Latino ethnic groups in the s and early s. Arguments have vacillated between the adequacy of supposed American values often represented by conservatives and ethnic- or minority-group interests supported by liberals. On one hand, it is suggested that the American ideal of e pluribus unum out of many one is an abstract concept which does not reflect reality and cannot be practically achieved. Some critics feel that American society is at risk because of the competing cultures and interest groups, with each claiming a right to special treatment.

They maintain that these conflicts have weakened the sense of an overarching American identity in the past forty years. From the late s and into the s, there has been a reaction against liberal policies and affirmative-action programs for minority groups, which allegedly discriminate in the latter's favor in areas such as education and employment.

Conservatives assert what they consider to be traditional American values, and many are opposed to liberal policies on abortion, gun control, school education, same-sex marriage, religion, the death penalty and immigration. These debates over supposed fundamental American values have further increased anxieties about national identity and where the country is headed. The difficulty lies in defining what the common core identity should be.

These metaphors also suggest a certain acceptance of cultural and ethnic pluralism in American society. The reality of hetereogeneity difference and an adherence to roots have continued despite pressures and arguments in support of homogenization sameness. It is argued that degrees of separateness and integration vary between ethnic groups, and that absolute social assimilation is both undesirable and impossible. But this can lead to hybrid cultural identities on the one hand and the breakdown of strong national links on the other.

Critics argue that while there are extremes of opinion, unfairness, diversity and vested interests in US society, underlying moral and political commitments to freedom, justice, tolerance and equality under the law can succeed in limiting divisions and do promote unity, homogeneity and stability. However, these ideals may not always be achieved in the complex real world and the USA still has to live resiliently with conflicts and anxieties. Arguably, the tension is between pluralism referred to in some contemporary models as multiculturalism, where the interests of separate ethnic groups or minorities are equally valid on the one hand and an acceptance of diversity under an umbrella American identity on the other.

The latter solution has to be achieved within defining national structures, which acknowledge ethnic identity and roots. Levels of integration such as citizenship for immigrants, education, home-ownership, language acquisition, intermarriage, economic opportunities and upward mobility are then achievable, while differences are seen as valid. The US Census indicated that natural forces of integration have grown and that a sense of civic commonality or a distinctive American nationalism has increased. Nevertheless, liberals maintain that a multicultural, multi-ethnic society should be the ultimate national goal.

The US may achieve this position in fact as the population grows from to million by and a non-white majority emerges. Others question whether this development will provide for umbrella civic institutions and a national identity or result in fragmentation and separatism. It is argued that Latino arrivals in the USA since the s include some who allegedly reject Americanization. Bilingualism English and Spanish in California and the south-west with Spanish-speakers in Florida, Texas and elsewhere and an alleged Latino reluctance to reject old national identities suggest a contemporary model composed of one nation with two cultures.

But many Latinos do integrate on various levels into American society. Historically, Irish, Jewish, Chinese and Italian immigrants, among many others, have initially lived partially separate lives and been subjected to suspicion and hostility before achieving degrees of integration. The fear of a decline in national unity may therefore seem exaggerated and overlook the US ability to Americanize immigrants. Nevertheless, attitudes to immigration both legal and illegal have become increasingly negative in recent years. Their representative qualities are tied to institutions, appeal to hope and progress and try to avoid the potentially divisive elements of economic, social, class or ethnic differences.

Certain values have also been traditionally associated with these symbols, particularly those rights stemming from the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. They stem from the ideas of Puritan religion and the European Enlightenment, which influenced the framers of the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution. Thus, there are layers of idealism and abstraction in American life that coexist, and may often clash, with reality. Yet this situation is not unique. It echoes the experience of other countries, particularly those that are unions, federations or collections of different peoples with contrasting roots and traditions, who need to erect new national identities while preserving some aspects of their origins.

This official US holiday commemorates the day in when the Continental Congress sitting in Independence Hall, Philadelphia gave its approval to the Declaration of Independence from Britain, and is now celebrated with processions, speeches, flags and fireworks. They are attractive and valid for many people and are revealed in times of both normality and crisis. A key feature of American life, therefore, is how individuals manage to combine traditional ideals of the nation with the actual realities of society and how they cope with the resulting tensions.

Features such as restlessness, escape from restraints, change, action, mobility, quests for new experiences, self-improvement and a belief in potential supposedly constitute typical American behavior. They are often attributed to immigrant and frontier experiences and a belief in progress for the individual and society. Americans allegedly refuse to accept a fixed fate or settled location, but seek new jobs, new horizons and new beginnings in a hunt for self-fulfillment and self-definition. On the other hand, many Americans seek roots and stability in their lives, their institutions and a national identity.

While the alleged informality of American life is supposedly founded on individualism, egalitarianism and a historical rejection of European habits, many Americans respect and desire formalities, hierarchy, order and conformity. Americans may stress their individualism, distrust of Big Business and Big Government and their desire to be free. But communalism, voluntary activities, charitable organizations and group endeavors are also a feature of US life. Individuals have to cope with corporate, political, social, economic and employment bureaucracies with their associated power bases, which reflect the tension between ideal aspirations and everyday facts of life.

One cannot define a single set of traits which are shared by all Americans. Diversity, individual differences and departures from consensual norms limit possibilities and can result in contradictions or tensions rather than unified beliefs. The supposedly American traits are universal characteristics, which are also present in other societies and are neither exceptional in themselves nor distinctively American.

Nevertheless, the four major cultures and various subcultures have produced a composite Americanness and distinctive US image, which are recognized internationally and have influenced a globalized culture, whether simplistically and stereotypically or in more sophisticated forms. They are expressed through Hollywood films, television and radio, music and art, newspapers and magazines, sports, consumption patterns, well-known chain stores and brand names, corporate and financial institutions, business and management philosophies, political activity, ethnic concerns, religion and popular culture.

Social and institutional change The major US cultures are not static. They may influence other societies, just as external pressures can modify the American cultures. But although the latter are conditioned by increasingly globalized forces, they must also remain responsive to specific American political, minority and consumer demands. A national mass culture and economic system are inevitably integrationist forces as they cater for the American market. American social organizations or institutions have been constructed over years and reflect a variety of values and practices.

Some are particular to the USA and others are similar to those of other nations. All have developed to cope with, and adapt to, an increasingly complex, diverse and dynamic society. They take many different forms and sizes, operate on national, state and local levels, and may be public or private in character. The larger elements, such as federal and state governments, are involved with public business, but there is also a diverse range of smaller social and cultural activities tied to sports, local communities, neighborhoods, religion, the theater and expressions of ethnic identity. These may take on more individualistic forms than the larger public institutions.

For some critics, it is the localized life and behavior of people in small-town America which typically define their society, rather than centralized federal institutions and the big cities. However, the larger frameworks do serve as a cement which holds local activities and people together. The USA, like other countries, gains its identity from a mixture of the local and the national, which inform and influence, as well as conflict with, each other.

The following chapters stress the historical context of US growth and suggest that the contemporary owes much to the past. Social structures are adaptable, provide frameworks for new situations and their present roles may be different from their original functions. They have evolved over time as they have been influenced by elite and government policies as well as grass-roots impulses and reactions. This process of change and adaptation continues and reflects current anxieties and concerns in American life. Social structures contribute to a culture of varied and often conflicting habits and ideals, as well as being practical organizations for realizing them. This book presents a range of critical viewpoints on the society and its institutions in an attempt to describe what may, or may not, be regarded as distinctively American.

It first considers the physical geography, cultural regions and peoples of the USA. It then examines the central social structures within which Americans have to operate, analyzes their historical growth and modern roles, and considers their underlying values. American attitudes to US society Social structures are not remote abstractions. They affect individuals directly in their daily lives.

Despite their diversity of origins and values, Americans do have many shared common concerns. They identify in public-opinion polls what are for them the major issues facing the country. Items such as the economy, politics, crime, ethnicity, religion, morality, immigration and race regularly lead the lists of problems. There has traditionally been skepticism about the accuracy of polls. They are now regarded as significant indicators although they can occasionally be misleading and reflect how respondents are sensitive to changing conditions. Poll results between and illustrate people's priorities and also how these may change or remain static over time.

In the first half of , all American polls according to PollingReport. By the time of the presidential election in November , the campaign against terrorism, domestic homeland security, foreign policy and Iraq became increasingly important. The economy and jobs were still prioritized but education had slipped in the ratings. Questions about Medicare medical program for people over 65 years of age , Medicaid medical care for low-income people under 65 , the cost of prescription drugs, social security federal payments to people who are unemployed, poor, old or disabled , abortion and same-sex marriage were also prominent. Concerns about corporate corruption and immigration had climbed up the poll ratings, whereas worries about gun control, drugs, the death penalty and crime had declined.

This latter finding coincided with an overall decrease in the crime rate in the late s and the early twenty-first century. Certain issues had remained central in people's minds since , but others, such as the energy crisis, had climbed up the list. More specific economic items such as unemployment, the credit crisis and difficulties with loans, mortgages and property became more urgent. Concerns such as abortion, crime and same-sex marriage had apparently declined in importance. However, fierce debates about Iraq, Afghanistan and foreign policy continued. TABLE 1. These findings were echoed in other polls in during the presidential election campaign and indicated sharp declines in approval ratings about the condition of the country and the performance of the US Administration since Given the alleged optimism of Americans, their faith in their society and a belief in an individual ability to achieve the American Dream, it is instructive to consider the results of polls which report on alienation in US society see Table 1.

These findings suggest a degree of powerlessness felt by ordinary Americans in the face of political, economic, bureaucratic, corporate and institutional forces. In terms of the ethnic composition of the country, and given the considerable significance of original settlement and later immigration in US history over the centuries, attitudes to national identity and immigration appear to be shifting somewhat. But these three largest ancestral groups in fact saw their numbers decline by According to the Christian Science Monitor in June , this does not represent a denial of roots but rather an increased sense of commonality, patriotism and American nationalism.

However, increased immigration, a non-white majority population by and increased birth rates for non-white people may significantly change these observations in the relatively near future. These finding have been reflected in other polls and suggest that many Americans see legal immigration as a problem and believe that illegal immigration should be stopped.

They might indicate that there is still a considerable nativist or xenophobic current in American society, which is at odds with the values of much of the country's political and economic leadership. The government, for example, argues that skilled and unskilled immigration is necessary to support the economy and an ageing population. Some critics argue that the meaning and definition of a more unified national and civic US identity remain elusive. They maintain that a candid debate about the essence of American identity is needed in the current fluid and polarized situation. Many Americans may generally appear to believe in the inherent validity of American values, but they continue to question what is meant by these values, how consensual they are and, consequently, what it means to be American.

What are some of the characteristics that you would associate with the American people and their society? Is the study of the major cultures an adequate way to approach American society? Do you find that the public opinion poll findings in this chapter give a valid picture of the USA? Give your reasons after carefully examining the poll results. Discuss whether multiculturalism and national identity can coexist. Further reading Addington, L. Alba, R. Bloom, A. Campbell, N. Davies and G. Crowther, J and K. Cullen, J. Datesman, M. Kearny and J. Ferguson, N. Hacker, A. Hall, J. Lindholm Is America Breaking Apart? Huntington, S. Jenkins, P. Leach, E. Lipset, S. Micklethwait, J.

Moen, P. Dempster-McClain and H. Pope, D. Sandel, M. Sargent, L. Woods, R. Zinn, H. Websites usinfo. Exercises Further reading Websites With an area of 3,, square miles 9,, square kilometers the United States is exceeded in size only by Russia, Canada and China. Of the fifty states, forty-eight lie between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and between Canada and Mexico, while two, Alaska and Hawaii, lie in the north-west corner of the continent and the Pacific Ocean, respectively. Island possessions in the Caribbean and the Pacific add another 11, square miles 17, kilometers to American territory.

Political ecology The most pronounced feature of the country is its variety. Its natural environment varies from the arctic to the tropical, from rainforest to desert, from vast plains to rugged mountains. Exploiting its natural resources has depleted reserves, caused extensive pollution and shown a wastefulness that has led to dependence on resources from other nations, although the country's own natural riches remain a main support of its economic life. Environmentalist movements and public concern since the mids have successfully lobbied for a huge national system of nature preserves and government monitoring and regulation of the environment.

The use of natural resources has become a matter of balancing priorities among overlapping environmental, economic and cultural interest groups. Natural resources, economic development and environmental concerns Approached from the Atlantic Ocean or the Gulf of Mexico, the country's first land formation is the Atlantic Plain, a coastal lowland stretching from New England to the middle of Texas. Its soil is mostly poor but includes a fertile citrus-growing region and the Cotton Belt in the south, which have both been intensively developed for commercial farming.

The Plain's most important natural wealth is found along and in the Gulf, where much of the nation's crude-oil and natural-gas reserves are located. Water pollution from industrial development in the North and commercial fertilizers and oil-drilling in the South have posed the most serious threats to the Plain's environment. PLATE 2. As the nation strives for energy independence, politicians consider exploiting all available resources and distributing the environmental costs across the country. Inland from the Atlantic Plain, the land rises to the Piedmont, a gently rolling fertile plateau. Along the eastern edge of the Piedmont is the fall line, where rivers running down to the Atlantic form waterfalls. When water power was used for grain and textile mills, America's first industrial cities grew up along the northern fall line near the coast.

The Piedmont rises to the Appalachians, much-eroded mountains from Canada to Alabama that separate the eastern seaboard from the interior. These mountains, the Appalachian Plateau, and the rugged ridge and valley country to their west delayed European invasion and settlement see Figure 2. Although the Appalachians and the upland sub-regions contain minerals, only iron, building stone and coal are found in large quantities. The coal deposits in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, in the area called Appalachia, are among the world's largest and once provided fuel for developing industry in the north-east and the Great Lakes region as well as for heating homes across the nation. West of the Appalachian highlands lies the Central Lowland, a vast area stretching from New York state to central Texas and north to Canada, which resembles a huge, irregular bowl rimmed by the Great Lakes and highlands.

The iron ore in one of these, the Mesabi Range at the western edge of the Lakes, transported inexpensively over the Great Lakes to the coal of Appalachia, made the development of America's industrial core possible. The Central Lowland is not entirely flat. The glacial moraine, an area of rocky territory with many lakes, runs along a line just north of the Ohio and Missouri rivers. On both sides of the moraine, the lowland has a table-like flatness except near rivers that have dug gorges. The lowland also varies in rainfall and temperature.

Rainfall decreases towards the west, resulting first in a change from forests mixed with fields to the prairies, where trees are rare. Farther west, the high prairie grass changes to short grass at the inch centimeter annual rainfall line where the Great Plains begin see Figure 2. From north to south, the long winters of the Upper Midwest change to the snow-less winters of the gulf states.

The natural resources of the Central Lowland, which is often called the nation's breadbasket, are its soil and fossil fuels. The fields of oil and gas in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas were the nation's most important domestic supply until reserves in Alaska were tapped. Across the lowland the increase in large-scale agribusinesses in recent years has produced intense efforts to deal with unwanted side effects, including polluted water supplies from plant fertilizers and insecticides and the leakage of concentrated animal feed and sewage from industrial pig, chicken and freshwater fish farming. The Great Plains is a band of semi-arid territory almost miles kilometers wide between Canada and Mexico.

The plains rise so gradually towards the west that large parts of the region appear to be utterly flat. The buffalo grass of the plains makes them excellent for ranching, but some areas, watered by automated artesian wells or irrigation, are now high- yield farm country. From the western edge of the Great Plains to the Pacific coast, a third of the continental United States consists of the Cordillera mountain chains the Rockies and the Pacific ranges and the basins and plateaus between them. Surrounding the Plateau is the desert Southwest. Valleys and plains rather than mountains occupy much of the Middle Rockies. The Wyoming Basin has provided a route through the mountains, from the Oregon Trail that pioneers followed to the inter-state highways of today.

In the northern Rockies are vast wilderness areas and the Columbia Basin, which is etched by the remarkable canyons of the Snake and Columbia rivers. The western arm of the Cordillera consists of two lines of mountains with a series of valleys between them. In from the coast are the highest peaks, including active volcanoes. All these valleys are blessed with rich soils, and the more southerly were relatively easy to irrigate. Since the invention of refrigeration, these valleys have supplied the nation with fruit and vegetables. The mountains between the valleys and the coast include major earthquake zones, such as the San Andreas Fault, which caused the quake that leveled San Francisco.

Distributing limited water resources fairly, however, rather than earthquakes, seems to be the most serious environmental challenge to a majority of westerners. Largely fragile tundra, Alaska's interior is composed of mountains, broken plateaus and fairly flat valleys with a cold inland climate. Much of coastal and island Alaska has a temperate climate because of warm ocean currents.

The building of the trans-Alaska pipeline, coastal oil spills and, as recently as the presidential election campaign, the debate over plans to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge ANWR to oil exploration have tested the nation's will to protect Alaska's nature. Republican Vice Presidential Candidate Sarah Palin, the governor of the state, joined her party and a large majority of Alaskan voters in supporting the opening of the ANWR during the campaign. The American Cordillera are world-famous for veins of precious metals, such as the gold of the Sierra and Yukon and the Comstock silver lode of Nevada.

More recently, industrial metals such as copper and lead have been mined. Large occurrences of oil and gas are found in California and Wyoming, and the Colorado Plateau contains uranium, oil shale and soft coal. To extract the oil and coal, say mining companies, open-pit and strip-mining are necessary. Conservationists, on the other hand, argue that this mining devastates parts of the plateau as thoroughly as it destroyed areas of the Great Plains and Appalachia. The natural riches of Hawaii are vegetable rather than mineral. Trade winds give the islands a temperate climate. The volcanic mountains catch much rain on the windward side of the islands so that the leeward side has only moderate rainfall.

Coastlines and river systems Among the most important physical features and resources of the country are its coastlines, harbors, ocean currents and network of lakes and rivers. The shallow waters of the continental shelf off the North Atlantic coast known as the Great Banks contain many kinds of fish and attracted fishermen from Europe even before European settlers established their first colonies in the New World. By the s the famous cod stocks there had collapsed from international over-fishing, however, and made the need to manage these maritime riches clear to the USA and Canada.

The east coast has a warmer climate because of the Florida Current. Fine harbors and estuaries made the sites of New York City, Philadelphia and Baltimore excellent locations for trade. The great eastern water systems are those that drain the Central Lowland: the Mississippi with its major tributaries and the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence system. One of the world's great inland water networks, the Mississippi system, carries freight from New Orleans north to Minneapolis and east to Pittsburgh. Western tributaries of the Mississippi are mostly unfit for navigation, but since the s the Missouri has carried heavy barge traffic as a result of dams, locks and dredging. Because canals connect it to the Mississippi, the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence system functions as the second half of one vast network of inland waterways.

The biggest group of freshwater lakes in the world, the Great Lakes carry more shipping than any other inland lake group. The fertile farmland surrounding the lakes and the iron, lumber and fossil fuels near their shores supported the rapid urbanization and industrialization of the Midwest in the s. The opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway in made the lake cities international seaports by bypassing the obstacles to ocean-going freighters in the St.

Lawrence with huge locks. On the west coast, limited rainfall and scant mountain run-off dry up all but three river systems, the Columbia, the Colorado and the San Joaquin-Sacramento, before they reach the sea. They do not support shipping, but the west's largest rivers have brought prosperity by providing hydroelectric power and irrigation. The Columbia, once a wild white river, now runs down through dams and calm lakes, turning the arid plateaus of Washington state into vegetable gardens and supplying electrical power as well as drinking water to several states and Native-American cultures.

The Colorado serves the same purposes on a smaller scale. Proposals for its further development have met opposition because more dams would destroy the beauty of the Grand Canyon and other canyon lands. Conservation, recreational areas and environmental protection Although the country's population is now over million, most of these people live in relatively small areas.

Some parts of the country are not suitable for urbanization because of climate or difficult topography. Others have been set aside as recreation areas or wildlife preserves. These and other factors give the USA a great variety of national, state and local parks and open spaces. In the USA, conservation of natural beauty and resources through national parks gained acceptance in the late s, with vocal support from President Theodore Roosevelt, among others. Yellowstone National Park, the first nature preserve created by Congress, was put under federal control in The Park Service now administers over different sites, whose combined territory exceeds 40, square miles , square kilometers of land and water.

There are national parks in all parts of the nation, but the largest and most famous are located between the Rockies and the Pacific. Government protection of the parks means controlled development. According to federal law, the government must balance the interests of developers, holiday-makers, environmentalists and Native Americans. Concerted lobbying of Congress by grass-roots groups and highly organized environmental organizations such as the Sierra Club and National Audubon Society soon resulted in a series of landmark federal laws.

In the same year an independent regulatory body, the Environmental Protection Agency EPA , took on the national government's responsibility for monitoring and protecting America's natural environment, and the Clean Air Act gave the EPA the duty of identifying and reducing airborne pollutants. By the end of the s the Clean Water Act, Safe Drinking Water Act and the Superfund statute, which provides emergency federal funding for eliminating the health hazards of toxic-waste sites across the nation, were in effect. These laws have been repeatedly strengthened and extended in the decades since their enactment because of the environmental damage caused largely by sprawling urban development, new and outmoded industrial sites, and innovative commercial forms of farming and food processing.

The middle latitudes are, however, known for wide variations in temperature and rainfall, and the great size of North America reinforces these differences. In general, the more distant a place is from an ocean, the more it has temperature extremes in the summer and winter. Most climates in America are distinctly inland because, with the general eastward movement of air across the country, the Cordillera mountain system limits the moderating influence of the Pacific to a narrow strip along the west coast.

Thus, San Francisco experiences only a small differential between winter and summer temperatures, but coastal cities in the Northeast have the same range of temperatures that extend from the Rockies to the east coast. The easterly direction of weather systems across the country also means the Atlantic Ocean has only a weak moderating influence. In his work on fan and participatory culture, Matt Hills examines the interplay between production and the consumerism that fan cultures criticize. Furthermore, several different fan cultures have turned those who subscribe to traditional workings of capitalism into the other; people who buy too many items automatically lose authenticity by contributing to structures that align too strongly with dominant capitalist society, therefore alienating themselves from supposedly committed fans.

Therefore, fans must perpetually occupy a space in which they carve out their own unique identity, separate from conventional consumerism but also bolster their credibility with particular collectors items. Although the two concepts seem based in opposition, Hills argues that they are inherently related and dependent upon one another. However, Hills then goes on to suggest that fan subculturists must accept such a polarity as an innate contradiction. Therefore, participants normally fall somewhere on the spectrum of consumer and producer, creating monetary value with their overinvestment in specific objects while also forming resistance against the typical trappings they find in consumerism.

According to Turk, fannish gifts include not only the most visible forms of creative output — fic, art, vids, etc. This helps explain why fans choose to participate in the subculture: the value lies not just in the creation of art or writing about their favorite TV show or movie, but in the consumption of those works by other fans, and the sense of community created when gifts are accepted in the form of being read, watched, or otherwise appreciated. Joli Jensen has addressed the role of class and elitism in fan and participatory culture.

These characterizations ultimately result in stigmatizing fan culture, as the participants are easily stereotyped. Jensen states that although these stereotypes are not representative of fan culture as a whole, they reveal our beliefs about modern society and our relationship to it. Furthermore, society views modernity as the increasing role of mass media in our lives. Those who fall victim to the irrational appeals are manipulated by mass media to essentially display irrational loyalties to an aspect of pop culture. They do not like the idea of being taken advantage of by a marketing firm or corporation, so they ostracize those who they believe have been.

However, this psychological compensation does not apply to all members of fan culture, as there is a difference between those fans who replace interpersonal relationships with media-audience relationships and those whose participation in fan culture is supplemental to or aids in making interpersonal relationships. Jensen states that within fan culture, there are fans, fanatics, and deviants. Whereas fans seek identity and connections with others via a subject, fanatics view the subject as an important aspect of their identity which is integral to their self-esteem. Furthermore, this line is constructed, context dependent. Basically, other members of society can be just as interested in a subject as fans, but the subject and the approach to it is what differentiates the two.

For instance, as Jensen explains, a person who is passionate about an academic subject can be just as passionate about that subject as a member of fan culture; however, society views academia as a rational interest held by educated, high class members of society whereas society views fandom as an emotional obsession held by uneducated low class members of society which is therefore dangerous. Henry Jenkins is an American media scholar. His book, Textual Poachers: Television Fans and Participatory Culture , is considered a seminal work in fan theory and the study of participatory culture.

Jenkins has studied how fan cultures resist traditional narratives of gender and sexuality. He has also written more generally about participatory culture beyond fan culture, including analysis of how online communication has facilitated creative participation by media users. Joli Jensen is a professor of communications at the University of Tulsa. She addresses her interests in American cultural and social thought through her works. He supervises a number of PhD students interested in his areas of study in addition to writing books and articles about fandom and participatory culture. In his first book Fan Cultures , Hills outlines a number of contradictions inherent in fan communities such as the necessity for and resistance towards consumerism, the complicated factors associated with hierarchy, and the search for authenticity among several different types of fandom.

Media and Scholarship. Citizen Fan. A French documentary about fan culture, particularly fan fiction, fanzines, vidding, and cosplay. Contains examples of the positive aspects of the Furry fandom as well as some of the more stigmatized aspects, comparisons to mainstream culture, and the notion that fandom is a phase that can be outgrown. Trekkies : A documentary featuring interviews with devoted fans of Star Trek, including Barbara Adams the Whitewater juror who appeared in court wearing a Starfleet uniform.

Ringers: Lord of the Fans A documentary covering the growth of the Tolkien fandom all the way from the original books by J. Done the Impossible A documentary about the fans of the TV series Firefly, in particular how fans played a part in getting the movie Serenity made after the original TV show was cancelled. Bacon-Smith, Camille. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. An early study of the fans of Star Trek and other genre television shows with a focus on the female fanzine and fan fiction community.

Duffett, Mark. Understanding Fandom. New York: Bloomsbury Academic. Looks at the field of fan research and methodological issues. Duffett also attempts to make sense of the debates surrounding other key scholars on issues related to fan culture. Gray, Jonathan, Cornel Sandvoss, and C. Lee Harrington. Fandom: Identities and Communities in a Mediated World. A collection of essays examining fandom spaces, fandom around the world, the impact of new technologies, and the legal and historical contexts of fan activity.

Harris, Cheryl, and Alison Alexander. Theorizing Fandom: Fans, Subculture, and Identity. Cresskill, N. Examines the role of fandom in society by exploring themes such as gender, power, and social class. Hellekson, Karen, and Kristina Busse. Jefferson, N. A collection of essays on modern Internet fan fiction communities, covering topics including community, sexuality, and the construction of narratives. Hills, Matt. Fan Cultures. New York: Routledge.

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