americans and their " culture"

[Cod]

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there was someone else purporting to be princess margaret's son the other day on tv... where would daytime tv be without them?

Hi Cod, Another American here. First, the 'true Americans' are the American Indians who were here when the 1st settlers came over. Second, America is different in that the great majority of people have come from somewhere else - one generation or more back. You seem to presume that any 'cultural' identity disappears when the next generation is born in America. On the contrary, many families do retain their 'cultural' identity and pass them on to their children, and so on, and so on, and so on, even when the 100% Irish may have intermarried with, say a Native American or a Chinese American. So in America, when you meet someone whose last name is O'Reilly or McCartney, even if they have never stepped foot in Ireland and they intermarried with a Native American or a Chinese person, they may very well identify themselves as Irish-Chinese-American or whatever, and no one will question that.

So do the canadians on this thread feel that the american culture has impinged/hindered/taken over the canadian culture?? Maybe it depends what part of canada you are from. From what i have seen in Canada, the tv presenters sound american, even say zeee instead of zed. As far as i know canadian publishing houses and book stores have virtually been taken over or closed out because of american monopolies. If you cant get books published in canada, does that affect canadian culture?

Would you say almost40 that America celebrates those differences? For example, on the Fourth of July do people dress in their cultural dress for parades?

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No doubt like any English speaking nation we have a fair amount of American entertainment available to us. But for a treasure trove of Canadian culture you only need look to the CBC, especially radio, lately they've had competitions for reading and writing groups to nominate what they feel is the best Canadian book. In terms of world literature Canada is hardly losing out: Rohinton Mistry, Margaret Atwood, the author of Life of Pi (forget his name, it won the Man Booker two years ago...) I'm sure other Canadians will think of more authors.

I don't know either, Cod. I don't think of my self as Irish or Irish-American. No culture made it down to my generation, and immigration happened over 5 generations ago, and I've never set foot in Ireland.

Maybe it has something to do with the way the world views Americans. After being on this site for awhile now, I've seen references over time to Americans as "ignorant" or "stupid", "greedy", "loud", "fat bloaters" and now "hillbilly". I think the images the world gets through the tv programs we export tends to support the view as us being a bunch of capitalist consumers who are not all that bright. Along with the election of Bush. I'm not saying that I disagree with the stereotype, I think that there's definitely truth in those statements that can be applied to quite a few of us. But not ALL of us are that way. I'd like to think I'm not all of those things. That's why I like this site, because I can see the views of other people besides Americans, and the way our news portrays events. But where does that leave me culturally? I don't really know. I don't really feel like I have one. Maybe thats why others grab at the past?

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What is so strange to me is the taking on of their various past european cultures, yet still being so insular in the present. I really find it shocking (living amongst educated, affluent americans) how stonkingly unaware they are of the rest of the world.

definition of culture:

The complete way of life of a people: the shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterize a group; their customs, art, literature, religion, philosophy, etc.; the pattern of learned and shared behavior among the members of a group.

nationality:
the status of belonging to a particular nation by birth or naturalization

Not to mention poor old recently departed Pierre Berton

mamadadawahwah, Canada realises they're in danger of being overwhelmed by America - so they protect their culture. They have really strict "CanCon" rules that protect Canadian music, for example, which is why there are about a billion Canadian pop groups out there. Anyone who has more than 10 CDs has a Canadian CD, pretty much guaranteed, whether they realise it or not.

But despite the music thing, and the authors, Canadian culture isn't really much different from American, despite what almost every Canadian will tell you.

NotQuiteCockney: I used that one before. Someone said to me that their family came over 300 yrs ago and I retorted that mine did over 10,000. It was a conversation killer though!

If every canadian tells me that their culture is different from the american culture, i would tend to believe them. What do you mean? Do you think Canadians are similar to americans? From experience I KNOW this is not true.

Having been born and bred in Canada, I can say categorically our american cousins are a "place apart".

Eh, any conversation in which people are claiming rights based on how long their folks have been in a country deserves to be killed!

I've heard "I think Natives should have the same rights as any other immigrants". What on earth does one say to that?

And, almost40, I think most people, at least in Europe, are at least partly from somewhere else. It's just a question of whether they know about it.

I'd say the difference between the "average" Canadian and the "average" American is much smaller than the difference between any two randomly chosen Canadians. They're both big countries, they're next to each other, and they're not that different.

Oh, except that saying they're not different doesn't bother Americans, but it sure bugs Canadians.

skerriesmum: No, Americans don't dress culturally different on the 4th of July - that's celebrating independence from the Brits . Americans do openly celebrate their cultures and include 'others' in their celebrations, for instance, St. Paddy's Day, Cinco de Mayo, Chinese New Year.

cod: if you married someone with an Irish surname, you wouldn't inherit Irish culture. The kids might, if the culture was passed down from the Mr.

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Diluted perhaps, but is there a 'pure' culture? I think not. Irish-American culture is different then Irish culture, no doubt.

Also, the 'whatever' culture today is different than it was 50 years ago. I doubt the British of today are the same as they were not so long ago.

Also, the 'whatever' culture today is different than it was 50 years ago. I doubt the British of today are the same as they were not so long ago.

the British? who are they? do you mean Scottish, Welsh, English (Cornish, northern, southern, midlands, one side of the Pennines or the other)?

Americans tend to assume that 'British' is homogenous. Many 'British' or even 'English' people are more Irish than the Irish Americans but if they consider themselves anything, it's just 'Catholic'.

or lapsed Catholic. (Which is a stronger identity than lapsed Church of England at any rate.)