The Pursuit of Happiness The U. The Northeast region is largely industrialised and life here is fast-paced. The region is home to some of the largest U.
Their colonial pride is evident in their professional sports teams; the names of teams in this region Patriots, Yankees, Nationals, 76ers make specific references to American history. In the West, however, time moves a little slower and life is more relaxed. Westerners often prioritise happiness and personal endeavours over career success and achievement.
People living on the West Coast are known for their love of the outdoors and their care for the environment. Recreational marijuana is also legal in six of the Western states. The South is perhaps the most distinct region of the United States.
Southerners emphasise family, religion, and conservative values. The Midwest is in some ways a blend of the other three regions. People here value hard work and individuality. In many Southern states, for example, people use Mr. Be respectful of their requests. Behavior Americans can be much more assertive than most international visitors. Making eye contact while talking to someone is often a big deal, and it can be considered disrespectful to avoid doing so.
It is not polite to pick your nose or your teeth with or without a toothpick in public. In general, follow the golden rule: Treat others as you would want to be treated.
Restaurants, bars, gas stations, and stores may have bathrooms, but they also sometimes decide that only customers can use them. So plan ahead! One of the biggest cultural aspects of life in the USA is tipping. In almost every situation where someone helps you with a service — a waiter, a hairdresser, a taxi driver, a bartender, a masseuse, etc. Business Clothing Sometimes Americans are considered to be casual dressers, though styles can differ depending on the city or town.
In a business or professional setting, or for special occasions such as a wedding, you should dress more formally. In fact, if you dress too casually for a job interview, for example, your chances of getting the position are significantly reduced.
Women can wear a suit with either pants or a skirt on the bottom , a dress, or nice pants or a skirt with a blouse. Unless a company explicitly says so, jeans should not be worn in professional settings. In general, for a special event, men have pretty much the same options as professional wear or can get even fancier by wearing a tuxedo, while women tend to wear dresses.
But, within reason, dress in your own style! Dining Most Americans eat three meals during the day: breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Specific timing for these meals vary by schedule and family, but generally breakfast is eaten sometime between 7 and 8 am and lunch is eaten sometime between 12 and 2 pm. What time do Americans eat dinner? So the logic can, by design, only work for some, and they are a small minority. Interestingly, the U.
No other rich nations even came close. Second to the U. It makes sense that people who believe in the power of themselves as individuals to achieve success by hard work and determination would also show this kind of optimism. If you see your days as full of promise for future success, then it follows that you would consider them "good" days.
In the U. No doubt, there's some truth to that. If you don't believe that something is possible, whether it's a personal or professional goal or dream, then how will you ever achieve it? But, as author Barbara Ehrenreich has observed, there are significant downsides to this uniquely American optimism. In her book Bright-Sided: How Positive Thinking is Undermining America , Ehrenreich suggests that positive thinking can ultimately harm us personally, and as a society.
As one summary of the book explains, "On a personal level, it leads to self-blame and a morbid preoccupation with stamping out 'negative' thoughts. Part of the problem with positive thinking, per Ehrenreich, is that when it becomes a mandatory attitude, it disallows for the acknowledgement of fear, and of criticism. Ultimately, Ehrenreich argues, positive thinking, as an ideology, fosters acceptance of an unequal and highly troubled status quo, because we use it to convince ourselves that we as individuals are to blame for what is hard in life, and that we can change our situation if we just have the right attitude about it.
This kind of ideological manipulation is what Italian activist and writer Antonio Gramsci referred to as " cultural hegemony ," achieving rule through the ideological manufacture of consent. When you believe that thinking positively will solve your problems, you are unlikely to challenge the things that may be causing your trouble.
Relatedly, late sociologist C. Wright Mills would look on this trend as fundamentally anti-sociological, because the essence of having a " sociological imagination ," or thinking like a sociologist, is being able to see the connections between "personal troubles" and "public issues. As Ehrenreich sees it, American optimism stands in the way of the kind of critical thinking that is necessary to fight inequalities and to keep society in check.
The alternative to rampant optimism, she suggests, is not pessimism—it is realism. The Global Values Survey reaffirmed another well-established trend: the richer a nation is, in terms of GDP per capita, the less religious is its population.
Around the world, the poorest nations have the highest levels of religiosity, and the wealthiest nations, like Britain, Germany, Canada, and Australia, the lowest. Conversely, the poorest nations, including Pakistan, Senegal, Kenya, and the Philippines, among others, are the most religious, with nearly all members of their populations claiming religion as an important part of their lives.
This is why it is unusual that in the U. This difference between the U. In other rich nations like Australia and France this figure is far lower 23 and 15 percent respectively , where most people do not conflate theism with morality.
These final findings about religion, when combined with the first two, demonstrate the legacy of early American Protestantism. Weber observed that in early American society, belief in God and religiosity were expressed in large part through dedicating oneself to a secular "calling," or profession. Followers of Protestantism at the time were instructed by religious leaders to dedicate themselves to their calling and work hard in their earthly life in order enjoy heavenly glory in the afterlife.
Over time, the universal acceptance and practice of the Protestant religion specifically waned in the U. However, religiosity, or at least the appearance of it, remains strong in the U.
While all of the values described here are considered virtues in the U. The belief in the power of the individual, in the importance of hard work, and optimism function more as myths than they do as actual recipes for success, and what these myths obscure is a society cleaved by crippling inequalities along lines of race, class, gender, and sexuality, among other things.
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