Your assignment is to write a multi-paragraph essay that defines your interpretation of what it means to be an American. This essay should use the strategies of definition and different perspectives from the unit to help you develop a complex and thoughtful definition. If possible, incorporate an iconic image into your essay.
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(start time: 8:02pm)
Americans are fiercely independent, tirelessly driven, and endlessly optimistic - almost to the point of being delusional. There is the matter of where one is born, I suppose, but the American spirit, as I see it, has nothing to do with birthplace but everything to do with one’s way of being in the world. (8:04)
The independent spirit of Americans has been in evidence since the first pilgrims arrived in what would become Plymouth Colony, in the year 1620. These brave folks faced the unknown, from the vast and fierce ocean, to the uncharted lands to which they were headed. This same type of strong-minded independence was in the spirits of the immigrants who came to America’s shores, across the “tempest-tossed” (“The New Colussus, Lazarus, Line 13) seas during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Upon arrival here, they were sometimes disillusioned, as in the case of the young Russian woman in “America and I” who believed that “...America was a land of living hope, woven of dreams, aflame with longing and desire” (Yezierska, 16). In spite of this disillusionment, Americans and would-be Americans have always been the type of people to find their true calling in a hard day’s work. (8:16, interrupted by one of the kids, discussion happens with husband about something heated, and lots of noise is also happening, simultaneously)
America was founded, from the beginning, by people willing to work endlessly to accomplish a beloved goal. From the Plymouth Colony pilgrims at our country’s beginning to the long-haul truckers who bring us vegetables from the salad bowl region of California today (shout out to Andrew who works in produce at Jay Hannaford!), Americans [8:21: my husband just picked on me for being serious about writing this anchor paper for you all… Gr….] have invariably been a hard-working people. Walt Whitman and Langston Hughes agree on this point in their poems “I Sing America!” and “I, Too, Sing America.” Whitman’s “The day what belongs to the day - at night the party of young fellows, robust, friendly, singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs” (lines 10-12) [note to self: make sure you know how to do the MLA appropriately for poems and line breaks] evokes the pride of the American worker, while Hughes’s “...But I laugh, and eat well, and grow strong” (lines 5-7) hints at the downside to the hard work of our country: slavery and servitude. While our country has moments that make us feel less than proud, Americans are a people who rebound and look again and again to hope.
Hope for freedom of religion inspired the founders of our nation to take unfathomable risks to bring themselves to these unknown shores. Hope is another word for optimism, something we Americans are known for throughout the world. Whether one is considering that “[In America] individuals of all nations are melted into a new race of men, whose labours and posterity will one day cause great change in the world” (St. John de Crevecoeur, 28), or that “...our neighbor is so much a part of our family that my mother never passes her house at night without glancing at the lights to see if she is home…” (Noda, 35), Americans are generally a nation of sweethearts who look to the good.
We Americans have crossed unknown oceans out of independence, worked ourselves endlessly to meet a vision we set out for ourselves, and continue to meet adversity with a hopeful look to the future. Some may mock us and believe us to be somehow “less than,” as the new kids on the Earth’s block, but I believe that what we have in America is something that is pretty inspirational and worth striving for. (8:36 - no edits)