In class, I recently read Michel-Guillame Jean de Crevecoeur's article "What is an American?" This article really got me thinking about what, in colonial times, was considered American.
According to Crevecoeur, Americans "are a mixture of English, Scotch, Irish, French, Dutch, German, and Swedes. From this promiscuous breed, that race now called Americans have arisen." Therefore, even though we came from a variety of different European countries, America is now our home and we are no longer European. "He is an American, who leaving behind him all his ancient prejudices and manners, receives new ones from the new mode of life he has embraced, the new government he obeys, and the new rank he holds." This description of Americanism includes a lot of self-definition relating to the rise of the individual American. This is because "his labour is founded on the basis of nature, self-interest." In America, "he now feels himself a man, because he is treated as such; the laws of his own country had overlooked him in his in-significancy."
This article's main purpose is to relate how Americans strive to satisfy their individual needs. In America, whatever the farmer produces is his own wealth. He no longer has to give it to anyone, tithe it away, and can simply choose to only benefit himself and his family. Unlike, "Ye poor Europeans, ye, who sweat, and work for the great--ye, who are obliged to give so many sheaves to the church, so many to your lords, so many to your government, and have hardly any left for yourselves--ye, who are held in less estimation than favourite hunters or useless lap-dogs." In Europe their personal bounty was not their own but also their government's. In America, your riches and your food were your own. Your individual needs were of key importance and the government did not interfere with those needs.
How is it that the need for governmental independence also fostered family values in the new world?
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