Culture of the United States

The development of the culture of the United States of America — History, Holidays, Sports, Religion, Cuisine, Literature, Poetry, Music, Dance, Visual Arts, Cinema, and Architecture — has been marked by a tension between two strong sources of inspiration: European ideals, especially British, and domestic originality.
American culture encompasses traditions, ideals, customs, beliefs, values, arts, and innovations developed both domestically and imported via colonization and immigration. Prevalent ideas and ideals from the European continent such as Democracy, various forms of Monotheism, and Civil liberties are present as well as those which evolved domestically such as important National holidays, uniquely American sports, proud military tradition, innovations in the arts and entertainment, and a strong sense of national pride among the population as a whole.
It includes both conservative and liberal elements, military and scientific competitiveness, political structures, risk taking and free expression, materialist and moral elements.
It also includes elements which evolved from Native Americans, and other ethnic subcultures; most prominently African-American and Latin American culture. Many cultural elements, especially popular culture have been exported across the globe through modern mass media, but a few of the cultural elements have remained rather exclusive to North America.
As most cultures, American culture is not static and is developing and changing as the demographic composition of the nation continues to change among other reasons due to a rising number of Central Americans seeking refuge in the United States (often illegally) due to deteriorating social and economic conditions in their respective countries.

Languages of United States

With over two-thirds of the planet's native English speakers, the United States is the second most populous English speaking country in the world (after India) and the most populous in terms of native speakers. Although the country has no official language at the federal level, 30 states have passed legislation making English the official language.
In addition, there is also a sizable population of Spanish speakers living predominantly in the border states with Mexico but also in largely in Florida, Illinois, and New York as well as other areas. There are a number of bilinguals, who speak both English and Spanish reasonably well but code-switch according to their dialog partner or context - some refer to this phenomenon as Spanglish.
Furthermore, French is also spoken in parts of Louisiana. Native American languages such as Navajo can still be heard in parts of Arizona and New Mexico as well as numerous other indigenous languages that are spoken on the country’s numerous Indian reservations and Native American cultural events (Pow wows). There are also numerous minority languages spoken among immigrant populations.
The American variety of English contains numerous loan words from European, Asian and African languages, that frequently also enter other varieties of English through American English.

Literature of the United States

In the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, American art and literature took most of its cues from Europe. Writers such as Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allan Poe, and Henry David Thoreau established a distinctive American literary voice by the middle of the nineteenth century. Mark Twain and poet Walt Whitman were major figures in the century's second half; Emily Dickinson, virtually unknown during her lifetime, would be recognized as America's other essential poet. Eleven U.S. citizens have won the Nobel Prize in Literature, most recently Toni Morrison in 1993. Ernest Hemingway, the 1954 Nobel laureate, is often named as one of the most influential writers of the twentieth century.[1] A work seen as capturing fundamental aspects of the national experience and character—such as Herman Melville's Moby-Dick (1851), Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), and F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby (1925)—may be dubbed the "Great American Novel". Popular literary genres such as the Western and hardboiled crime fiction were developed in the United States.

Faith of United States

Among developed countries, the US is one of the most religious in terms of its demographics. According to a 2002 study by the Pew Global Attitudes Project, the US was the only developed nation in the survey where a majority of citizens reported that religion played a "very important" role in their lives, an attitude similar to that found in its neighbors in Latin America.
Several of the original Thirteen Colonies were established by English and Irish settlers who wished to practice their own religion without discrimination or persecution as religious extremists in Europe: Pennsylvania was established by Quakers, Maryland by Roman Catholics and the Massachusetts Bay Colony by Puritans. Nine of the thirteen colonies had official public religions. Yet by the time of the Philadelphia Convention of 1787, the United States became one of the first countries in the world to enact freedom of religion by way of a codified separation of church and state.
Modeling the provisions concerning religion within the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, the framers of the United States Constitution rejected any religious test for office, and the First Amendment specifically denied the central government any power to enact any law respecting either an establishment of religion, or prohibiting its free exercise. In following decades, the animating spirit behind the constitution's Establishment Clause led to the disestablishment of the official religions within the member states. The framers were mainly influenced by secular, Enlightenment ideals, but they also considered the pragmatic concerns of minority religious groups who did not want to be under the power or influence of a state religion that did not represent them.[3] Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of Independence said "The priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot."

• Religious Statistics for the United States
  It should be noted the following information is a ballpark estimate as actual statistics constantly vary.
  According to the CIA,[5] the following is the order of religious preferences in the United States:
  Christian: (78.5%)
  Protestant (51.3%)
  Roman Catholic (23.9%)
  Mormon (1.7%)
  other Christian (1.6%)
  unaffiliated (12.1%)
  none (4%)
  other or unspecified (2.5%)
  Jewish (1.7%)
  Buddhist (0.7%)
  Muslim (0.6%)

National Holidays of United States

The United States observes holidays and traditions that are derived from significant events in US history, Religious traditions, and National Patriarchs.
As a legacy of colonization, Thanksgiving has become a traditional American holiday which evolved from the will of English pilgrims to “give thanks” for their welfare. Today, Thanksgiving is generally celebrated as a family reunion with a large afternoon feast. European colonization has led to many traditional Christian holidays such as Easter, Lent, St. Patrick’s Day, and Christmas to be widely observed albeit they are celebrated in a secular manner by many people today.
Independence Day (colloquially known as the Fourth of July) celebrates the anniversary of the country’s Declaration of Independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain. It is generally observed by parades throughout the day and the shooting of fireworks at night.
Halloween is thought to have evolved from the ancient celtic festival of Samhain which was introduced in the American colonies by Irish settlers. It has become a holiday that is widely celebrated by children and teens who traditionally dress up in costumes and go door to door saying the words “Trick or Treat” in exchange for candy. It also brings about an emphasis on eerie and frightening urban legends and movies.
Additionally, Mardi Gras, which evolved from the Catholic tradition of Carnival, is observed notably in New Orleans, St. Louis, and Mobile, AL as well as numerous other towns. Texas still observes the anniversary of its Independence Day from Mexico.

Sports of United States

Sports in the United States are an important part of the American culture. However, the sporting culture of the U.S. is unique from that of many other countries. Compared to any other nation, American preferences for sports differ from the rest of the world. For example, soccer, the most popular sport in the world, is not nearly as popular in the United States.
Baseball is the oldest of the major American teamsports. Professional baseball dates from 1869 and had no close rivals in popularity until the 1960s; though baseball is no longer the most popular sport it is still referred to as the "national pastime." Also unlike the professional levels of the other popular spectator sports in the U.S., Major League Baseball teams play almost every day from April to October. American football now attracts more television viewers than baseball; however, National Football League teams play only 16 regular-season games each year, so baseball is the runaway leader in ticket sales.
Basketball is another major sport, represented professionally by the National Basketball Association. Most Americans recognize a fourth major sport - Ice hockey. Always a mainstay of Great Lakes and New England-area culture, the sport gained tenuous footholds in regions like the American South in recent years, as the National Hockey League pursued a policy of expansion.
American football, known in many anglophone countries as gridiron, is widely considered to be the most popular sport in the United States. The 32-team National Football League (NFL) is the most popular and only major professional American football league. Its championship game, the Super Bowl, is the biggest annual sporting event held in the United States. Additional millions also watch college football throughout the autumn months, and some communities, particularly in rural areas, place great emphasis on their local high school team. American football games usually include cheerleaders and marching bands which aim to raise school spirit and entertain the crowd at half-time. Basketball, invented in Springfield, Massachusetts 1891, by Canadian-born physical education teacher James Naismith, is the second most popular sport behind football. However, in regards to professional sports, basketball, or the NBA, is ranked third in popularity behind football and baseball.[15] The National Basketball Association, more popularly known as the NBA, is the world's premier men's professional basketball league and one of the major professional sports leagues of North America.

Sports and community culture

together, usually in late September or early October, to welcome back former residents and alumni. It is built around a central event, such as a banquet, a parade, and most often, a game of American football, or, on occasion, basketball, or ice hockey. When celebrated by schools, the activities vary widely. However, they usually consist of a football game played on the school's home football field, activities for students and alumni, a parade featuring the school's marching band and sports teams, and the coronation of a Homecoming Queen (and at many schools, a Homecoming King).

Cuisine of United States

Mainstream American culinary arts are similar to those in other Western countries. Wheat is the primary cereal grain. Traditional American cuisine uses ingredients such as turkey, white-tailed deer venison, potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn, squash, and maple syrup, indigenous foods employed by American Indians and early European settlers. Slow-cooked pork and beef barbecue, crab cakes, potato chips, and chocolate chip cookies are distinctively American styles. Soul food, developed by African slaves, is popular around the South and among many African Americans elsewhere. Syncretic cuisines such as Louisiana creole, Cajun, and Tex-Mex are regionally important. Iconic American dishes such as apple pie, fried chicken, pizza, hamburgers, and hot dogs derive from the recipes of various immigrants. So-called French fries, Mexican dishes such as burritos and tacos, and pasta dishes freely adapted from Italian sources are widely consumed. Americans generally prefer coffee to tea, with more than half the adult population drinking at least one cup a day. Marketing by U.S. industries is largely responsible for making orange juice and milk (now often fat-reduced) ubiquitous breakfast beverages.During the 1980s and 1990s, Americans' caloric intake rose 24%; frequent dining at fast food outlets is associated with what health officials call the American "obesity epidemic." Highly sweetened soft drinks are widely popular; sugared beverages account for 9% of the average American's daily caloric intake.