U.S. Culture
antitechnology aspect that led some Americans to switch to a partially or
wholly vegetarian diet, or to emphasize products produced organically
(without chemical fertilizers and pesticides). Many considered these foods
more wholesome and socially responsible because their production was less
taxing to the environment. In the latter 20th century, Americans also
worried about the effects of newly introduced genetically altered foods
and irradiation processes for killing bacteria. They feared that these new
processes made their food less natural and therefore harmful.
These concerns and the emphasis on variety were by no means universal,
since food habits in the late 20th century often reflected society’s
ethnic and class differences. Not all Americans appreciated California
cuisine or vegetarian food, and many recent immigrants, like their
immigrant predecessors, often continued eating the foods they knew best.
At the end of the 20th century, American eating habits and food production
were increasingly taking place outside the home. Many people relied on
restaurants and on new types of fully prepared meals to help busy families
in which both adults worked full-time. Another sign of the public’s
changing food habits was the microwave oven, probably the most widely used
new kitchen appliance, since it can quickly cook foods and reheat prepared
foods and leftovers. Since Americans are generally cooking less of their
own food, they are more aware than at any time since the early 20th
century of the quality and health standards applied to food. Recent
attention to cases in which children have died from contaminated and
poorly prepared food has once again directed the public’s attention to the
government's role in monitoring food safety.
In some ways, American food developments are contradictory. Americans are
more aware of food quality despite, and maybe because of, their increasing
dependence on convenience. They eat a more varied diet, drawing on the
cuisines of immigrant groups (Thai, Vietnamese, Greek, Indian, Cuban,
Mexican, and Ethiopian), but they also regularly eat fast foods found in
every shopping mall and along every highway. They are more suspicious of
technology, although they rely heavily on it for their daily meals. In
many ways, these contradictions reflect the many influences on American
life in the late 20th century—immigration, double-income households,
genetic technologies, domestic and foreign travel—and food has become an
even deeper expression of the complex culture of which it is part.
Dress
In many regions of the world, people wear traditional costumes at
festivals or holidays, and sometimes more regularly. Americans, however,
do not have distinctive folk attire with a long tradition. Except for the
varied and characteristic clothing of Native American peoples, dress in
the United States has rarely been specific to a certain region or based on
the careful preservation of decorative patterns and crafts. American dress
is derived from the fabrics and fashions of the Europeans who began
colonizing the country in the 17th century. Early settlers incorporated
some of the forms worn by indigenous peoples, such as moccasins and
garments made from animal skins (Benjamin Franklin is famous for flaunting
a raccoon cap when he traveled to Europe), but in general, fashion in the
United States adapted and modified European styles. Despite the number and
variety of immigrants in the United States, American clothing has tended
to be homogeneous, and attire from an immigrant’s homeland was often
rapidly exchanged for American apparel.
American dress is distinctive because of its casualness. American style in
the 20th century is recognizably more informal than in Europe, and for its
fashion sources it is more dependent on what people on the streets are
wearing. European fashions take their cues from the top of the fashion
hierarchy, dictated by the world-famous haute couture (high fashion)
houses of Paris, France, and recently those of Milan, Italy, and London,
England. Paris designers, both today and in the past, have also dressed
wealthy and fashionable Americans, who copied French styles. Although
European designs remain a significant influence on American tastes,
American fashions more often come from popular sources, such as the school
and the street, as well as television and movies. In the last quarter of
the 20th century, American designers often found inspiration in the
imaginative attire worn by young people in cities and ballparks, and that
worn by workers in factories and fields.
Blue jeans are probably the single most representative article of American
clothing. They were originally invented by tailor Jacob Davis, who
together with dry-goods salesman Levi Strauss patented the idea in 1873 as
durable clothing for miners. Blue jeans (also known as dungarees) spread
among workers of all kinds in the late 19th and early 20th centuries,
especially among cowboys, farmers, loggers, and railroad workers. During
the 1950s, actors Marlon Brando and James Dean made blue jeans fashionable
by wearing them in movies, and jeans became part of the image of teenage
rebelliousness. This fashion statement exploded in the 1960s and 1970s as
Levi's became a fundamental part of the youth culture focused on civil
rights and antiwar protests. By the late 1970s, almost everyone in the
United States wore blue jeans, and youths around the world sought them. As
designers began to create more sophisticated styles of blue jeans and to
adjust their fit, jeans began to express the American emphasis on
informality and the importance of subtlety of detail. By highlighting the
right label and achieving the right look, blue jeans, despite their worker
origins, ironically embodied the status consciousness of American fashion
and the eagerness to approximate the latest fad.
American informality in dress is such a strong part of American culture
that many workplaces have adopted the idea of “casual Friday,” a day when
workers are encouraged to dress down from their usual professional attire.
For many high-tech industries located along the West Coast, as well as
among faculty at colleges and universities, this emphasis on casual attire
is a daily occurrence, not just reserved for Fridays.
The fashion industry in the United States, along with its companion
cosmetics industry, grew enormously in the second half of the 20th century
and became a major source of competition for French fashion. Especially
notable during the late 20th century was the incorporation of sports logos
and styles, from athletic shoes to tennis shirts and baseball caps, into
standard American wardrobes. American informality is enshrined in the
wardrobes created by world-famous U.S. designers such as Calvin Klein, Liz
Claiborne, and Ralph Lauren. Lauren especially adopted the American look,
based in part on the tradition of the old West (cowboy hats, boots, and
jeans) and in part on the clean-cut sportiness of suburban style (blazers,
loafers, and khakis).
Sports and Recreation
Large numbers of Americans watch and participate in sports activities,
which are a deeply ingrained part of American life. Americans use sports
to express interest in health and fitness and to occupy their leisure
time. Sports also allow Americans to connect and identify with mass
culture. Americans pour billions of dollars into sports and their related
enterprises, affecting the economy, family habits, school life, and
clothing styles. Americans of all classes, races, sexes, and ages
participate in sports activities—from toddlers in infant swimming groups
and teenagers participating in school athletics to middle-aged adults
bowling or golfing and older persons practicing t’ai chi.
Public subsidies and private sponsorships support the immense network of
outdoor and indoor sports, recreation, and athletic competitions. Except
for those sponsored by public schools, most sports activities are
privately funded, and even American Olympic athletes receive no direct
national sponsorship. Little League baseball teams, for example, are
usually sponsored by local businesses. Many commercial football,
basketball, baseball, and hockey teams reflect large private investments.
Although sports teams are privately owned, they play in stadiums that are
usually financed by taxpayer-provided subsidies such as bond measures.
State taxes provide some money for state university sporting events.
Taxpayer dollars also support state parks, the National Park Service, and
the Forest Service, which provide places for Americans to enjoy camping,
fishing, hiking, and rafting. Public money also funds the Coast Guard,
whose crews protect those enjoying boating around the nation's shores.
Sports in North America go back to the Native Americans, who played forms
of lacrosse and field hockey. During colonial times, early Dutch settlers
bowled on New York City's Bowling Green, still a small park in southern
Manhattan. However, organized sports competitions and local participatory
sports on a substantial scale go back only to the late 19th century.
Schools and colleges began to encourage athletics as part of a balanced
program emphasizing physical as well as mental vigor, and churches began
to loosen strictures against leisure and physical pleasures. As work
became more mechanized, more clerical, and less physical during the late
19th century, Americans became concerned with diet and exercise. With
sedentary urban activities replacing rural life, Americans used sports and
outdoor relaxation to balance lives that had become hurried and confined.
Biking, tennis, and golf became popular for those who could afford them,
while sandlot baseball and an early version of basketball became popular
city activities. At the same time, organizations such as the Boy Scouts
and the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) began to sponsor sports
as part of their efforts to counteract unruly behavior among young people.
Baseball teams developed in Eastern cities during the 1850s and spread to
the rest of the nation during the Civil War in the 1860s. Baseball quickly
became the national pastime and began to produce sports heroes such as Cy
Young, Ty Cobb, and Babe Ruth in the first half of the 20th century. With
its city-based loyalties and all-American aura, baseball appealed to many
immigrants, who as players and fans used the game as a way to fit into
American culture.
Starting in the latter part of the 19th century, football was played on
college campuses, and intercollegiate games quickly followed. By the early
20th century, football had become a feature of college life across the
nation. In the 1920s football pep rallies were commonly held on college
campuses, and football players were among the most admired campus leaders.
That enthusiasm has now spilled way beyond college to Americans throughout
the country. Spectators also watch the professional football teams of the
National Football League (NFL) with enthusiasm.
Basketball is another sport that is very popular as both a spectator and
participant sport. The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA)
hosts championships for men’s and women’s collegiate teams. Held annually
in March, the men’s NCAA national championship is one of the most popular
sporting events in the United States. The top men’s professional
basketball league in the United States is the National Basketball
Association; the top women’s is Women’s National Basketball Association.
In addition, many people play basketball in amateur leagues and
organizations. It is also common to see people playing basketball in parks
and local gymnasiums around the country.
Another major sport played in the United States is ice hockey. Ice hockey
began as an amateur sport played primarily in the Northeast. The first
U.S. professional ice hockey team was founded in Boston in 1924. Ice
hockey’s popularity has spread throughout the country since the 1960s. The
NCAA holds a national collegiate ice hockey championship in April of each
year. The country’s top professional league is the National Hockey League
(NHL). NHL teams play a regular schedule that culminates in the
championship series. The winner is awarded the Stanley Cup, the league’s
top prize.
Television transformed sports in the second half of the 20th century. As
more Americans watched sports on television, the sports industry grew into
an enormous business, and sports events became widely viewed among
Americans as cultural experiences. Many Americans shared televised moments
of exaltation and triumph throughout the year: baseball during the spring
and summer and its World Series in the early fall, football throughout the
fall crowned by the Super Bowl in January, and the National Basketball
Association (NBA) championships in the spring. The Olympic Games, watched
by millions of people worldwide, similarly rivet Americans to their
televisions as they watch outstanding athletes compete on behalf of their
nations. Commercial sports are part of practically every home in America
and have allowed sports heroes to gain prominence in the national
imagination and to become fixtures of the consumer culture. As well-known
faces and bodies, sports celebrities such as basketball player Michael
Jordan and baseball player Mark McGwire are hired to endorse products.
Although televised games remove the viewing public from direct contact
with events, they have neither diminished the fervor of team
identification nor dampened the enthusiasm for athletic participation.
Americans watch more sports on television than ever, and they personally
participate in more varied sporting activities and athletic clubs.
Millions of young girls and boys across the country play soccer, baseball,
tennis, and field hockey.
At the end of the 20th century, Americans were taking part in individual
sports of all kinds—jogging, bicycling, swimming, skiing, rock climbing,
playing tennis, as well as more unusual sports such as bungee jumping,
hang gliding, and wind surfing. As Americans enjoy more leisure time, and
as Hollywood and advertising emphasize trim, well-developed bodies, sports
have become a significant component of many people's lives. Many Americans
now invest significant amounts of money in sports equipment, clothing, and
gym memberships. As a result, more people are dressing in sporty styles of
clothing. Sports logos and athletic fashions have become common aspects of
people’s wardrobes, as people need to look as though they participate in
sports to be in style. Sports have even influenced the cars Americans
drive, as sport utility vehicles accommodate the rugged terrain, elaborate
equipment, and sporty lifestyles of their owners.
Probably the most significant long-term development in 20th-century sports
has been the increased participation of minorities and women. Throughout
the early 20th century, African Americans made outstanding contributions
to sports, despite being excluded from organized white teams. The
exclusion of black players from white baseball led to the creation of a
separate Negro National League in 1920. On the world stage, track-and-
field star Jessie Owens became a national hero when he won four gold
medals and set world and Olympic records at the Berlin Olympics in 1936.
The racial segregation that prevented African Americans from playing
baseball in the National League until 1947 has been replaced by the
enormous successes of African Americans in all fields of sport.
Before the 20th century women could not play in most organized sports.
Страницы: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8
|