The Making of the American Essay,What It Means To Be An American Essay
WebIn my eyes to be an American means to have privileges, rights, and freedom. America isn't perfect, but it is one of the only countries that have rights given to people of different WebOct 21, · American Culture essay talks about the USA, it’s history, region, culture and more. Learn more about American culture, their eating habits etc. You’ll get to know a WebJan 4, · One must act as an American to be an American by for instance paying taxes, voting in elections, and serving their country at home or abroad. Thus, being an WebThe American is a person who has left behind all his ancient manners and prejudices, and has received new ones from the mode of life he has embraced, the rank he holds and WebThe Ten Best American Essays Since , According to Robert Atwan. James Baldwin, "Notes of a Native Son," (Read it here.) Norman Mailer, "The White Negro," ... read more
Many might consider an American to be a person from the United States. However, some may discover a deeper meaning to this question and answer in a less literal way. The stories read in class from Unit One help the public to answer this puzzling question. Their description of American history gives insight about what the land was founded upon. Some impressions of the past are still seen in modern America. The common value of freedom by the Pilgrims, Olaudah Equiano, and fictional Rebecca Nurse in The Crucible and their need to fight for what they believe in, makes them very persistent people.
When the Puritan Pilgrims and the slave Equiano came to America,. Throughout the Age of Exploration, Europeans encountered many different types of people, places, and ideas. These characteristics are exemplified in Christopher Columbus and Oliver Cromwell, both of whom were influential individuals in the New World. Throughout history, America has grown into a prosperous country inhabited by many native-born citizens as well as immigrants. As America advanced, its citizens developed an identity for themselves that in turn reveals itself in American literature.
These common ideas include the following: the need and desire for independence; the desire to work hard and smart; and the respect for oneself and others. Creve Coeur depicts the American identity in Letters to an American Farmer, and Paine illustrates his understanding of this identity in Common Sense. Venturing on to be an American means you have to of been a chunk of the melting pot. What this means is that our cultures have been leisurely vanishing and turning into something new. Like a new race of men. This new race of men would be called Americans. This new race is a new culture.
This new culture is nothing like your old culture or your ancestors '. This new culture can lead to many good things. One of them is that a new culture will form, this would allow us to all come together and be as one Millet Joyce paragraph 1. It is good by virtue of the new race of men can have more advantages in pretty much anything like. After the Revolutionary War, America was endeavoring to define itself as a country and to identify and describe itself as a people. Crevecoeur sends a clear message that Americans are ambitious individuals willing to take a risk to start over in a new World, and uniquely distinct from their parent — England. It will not be an exaggeration to say that before the American revolution, the territory of the future United States was occupied by a vast number of people of various cultures and origins.
The matter is that the colonial period of the development of America was tough enough, incorporating a considerable amount of changes and transformations. Needless to say that the latter was due to the process of unification of the cultural peculiarities and traditions of the four continents such as Europe, Africa, South America, and North America. It goes without saying that this period gave rise to an era of freedom. In fact, the relationships of the Americans and the Europeans was primarily based on the desire to trade with Asia. However, it turned out to become a struggle for power of the two empires, striving to colonize, conquer and exploit the New World.
The matter is that the inhabitants of those territories were Indian societies with their particular customs and. Crevecoeur, James H. National Humanities Center, n. To start off, one of the traits an American has is being independent. Americans are strong individuals that like to be self-made. They also fight to be an individual and are separate. However sometimes being independent is a bad thing. Related to this respect for individuality are American traits of independence and self-reliance. Since this is such a marked trait in the American style of relating,. Since this great country was first established many intuitive minds have tried to answer the question; "What is an American".
This country is full of individuals of many backgrounds, and diversities and each person has a different opinion on this question. In my opinion, an American is someone who values freedom and equality and pursues the "American dream. Each of the seven readings, and the one image I compiled help mold this broader definition into a more precise description of an American. Essay Topics Writing. Home Page Research What Is an American Essay. What Is an American Essay Decent Essays. Open Document. What is an American Introduction Although the present day American is a totally a different person, at the close of the Revolutionary War the same individual was a European immigrant impacted by the nature of the American continent.
In St. This race consists of unique type of people who are not governed by laws as strict as they experienced in Europe. They are a breed of people who had no home and no country in Europe. This paper discusses what the American was thought to be, in view of St. The American St. Jean de Crevecoeur describes the …show more content… This is a society in which neither social class barriers nor economic class problems prohibit interaction. Everyone is equal and the resources are shared equitably by everyone. In this society, the rich and the poor are not that apart as in Europe, everyone is united by a mild government, with everyone respecting the law and having no fear of power given that they are all equitable. The American is a new man who is neither a European, nor his direct descendant.
He is a strange mix of blood which cannot be found in any other country. The American is described as a person whose grandfather was an Englishman, his mother was Dutch and who has married a Frenchwoman. The American is a person who has left behind all his ancient manners and prejudices, and has received new ones from the mode of life he has embraced, the rank he holds and the government he obeys. A person becomes an American after being received in the broad lap of the great Alma Mater, and he becomes melted down into the new race of men whose posterity and efforts could transform the world in the days to come. Lopate looks back to the Puritans and forward to writers like Wesley Yang and Jia Tolentino.
What is the next face of the essay form? What does the term mean to you in ? How has your understanding of the word evolved? I will admit that when I was younger, I tended to be very unpatriotic and critical of my country, although once I started to travel abroad and witness authoritarian regimes like Spain under Franco, I could never sign on to the fear that a fascist US was just around the corner. I came to the conclusion that we have our faults, but our virtues as well. Part of the thrill in putting together this anthology was to see it operating simultaneously on two tracks: first, it would record the development of a literary form that I loved, the essay, as it evolved over years in this country. At the same time, it would be a running account of the history of the United States, in the hands of these essayists who were contending, directly or indirectly, with the pressing problems of their day.
The promise of America was always being weighed against its failure to live up to that standard. Dubois and James Weldon Johnson eloquently addressing racial injustice. Issues of identity, gender and intersectionality were explored by writers such as Richard Rodriguez, Audre Lorde, Leonard Michaels and N. Scott Momaday, sometimes with touches of irony and self-scrutiny, which have always been assets of the essay form. How did you? What were your criteria? PL : I thought I knew the field fairly well to begin with, having edited the best-selling Art of the Personal Essay in , taught the form for decades, served on book award juries and so on. But once I started researching and collecting material, I discovered that I had lots of gaps, partly because the mandate I had set for myself was so sweeping.
But it also occurred to me that fine essayists must exist in every discipline, not only literature, which sent me on a hunt that took me to cultural criticism Clement Greenberg, Kenneth Burke , theology Paul Tillich , food writing M. Fisher , geography John Brinkerhoff Jackson , nature writing John Muir, John Burroughs, Edward Abbey , science writing Loren Eiseley, Lewis Thomas , philosophy George Santayana. My one consistent criterion was that the essay be lively, engaging and intelligently written. In short, I had to like it myself. Of course I would need to include the best-known practitioners of the American essay—Emerson, Thoreau, Mencken, Baldwin, Sontag, etc.
Finally, I wanted to show a wide variety of formal approaches, since the essay is by its very nature and nomenclature an experiment, which brought me to Gertrude Stein and Wayne Koestenbaum. Equally important, I was aided in all these searches by colleagues and friends who kept suggesting other names. For every fertile lead, probably four resulted in dead ends. Meanwhile, I was having a real learning adventure. LH: Do you have a personal favorite among American essayists? If so, what appeals to you the most about them?
So much American thought grows out of Emerson, or is in contention with Emerson, even if that debt is sometimes unacknowledged or unconscious. What I love about Emerson is his density of thought, and the surprising twists and turns that result from it. He has a playful skepticism, a knack for thinking against himself. Each sentence starts a new rabbit of thought scampering off. LH: You make the interesting decision to open the anthology with an essay written in , 50 years before the founding of the republic. PL : I wanted to start the anthology with the first fully-formed essayistic voices in this land, which turned out to belong to the Puritans.
Cotton Mather and Jonathan Edwards were highly cultivated readers, familiar with the traditions of essay-writing, Montaigne and the English, and with the latest science, even as they inveighed against witchcraft. I will admit that it also amused me to open the book with Cotton Mather, a prescriptive, strait-is-the-gate character, and end it with Zadie Smith, who is not only bi-racial but bi-national, dividing her year between London and New York, and whose openness to self-doubt is signaled by her essay collection title, Changing My Mind. Their attraction to reasoned argument and willingness to entertain possible objections to their points of view inspired a vigorous strand of American essay-writing.
Phillip Lopate spoke to Literary Hub about the new anthology he has edited, The Glorious American Essay. Lopate looks back to the Puritans and forward to writers like Wesley Yang and Jia Tolentino. What is the next face of the essay form? What does the term mean to you in ? How has your understanding of the word evolved? I will admit that when I was younger, I tended to be very unpatriotic and critical of my country, although once I started to travel abroad and witness authoritarian regimes like Spain under Franco, I could never sign on to the fear that a fascist US was just around the corner.
I came to the conclusion that we have our faults, but our virtues as well. Part of the thrill in putting together this anthology was to see it operating simultaneously on two tracks: first, it would record the development of a literary form that I loved, the essay, as it evolved over years in this country. At the same time, it would be a running account of the history of the United States, in the hands of these essayists who were contending, directly or indirectly, with the pressing problems of their day. The promise of America was always being weighed against its failure to live up to that standard. Dubois and James Weldon Johnson eloquently addressing racial injustice. Issues of identity, gender and intersectionality were explored by writers such as Richard Rodriguez, Audre Lorde, Leonard Michaels and N.
Scott Momaday, sometimes with touches of irony and self-scrutiny, which have always been assets of the essay form. How did you? What were your criteria? PL : I thought I knew the field fairly well to begin with, having edited the best-selling Art of the Personal Essay in , taught the form for decades, served on book award juries and so on. But once I started researching and collecting material, I discovered that I had lots of gaps, partly because the mandate I had set for myself was so sweeping. But it also occurred to me that fine essayists must exist in every discipline, not only literature, which sent me on a hunt that took me to cultural criticism Clement Greenberg, Kenneth Burke , theology Paul Tillich , food writing M. Fisher , geography John Brinkerhoff Jackson , nature writing John Muir, John Burroughs, Edward Abbey , science writing Loren Eiseley, Lewis Thomas , philosophy George Santayana.
My one consistent criterion was that the essay be lively, engaging and intelligently written. In short, I had to like it myself. Of course I would need to include the best-known practitioners of the American essay—Emerson, Thoreau, Mencken, Baldwin, Sontag, etc. Finally, I wanted to show a wide variety of formal approaches, since the essay is by its very nature and nomenclature an experiment, which brought me to Gertrude Stein and Wayne Koestenbaum. Equally important, I was aided in all these searches by colleagues and friends who kept suggesting other names. For every fertile lead, probably four resulted in dead ends. Meanwhile, I was having a real learning adventure.
LH: Do you have a personal favorite among American essayists? If so, what appeals to you the most about them? So much American thought grows out of Emerson, or is in contention with Emerson, even if that debt is sometimes unacknowledged or unconscious. What I love about Emerson is his density of thought, and the surprising twists and turns that result from it. He has a playful skepticism, a knack for thinking against himself. Each sentence starts a new rabbit of thought scampering off. LH: You make the interesting decision to open the anthology with an essay written in , 50 years before the founding of the republic. PL : I wanted to start the anthology with the first fully-formed essayistic voices in this land, which turned out to belong to the Puritans.
Cotton Mather and Jonathan Edwards were highly cultivated readers, familiar with the traditions of essay-writing, Montaigne and the English, and with the latest science, even as they inveighed against witchcraft. I will admit that it also amused me to open the book with Cotton Mather, a prescriptive, strait-is-the-gate character, and end it with Zadie Smith, who is not only bi-racial but bi-national, dividing her year between London and New York, and whose openness to self-doubt is signaled by her essay collection title, Changing My Mind. Their attraction to reasoned argument and willingness to entertain possible objections to their points of view inspired a vigorous strand of American essay-writing.
So, while we may fix the founding of the United States to a specific year, the actual culture and literature of the country book-ended that date. Which essay in the last 12 years would be your st selection? PL : Funny you should ask. As it happens, I am currently putting the finishing touches on another anthology, this one entirely devoted to the Contemporary i. I have been immersed in reading younger, up-and-coming writers, established mid-career writers, and some oldsters who are still going strong Janet Malcolm, Vivian Gornick, Barry Lopez, John McPhee, for example. Such a banquet of names speaks to the intergenerational appeal of the form. It has something to do with the current moment, which has everyone more than a little confused and therefore trusting more than ever those strong individual voices that are willing to cop to their subjective fears, anxieties, doubts and ecstasies.
The Glorious American Essay , edited by Phillip Lopate, is available now. Created by Grove Atlantic and Electric Literature. Craft and Criticism Fiction and Poetry News and Culture Lit Hub Radio Reading Lists Book Marks CrimeReads About. Via Pantheon. By Phillip Lopate. anthologies essayists essays Pantheon Books Phillip Lopate The Glorious American Essay. Phillip Lopate Phillip Lopate is the author of To Show and to Tell: The Craft of Literary Nonfiction and of four essay collections, Bachelorhood , Against Joie de Vivre , Portrait of My Body , and Portrait Inside My Head. He is the editor of the anthologies The Art of the Personal Essay , Writing New York , and American Movie Critics.
He was awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, a New York Public Library Center for Scholars and Writers Fellowship, two National Endowment for the Arts grants, and two New York Foundation for the Arts grants. He is professor of writing at Columbia University's nonfiction MFA program, and lives in Brooklyn, New York. Previous Article Recent History: Lessons From Obama, Both Cautionary and Hopeful. Next Article Lit Hub Daily: November 17, Close to the Lithub Daily Thank you for subscribing! The Best Reviewed Books of the Week February 3, AudioFile's Best Audiobooks of January January 31, by Book Marks. The Best Reviewed Books of the Month January 27, by Book Marks.
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What Is an American Essay,to the Lithub Daily
blogger.com has been introduced by experts for students to have their academic assignments written at affordable prices. Here, students are guaranteed of WebIn my eyes to be an American means to have privileges, rights, and freedom. America isn't perfect, but it is one of the only countries that have rights given to people of different WebThe American is a person who has left behind all his ancient manners and prejudices, and has received new ones from the mode of life he has embraced, the rank he holds and WebThe Ten Best American Essays Since , According to Robert Atwan. James Baldwin, "Notes of a Native Son," (Read it here.) Norman Mailer, "The White Negro," WebOct 21, · American Culture essay talks about the USA, it’s history, region, culture and more. Learn more about American culture, their eating habits etc. You’ll get to know a WebJan 4, · One must act as an American to be an American by for instance paying taxes, voting in elections, and serving their country at home or abroad. Thus, being an ... read more
Margaret Fuller, from Woman in the Nineteenth Century Everybody you ask this question to will have a completely different response. Nov 17, ISBN As an American, one is free to speak their mind because of the right to freedom of speech. Albert Einstein, The World as I See It George Santayana , The Genteel Tradition in American Philosophy Our objective is to ensure that the service we give satisfies our clients in terms of quality.
He is professor of writing at Columbia University's nonfiction MFA program, and lives in American essay, New York. The most important however, is freedom. Selected Essays of Gore Vidal Gore Vidal. Alexander HamiltonThe Federalist No. If the price is satisfactory, accept the bid and watch your concerns slowly fade away! This country is full of individuals of many backgrounds, and diversities and each person has a different opinion on this question. The American is a new person acting upon new principles, american essay, forcing him to entertain new ideas and come up with new opinions.
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