The Political Spectrum

Per Repeal’s request, I’ll take my question and try to formulate a coherent post. No promises, as I may tend to ramble a bit.

The starting point for this debate is always; what is “culture?” Similar the Supreme Court, I’ll start with some dictionary definitions first:

1. According to Webster’s on-line, culture is: the act of developing the intellectual and moral faculties especially by education; expert care and training; enlightenment and excellence of taste acquired by intellectual and aesthetic training; acquaintance with and taste in fine arts, humanities, and broad aspects of science as distinguished from vocational and technical skills; the integrated pattern of human knowledge, belief, and behavior that depends upon man's capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge to succeeding generations; the customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social group or; the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes a company or corporation.


2. Dictionary.com provides the following definitions: The totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs, institutions, and all other products of human work and thought; these patterns, traits, and products considered as the expression of a particular period, class, community, or population; these patterns, traits, and products considered with respect to a particular category, such as a field, subject, or mode of expression; the predominating attitudes and behavior that characterize the functioning of a group or organization; intellectual and artistic activity and the works produced by it; development of the intellect through training or education; enlightenment resulting from such training or education; or a high degree of taste and refinement formed by aesthetic and intellectual training.

While these definitions are interesting and certainly accurate, I’m not sure they entirely reflect where I was going with the American culture in the context of a debate over “multiculturalism.” To put the question more succinctly, it seems to me that what one really wants to know is what makes one American? What are the traits, beliefs, habits, interests, or other general characteristics that one would list if one were forced to describe our nation to someone who has never heard of it before?

It’s easy to get bogged down in the specifics, and to be sure a lot of the answers depend on things like location. Are we talking about the Northeast, the Midwest, the Plains, the South, the Southeast, the West, the Southwest, the Northwest, or an area outside the continental United States (Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, etc)? The answer to this question might have a large impact on the answer that would be given, as clearly people in NY are culturally distinct from people in CA who are all distinct from people in TN, AL, or TX. Are we to consider socio-economic factors (ala, repeal’s points from the comments)? It is arguably true that poorer people have different responses to cultural questions than the affluent, which have different responses than the “middle-class” (however it is defined) American might have. Do we consider race, religion, ethnicity, or other factors? America is, as is often quoted, a “nation of immigrants” who can trace ancestors from almost all around the globe. Being American is to be a part of the great melting pot, which has been combining persons of all races, religions, backgrounds and above all “cultures” since the discovery of the "new world." All these details begs a question; is it true that because we are an “amalgam” of different cultures, does that mean that there is no American culture?

I think the answer to this question is no, and I’m going to guess that Paul and GC will agree with this sentiment. There are things that are uniquely “American,” which separate us from the cultures of our ancestors. While we may include and cherish those historical roots, we have evolved and developed as a nation to the point where we are now one people, who can define a unique cultural identity, which then can arguably be used to render judgments about the cultures of other countries. So enough dancing around the question; what are those uniquely American things?

Well, I think the first place to start is with our conception of freedom and self-determination. The “American Dream,” if you will, is uniquely American. Regardless of its truth, and there is still a tremendous amount of truth there, the belief that even the poorest, worst off, of our citizens can one day rise up and be CEO of a corporation, a Member of Congress, a lawyer, doctor, CPA or other similarly important and financially well-off position, is something that is arguably not paralleled anywhere else in the world, even in the so-called other western democracies. You are what you make of yourself and the opportunities are limitless, that is a cornerstone of Americanism. Other things might include, our federalist, limited form of national government. The manner in which we hold elections, especially Presidential elections (i.e., the Electoral College). One might argue that our University system, with its sheer size, strength and dominance over the world higher education market, is uniquely American. The fact that per capita more people go to college here is something that is truly a part of that American Dream that is so quintessentially American.

I could go on, but I am sure that others will have things to add as there is a lot of art, music, writing, thought, and scientific achievement that factors in to this debate and deserves to be mentioned.  However, I don’t want to forget the flip-side of the coin. There are negatives or arguable negatives to our culture as well. Some might argue that our percentage of incarcerated persons, which far outnumbers even the most totalitarian of regimes, is something that is a part of American culture. The continued use and support for the death penalty, another American attribute. Our abysmal treatment of the Indians and our embracing of slavery is also American, though perhaps not as bad as other nation’s treatment of indigenous peoples, and we, in fairness, weren’t the only slave nation.

In sum, the question of American culture is far from an easy one, there are lots of variables, as well as I am sure numerous things that I didn’t think of or mention (hint, I’m depending on the other members of the blog to fill them in as their contributions will be interesting and intelligent as usual). Moreover, none of this even begins to address the issue of cross-cultural comparisons, which as I have advocated is the heart of the “multicultural” debate, at least on the philosophical level. This is a fruitful topic and I hope to see lots of comments, suggestions, and arguments, as I’m not convinced that there are any definitive answers.

UPDATE: This post was my first with the new Blogger plug-in for Microsoft Word, which is available here. It worked rather well and might be an improvement over using Blogger directly, or even the cut-and-paste approach, which I know is quite popular.