[img][650:488]http://www.koalie.net/Walks/200310-CA-J6/20031003172546.jpg[/img]

sorry, had to.

but mostly i agree with you. i mean, it takes hard work to maintain a climate that fosters the continued viability of the "american dream," but i don't think it's dead.

Exactly. How many of you asshats still hold on to the myth that you are "Irish."

I know I identify with being an Iti, but I wouldn't go out like Piazza and play for their national team.

What sort of "culture" are you people looking for?

My mother is an immigrant from Italy and my dad's american. I don't really identify with anything Italian as opposed to American. Moreover my grandmother from Italy still speaks broken English at best, but she's tried her whole life to be American and keep her Italian culture alive.

not sure i would want to assimilate into some of the shitty aspects culture if I moved here from some small village in guatemala. some aspects are great but some (like these 12 year old girls I see walking around half-naked at the mall) are not so great.

The Potter Stewart definition of pornography.

I think one of the things that people are forgetting is that Bavaria and North Germany/Prussia have different cultures. Sicily is MUCH different than say, Tuscany. Bordeaux and the Sur Mer regions of France have different customs.

But, they are all bound together by the IDEA that they are one country.

I love Alabama, I love the South, but I love America much, much more.

Why do you assume that Guatemala has a morally superior society? Every place in the world has good and bad. Nobody is asking Guataemalans to undress their daughters before they go to the mall.

NOBLE SAVAGES Tanner.

I agree. And if the gotdamn Super Bowl ain't a cultural event, I don't know what is.

i think we're moving more towards a national monoculture all the time. the more what we see on tv, where we shop, what we eat, etc. is determined by a few national corporations (as opposed to local media, local business, local restaraunts) the more quirky local traditions get paved over.
i'd imagine a lot of people on this board have noticed that on the radio--in a lot of markets, there's no such thing as a regional hit. in the kansas city area for example, you'll never hear a kansas city band despite the fact that there's a thriving music scene. the same hot club tracks are banging from coast to coast.
no real point or solution, other than the idea that a monolithic american culture is something to be resisted..

Culturally speaking, I feel I have very little in common with 95% of the board.

so you're a federalist?

Exactly. If you consider how anthropologists define "culture", they look at a host of distinquishing characteristics--technological development, governance, religion, artistic aesthetics (clothing, architecture, decoration, etc.), family structure, means of subsistence, development of trade, etc.

Overall, 21st century "United States" culture would be probably be defined by some future anthropologist as a technologically advanced (computer/automation driven), constitutional republic--predominantly single-family based derived mostly from an occidental judeo-christian heritage; economically reliant on service industries and extensive trade.

I suspect you'd be hard-pressed to define a common aesthetic sense--nor could you find one in any other developed culture. I believe part of cultural development is the exposure to and adoption of new aesthetes--it's an evolutionary process that blurs any boundaries. The cultures with a well-defined/easily identified aesthetic code tend to be the most primitive/isolated.

culture is pretty regional from what i have seen. i have a lot more in common with dudes from vancouver than people from say, los angeles..let alone people from kansas city or raleigh or something.

I can kind of agree with this. I see the old ways of S. Louisiana which has been more resistant to the monoculture eroding every day.

Because Louisiana ISN'T AMERICA.

I should have seen this coming.

i think there's some merit to the idea that a big country without many cultural differences could be a bad thing. and yeah, i think the basic assumption of having states in the first place is that they'll have different cultures, different political values, etc. which causes them to check each other.
edit: although i definitely don't take the idea to the extreme, i'm fully aware of the dark side of american federalism, and don't think that "culture" justifies oppression.

If I were you, I'd try to get over the fact that milling about with the commoners of North Carolina has somehow ruined your life.

And understand that all your precious liberal thoughts don't amount to a bucket of warm piss if you can't get folks elected. And that the hatred of the people you are trying to help is why they don't for the same people you do.

You put it on the tee, I hit it out of the park.

I actually get your point dude that the Gap/MTV/Clear Channel-ification of America is kind of shit. Regional cultures are much less prevalent now than they were even 20 years ago. And even though there is still a discernable difference between say Chicago culture and New York culture, its the fact that people in the more rural parts of the country are more intune (for good or ill) with the "prevailing culture" of the country.

In New York, restaurant food is very very good, but the portions are small.

In Chicago, restaurant food is so-so, but they heap tons of it on your plate.

Chicago, city of big portions.

Atlanta - decent food, decent portions, get carjacked in the parking lot.