1.Factors, fundamental to an understanding of the USA.

One of the ways of studying the country is to make comparisons.

The first Europeans in America were predominantly Spanish and French explorers, interested in finding gold, making Catholic

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Лекция 1 The Making of the Nation

BEFORE the 1960s – the main reason
– to know history and arts of a
particular culture.
“Big-C Culture”
DURING the 1960s – the main
reason – to know the people and
understand
their
lifestyle
and
culture.

3. NELSON BROOKS

A researcher in foreign language
learning believes that “the study of
culture goes beyond artistic
expression”.
The personal side of culture – “the
distinctive life-way of a people”.
“Little-c сulture”

4. 1.Factors, fundamental to an understanding of the USA.

1.1. It is one of the superpowers.
1.2. Is geography a destiny? Americans, from the first PaleoIndians to the most recent immigrants, would probably agree that
geography is at least the great shaper of American settlement.
1.3. The US collects enormous amounts of solar energy and turns
it into food.
1.4. The first Americans encountered almost every biome known
on Earth.
1.5. The size of the country and a great variety of life which goes
within it.
1.6. The peoples of the country.
1.7. American society is the most open and at the same time most
intensely and continually self-critical in the world.

5.

“America is so vast
that almost everything
said about it is likely to
be true, and the
opposite is probably
equally true”.
James T. Farrell,
an American novelist, shortstory writer and poet

6. One of the ways of studying the country is to make comparisons.

to grasp the size of the country
E.x. San Francisco is about as far away
from New York as Paris is from
Bagdad.
E.x. Germanу=Oregon
France=Texas
Italy=Arizona

7.

When people consider a move to the
US, they usually base on 9 factors:
ambience
housing
jobs
crime
transportation
education
health care
recreation
сlimate
They all have equal weight.

8. 2. A Nation of immigrants

a society of immigrants
2 reasons:
1. built by generations
of immigrants
2. takes in more
immigrants than any
other country
50 million newcomers

9.

Many different cultural traditions, ethnic
sympathies, national origins, racial groups,
religious affiliations make up “We the People”.
Of all many different nationalities and ethnic
groups some have quickly assimilated.
They have largely lost or intentionally given up
many specific markers which would make them
different from their neighbours.

10.

This
process
of
assimilation
or
“Americanization” – becoming part of the
“melting pot” – has characterized the immigrant
experience in American history.

11.

Others, while becoming American in
other ways, maintained much of their
ethnic identities.
“Salad bowl” –
the process
of maintaining much
of the ethnic identities.

12.

“Pizza” – the process
of maintaining much of
your traditions along
with aspiration for some
oneness with other
nations and cultures.

13.

3. FIRST IMMIGRANTS –
I WAVE
COLONIAL IMMIGRATION
1680-1776

14. Why is America called America?

Amerigo Vespucci
Christopher Columbus
1497 – 1492

15.

Christopher Columbus didn’t really
know where he was going (but he
was sure it wouldn’t be America).
Christopher didn’t really know where
he was when he got there (but he
was sure that it wasn’t America).
Chris didn’t really know where he’d
been when he got home again (but he
took some Indians back with him, to
prove that he sure hadn’t been to
America).

16. The first Europeans in America were predominantly Spanish and French explorers, interested in finding gold, making Catholic

converts and establishing
trade.
1500s – Spanish
explorers – Florida
French fur traders –
St. Lawrence River – to
the Great Lakes down
to the Mississippi River
The British Jamestown (Virginia)–
the 1st successful
English colony.

17.

London company expected to make money
from the settlement. Jamestown became the
first New World colony to find a cash cow and
an economic system for exploiting it.
Adventurers and rogues, religious believers and
practical builders, all kinds of people came.
All the colonists, but particularly laborers,
struggled with hunger, illness and high child
mortality in the early years.

18.

4. OLD IMMIGRATION II WAVE
1820-1890

19.

Between 1840 and 1860 - the greatest
influx of immigrants.
10 million people came to America.
By the middle of the century the US with
over 23 million inhabitants had a larger
population than any single European
country.
German immigration was especially heavy.
500 000 Germans came to live in the US.
The northern and western Europeans who
arrived between 1840 and 1880 are often
referred to as the “Old Immigration”.

20.

5. SOUTHEASTERN EUROPEANS
– III WAVE
1890-1930

21.

A new wave of immigration - in the
late 1800s.
Latin, Slavic and Jewish peoples from
southern and eastern Europe.
The flood of immigration affected
American cities.
Ethnic
neighborhoods
–
“Little
Italys” or “Chinatown” .
In 1890 New York - a city of
foreigners:
8 of 10 of its residents were foreignborn.

22.

6. THE FOURTH WAVE 1965 TO THE PRESENT

23.

After the government set strict immigration quotas in the
1920s, the share of foreign-born inhabitants dropped to
its lowest level in more than a hundred years.
In 1965 Congress passed the Immigration and
Nationality Act.
Newcomers again began to migrate to the US and this
time primarily from Latin America and Asia. It ushered
the fourth major wave of immigration.
It rose to a peak in the late 1990s and produced the
highest immigration totals in American history by the end
of the decade.
Three quarters of the legally resident foreign-born are
Latino (51%) and Asian (24%).

24.

Large numbers of Asian immigrants arrived with more
capital and a higher level of education than most Latinos.
By the second decade of the 21st century this new wave
of migration had made the US into a remarkably diverse
nation. At least 350 different languages are spoken in
American homes, including 150 native North American
languages such as Yupik and Cherokee.
The Federal government invented the word “Hispanics”
to put in a single category all the Central and South
American Spanish-speaking cultures arriving in the USA
in the fourth wave.

25. 7. The American Dream

American society –
the most open,
individualistic and at
the same time
intensely and
continually self-critical
in the world.
The distance between
the reality of life and
the hope for a better
one.

26.

The American Dream is older than America. Centuries
before Christopher Columbus' historic 1492 voyage put
the New World on European maps, the Old World was
buzzing with stories of lands beyond the western
horizon.
It is the story of three distinct peoples - Native
Americans, European Americans and African
Americans and of their long struggle to build an
exceptional nation.

27.

In 2007 Americans celebrated the 400th
anniversary of the founding Jamestown,
the first lasting British settlement in the
US.
At a time when the Spanish, French and
Portuguese were getting rich on America’s
lumber, silver and furs, the London Co., a
group of merchants sponsored 104 English
settlers – men and boys (No women!).

28.

“a fresh start for the human
race”.
Robert Frost, an American poet
Puritans from England – Massachusetts –escaped
religious persecution – “a city upon a hill”.
1600 – 1700s – permanent settlements were rapidly
established all along the east coast.
“The American Dream was a sanctuary on the Earth for
individual man”.

29. 8. American Indians

Ten to twelve, 20 or more millenia past, “The People”
(Indians) have made their homes in North America.
Here they thrived, adapting to the new world, building
complex civilizations, creating individual and separate tribes,
each with its own lifestyle, language, religion and customs.
th century – the Indian population had
By the end of the 19
almost been wiped out.
More than a million Indians died in the first 100 years of
European settlement in the New World after they were
exposed to ailments not present in the Americas.

30.

The Indians of the Southwest have retained their
ancient culture, religion, art. Most of the tribes are
located at or near where they were in the 16th century.
Native costumes, ceremonies, music are preserved at
the many powwows and festivals held every year.
Nowhere in America is this more apparent than in the
Southwest. Here the Indians learned to live in a
beautiful but harsh environment of greatly diverse
weather patterns ranging from desert heat to mountain
snows, often without rain for months on end.

31.

They developed basketry, pottery and weaving, and
above all, a oneness with the earth, a strоng belief in the
beauty and bounty of nature.
While their contemporaries across the vast oceans
created metal tools and weapons, the Indian raised stone
technology to an artful degree, building stone pueblos.
They also created objects in clay, grasses and metal of
enduring beauty.
Where the past seems just yesterday and history is all
around, the Indian has maintained harmony with
“Mother Earth and Father Sky”, blending what is
modern with what is traditional like no other culture
within America’s great boundaries.

32.

To the Indians the white
men were unwanted
trespassers.
They did not want
“the white man’s
civilization”.

33.

9. Nativist Sentiment - - - - - - - -
The assimilation of the new southern and eastern
peoples was a source of conflict.
- the ethnic composition of the country was
changing; America was losing its established
character and identity;
- overpopulation is a threat;
- immigrants may lower the quality of life in
America;
- national
security,
population
growth,
environmental
problems
and
cultural
differences;

34.

9. Nativist Sentiment + + + + + + +
illegal immigrants take jobs that US citizens do not
want, are paid less that the legal minimum wage,
work in substandard conditions;
illegal aliens supply cheap labour as farm workers at
harvest time or work at menial tasks which
Americans shun;
some Americans broaden the concept “refugee” to
include economic refugees – persons suffering from
severe poverty;
the cultural wealth and diversity, which immigrants
have been bringing to the nation since its
conception, is emphasized.