American Culture

American culture

The culture of the United States is a Western culture originally influenced by European cultures. It has been developing since long before the United States became a country with its own unique social and cultural characteristics such as dialect, music, arts, social habits, cuisine, and folklore. Today, the United States of America is an ethnically and racially diverse countryas a result of large-scale immigration from many different countries throughout its history.
Its chief early influences came from English, Scottish and Irish settlers of colonial America. British culture, due to colonial ties with Britain that spread the English language, legal systemand other cultural inheritances, had a formative influence. Other important influences came from other parts ofwestern Europe, especially Germany, France, and Italy.
American culture includes both conservative and liberal elements, military and scientific competitiveness, political structures, risk taking and free expression, materialist and moral elements. Despite certain consistent ideological principles ( individualism, egalitarianism, and faith in freedom and democracy), American culture has avariety of expressions due to its geographical scale and demographic diversity.
It also includes elements which evolved from Native Americans, and other ethnic subcultures; most prominently the culture of African Americans and different cultures from Latin America. Many cultural elements, especially popular culture, have been exported across the globe through modern mass media.
LanguagesAlthough the United States has no official language at the federal level, 30 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. There are more than 300 languages besides English which canclaim native speakers in the United States—some of which are spoken by the indigenous peoples (about 150 living languages) and others which were imported by immigrants.
Indigenous languages of the United States include the Native American languages, which are spoken on the country’s numerous Indian reservations and Native American cultural events such as pow wows; Hawaiian, which has officialstatus 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. American Sign Language, used mainly by the deaf, is also native to the country.
ReligionAmong developed countries, the U.S. is one of the most religious (primarily Christian) in terms of its demographics.
Today, governments at the national, state, and local levels are secular institution, with what is often called the "separation of church and state" prevailing. But like federal politics, the topic of religion in the United States can cause an emotionally heated debate over moral, ethical andlegal issues affecting Americans of all faiths in everyday life, such as polarizing issues of abortion, gay marriage and what is considered obscenity.
Several of the original Thirteen Colonies were established by English and Irish settlers who wished to practice their own religion without discrimination or persecution: Pennsylvania was established by Quakers, Maryland by Roman Catholics andthe Massachusetts Bay Colony by Puritans. The first bible printed in a European language in the Colonies was by German immigrant Christopher Sauer.Nine of the thirteen colonies had official public religions. Yet by the time of the Philadelphia Convention of 1787, the United States became one of the first countries in the world to codify freedom of religion into law, although this originally...