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I travel to European countries a lot - especially to the United Kingdom, France, Italy and the Netherlands - and I am Europhile when it comes to a lot of cultural things (read: NOT political things). Sometimes, I wonder what it would be like if the United States had many states and regions with a stronger European influence - something at the level of the province of Quebec in Canada.
Do you think that this would be a welcome improvement for the United States? By the way, I appreciate that American culture is strong and unique. So, I'm not arguing about that at all... just greater European influence to make things a little more colorful and elegant, I suppose.
It would've been interesting to see what if places like Ohio had fully preserved it's German heritage or Louisiana and Maine their French background, be like today.
But essentially the only way the US could've continued to have a stronger European cultural feel (about it) was if it had remained associated with the (UK) at least in the way Canada New Zealand and the Barbados has, or at least until the late 19th century. Then it would've been. Remember it was Britain that allowed the French culture to continue in Quebec, even after France surrendered it. C'set la vie...
Remember it was Britain that allowed the French culture to continue in Quebec, even after France surrendered it. C'set la vie...
Wrong. The Brits tried to expel the french Acaadians from the Maritimes and even northern Maine. Why do you think there is a direct tie between the Cajuns in Louisiana and the Acadians in the Maritimes and Maine?
As for the US being more like Europe... No thanks.
I travel to European countries a lot - especially to the United Kingdom, France, Italy and the Netherlands - and I am Europhile when it comes to a lot of cultural things (read: NOT political things). Sometimes, I wonder what it would be like if the United States had many states and regions with a stronger European influence - something at the level of the province of Quebec in Canada.
Do you think that this would be a welcome improvement for the United States? By the way, I appreciate that American culture is strong and unique. So, I'm not arguing about that at all... just greater European influence to make things a little more colorful and elegant, I suppose.
No i love the culture of America.
We are made up of people of all over the world who moved here for a better life forming one great culture and a great country.
I wish the USA spent a little more time focusing on quiality of life and not just business and money. The biggest thing I notice right away when I go overseas is how "everyday" food is SOOOOO much better than what you find in the USA. We do so much to food to make it last forever, bring price down and process it all that many people here probably don't realize what absolute garbage most of our food is compared to other countries who have laws in place to keep food legit and not process it so much like we do that most of our food wouldn't be legal in places like Europe. You certainly CAN get good food here if you hunt around and pay a little more, but elsewhere it's just everywhere. I was in Italy last month and grabbed breat, meat, basel, cheese and some sauce from a grocery store and made my own sandwich and wanted to cry at how much better that cheap homemade sandwich from a dive grocery tasted than anything you get over here.
Most of our culture is basically European, it's just a mongrelized blend mixed in with other elements. A lot of things that are uniquely American--everything from baseball and football to hot dogs and hamburger and Thanksgiving all have their roots in some element of some European culture. Europe itself doesn't really consist of "European" culture, it's a lot of different cultures--Scandinavians have about as much in common with Greeks as we do with someone in Scotland.
Our pure examples of European cultures for the most part just dried up with in a generation or two after the Immigration Act of 1924 when the immigrants were restricted from coming in the high numbers they had before. German culture(and the German language) had a huge cultural imprint for years, but the whole community really assimilated quickly after the one-two punch of World War I and World War II when German-Americans were suddenly suspect as possible allies to an enemy power. You read though about New York in the 1920s and there was huge German neighborhoods with beer halls and so on even in places like the Upper East Side.
Part of the bargain of America though has always been, "You can come here, but eventually you'll need to learn English and assimilate or we won't trust you." To varying degrees that's what the Italians and Poles and Greeks and Hungarians and Eastern European Jews all went through. It's why though, our neighborhoods of European cultures become shells of what they used to be once a generation really starts assimilating and moving to the suburbs and immigration stops. Like Brighton Beach is still a visible and heavily Russian neighborhood, but if Russian people stopped immigrating to the US, you'd see that become sort of a ethnic theme park(like many Little Italys became) or another group would move in. But it's sort of the reason that we just count European people as "whites" and not separate ethnicity for the most part these days.
Most of our culture is basically European, it's just a mongrelized blend mixed in with other elements. A lot of things that are uniquely American--everything from baseball and football to hot dogs and hamburger and Thanksgiving all have their roots in some element of some European culture. Europe itself doesn't really consist of "European" culture, it's a lot of different cultures--Scandinavians have about as much in common with Greeks as we do with someone in Scotland.
Our pure examples of European cultures for the most part just dried up with in a generation or two after the Immigration Act of 1924 when the immigrants were restricted from coming in the high numbers they had before. German culture(and the German language) had a huge cultural imprint for years, but the whole community really assimilated quickly after the one-two punch of World War I and World War II when German-Americans were suddenly suspect as possible allies to an enemy power. You read though about New York in the 1920s and there was huge German neighborhoods with beer halls and so on even in places like the Upper East Side.
Part of the bargain of America though has always been, "You can come here, but eventually you'll need to learn English and assimilate or we won't trust you." To varying degrees that's what the Italians and Poles and Greeks and Hungarians and Eastern European Jews all went through. It's why though, our neighborhoods of European cultures become shells of what they used to be once a generation really starts assimilating and moving to the suburbs and immigration stops. Like Brighton Beach is still a visible and heavily Russian neighborhood, but if Russian people stopped immigrating to the US, you'd see that become sort of a ethnic theme park(like many Little Italys became) or another group would move in. But it's sort of the reason that we just count European people as "whites" and not separate ethnicity for the most part these days.
Yep, Yep, Yep. There always seemed to be a phobia of immigrants not learning English or fully assimilating once they arrive in America. This lead to immigrants themselves having a phobia of not being able to integrate. So integration and not being seen as "too" ethnic seemed to be a priority among many immigrants. I think the pressure may be on the most for Middle-Easterners out of all the ethnic groups, especially in this post-9/11 America.
As for the Hispanic community will fully assimilate one day. Right now, only certain groups of Hispanics are fully assimilated, and those assimilated groups of Hispanics have even been given various titles, like Chicanos, Tejanos, and Nuyoricans.
Going back to the whole convo on Ethnic Whites, one thing seems clear. Even though they were disgriminated against by American Protestant Anglos, once they fully assimilated and became somewhat trusted and or accepted as "Just White" they all joined the club in discrimination against Blacks. It seems getting away from being looked at as "ethnic white" and membership as "Just White like us" was dependent upon your gradual move up in the ethnic latter, away from Blacks. Irish in Boston got discrimnated against, than turned around and did it to Blacks, So did the Italians in NYC. Now I hear it's happening with Mexican-American gangs in California(but it's probably exagerrated by the media).
BUT, if you're Black AND a foreigner? You get it from all cylinders. You get it from Whites, and jealous Black Americans. But sometimes if you're a Black foreigner, who is somewhat docile, and you have somewhat of an education(think intelligent Nigerians/West Africans) than you might get more respect from Whites, than a Black American would. Whites may think of you as "The other Blacks", and not the Ghetto African-Americans. This may lead to the disapproval and general discrimination against African-Americans, at the hands of African immigrants. African immigrants may sometimes distance themselves from the general African-American community, so they can get approval from White-Americans.
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