Culture of the United States

[1] America's foundations were initially Western-based, and primarily English-influenced, but also with prominent French, German, Greek, Irish, Italian, Jewish, Polish, Scandinavian, and Spanish regional influences.

Americans pioneered or made great strides in musical genres such as heavy metal, rhythm and blues, jazz, gospel, country, hip hop, and rock 'n' roll.

The country is home to a wide variety of ethnic groups, traditions, and values,[25][26] and exerts major cultural influence on a global scale, with the phenomenon being termed Americanization.

[citation needed] The South is sometimes informally called the "Bible Belt" due to socially conservative evangelical Protestantism, which is a significant part of the region's culture.

This region is usually contrasted with the mainline Protestantism and Catholicism of the Northeast, the religiously diverse Midwest and Great Lakes, the Mormon Corridor in Utah and southern Idaho, and the relatively secular West.

The cuisine of the United States is extremely diverse, owing to the vastness of the country, the relatively large population (1⁄3 of a billion people) and the significant number of native and immigrant influences.

Iconic American dishes such as apple pie, donuts, fried chicken, pizza, hamburgers, and hot dogs derive from the recipes of various immigrants and domestic innovations.

Always a mainstay of Great Lakes and New England-area culture, the sport gained tenuous footholds in regions like the American South since the early 1990s, as the National Hockey League pursued a policy of expansion.

While the diverse cultural roots of Americans are reflected in their clothing, particularly those of recent immigrants, cowboy hats and boots, and leather motorcycle jackets are emblematic of specifically-American styles.

[citation needed] Blue jeans were popularized as work clothes in the 1850s by merchant Levi Strauss, a German-Jewish immigrant in San Francisco, and adopted by many American teenagers a century later.

For example, Miami for swimwear, Boston and the general New England area for formal menswear, Los Angeles for casual attire and womenswear, and cities like Seattle and Portland for eco-conscious fashion.

Since the 2012 general election, voters in the District of Columbia and the states of Alaska, California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington approved the legalization of marijuana for recreational use.

In the late-18th and early-19th centuries, American artists primarily painted landscapes and portraits in a realistic style or that which looked to Europe for answers on technique: for example, John Singleton Copley was born in Boston, but most of his portraiture for which he is famous follow the trends of British painters like Thomas Gainsborough and the transitional period between Rococo and Neoclassicism.

Minstrel shows were developed in the 19th century and they were typically performed by white actors wearing blackface makeup for the purpose of imitating and caricaturing the speech and music of African Americans.

[95] Mid-20th-century American pop stars such as Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra,[96] and Elvis Presley became global celebrities,[89] as have artists of the late 20th century such as Michael Jackson, Prince, Madonna, and Whitney Houston.

[97][98] American professional opera singers have reached the highest level of success in that form, including Renée Fleming, Leontyne Price, Beverly Sills, Nelson Eddy, and many others.

As of 2022[update], Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus, Ariana Grande, Eminem, Lady Gaga, Katy Perry, and many others contemporary artists dominate global streaming rankings.

Thomas Kuhn revolutionized the philosophy of science with his book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962), one of the most cited academic works of all time, and he coined the term paradigm shift.

[136] The U.S. military operates about 800 bases and facilities abroad,[137] maintainaining deployments greater than 100 active duty personnel in 25 foreign countries,[138] and possesses significant capabilities in both defense and power projection.

[142] The Supreme Court has ruled that the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution protects an individual right to possess modern firearms, subject to reasonable regulation,[143] a view shared by the majority of Americans.

The great American inventors include Robert Fulton (the steamboat); Samuel Morse (the telegraph); Eli Whitney (the cotton gin, interchangeable parts); Cyrus McCormick (the reaper); and Thomas Edison (with more than a thousand inventions credited to his name).

Examples include the lightbulb, the airplane, the transistor, the atomic bomb, nuclear power, the personal computer, the iPod, video games, online shopping, and the development of the Internet.

The rise of fascism and Nazism in the 1920s and 30s led many European scientists, such as Albert Einstein, Enrico Fermi, and John von Neumann, to immigrate to the United States.

[154] The Wright brothers in 1903 made the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight, and the automobile companies of Ransom E. Olds and Henry Ford popularized the assembly line in the early 20th century.

According to a 2002 study by the Pew Global Attitudes Project, the U.S. 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 opinion similar to that found in Latin America.

[165][166] Although participation in organized religion has been diminishing, the public life and popular culture of the United States incorporates many Christian ideals specifically about redemption, salvation, conscience, and morality.

Upper class Americans commonly have elite Ivy League educations and are traditionally members of exclusive clubs and fraternities with connections to high society, distinguished by their enormous incomes derived from their wealth in assets.

Working-class individuals take great pride in doing what they consider to be "real work" and keep very close-knit kin networks that serve as a safeguard against frequent economic instability.

The Northern states had outlawed slavery in their territory in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, though their industrial economies relied on raw materials produced by slaves in the South.

[239] Throughout most of the country's history before and after its independence, the majority race in the United States has been Caucasian—aided by historic restrictions on citizenship and immigration—and the largest racial minority has been African Americans, most of whom are descended from slaves smuggled to the Americas by the European colonial powers.

The Rocky Mountains, Lander's Peak (1863) by Albert Bierstadt , at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan
Betsy Ross was an American upholsterer who was credited by her relatives in 1870 with making the first American flag .
European immigrants arriving in New York City by ship in the late 19th century and early 20th century
Regions of the United States as defined by the United States Census Bureau
The NYC Pride March is the world's largest LGBT event . Regional variation exists with respect to tolerance in the U.S.
Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall with American Flag
The First Thanksgiving 1621 , oil-on-canvas by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris (1899)
Apple pie is one of a number of American cultural icons.
A typical Baseball diamond as seen from the stadium
The opening of College football season is a major part of American pastime. Massive marching bands , cheerleaders , and colorguard are common at American football games.
Completed in 1923, the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum will become the first stadium to have hosted the Summer Olympics three times when it hosts the 2028 Summer Olympics . [ 52 ]
Bronze Statue by Marshall Fredericks at the USTA National Tennis Center in Flushing , Queens
Times Square in Midtown Manhattan is the world's most famous location for New Year's celebrations, with the annual ball drop .
Fireworks light up the sky over the Washington Monument during Independence Day .
John F. Kennedy unofficially spares a turkey on November 19, 1963. The practice of " pardoning " turkeys in this manner became a permanent tradition in 1989.
Haute couture fashion models on the catwalk during New York Fashion Week
Ronald Reagan wearing stonewash denim associated with Western clothing , 1970s
Marilyn Monroe signing divorce papers with celebrity attorney Jerry Giesler
The American Foursquare was a popular house style from the late 19th century until the 1930s.
New York City Police officers pour liquor into sewer during Prohibition in 1921
The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier located in Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia
The current One World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan (background, seen under construction) surpassed the height of the Empire State Building in Midtown Manhattan (foreground) on April 30, 2012.
American Gothic (1930) by Grant Wood is one of the most famous American paintings and is widely parodied . [ 83 ]
From Georgia O'Keeffe's Red Canna series, 1919—an example of abstract modernism
Lincoln Center , on the Upper West Side of Manhattan , hosts the David H. Koch Theater (left), the Metropolitan Opera House (center), and David Geffen Hall (right), surrounding the Revson Fountain .
Lin-Manuel Miranda as Alexander Hamilton in Hamilton , the Broadway musical
The Hollywood Sign
Comcast Center in Philadelphia , headquarters of Comcast , the world's largest telecommunications and media conglomerate
Painting by Howard Chandler Christy of the scene at the Philadelphia Convention which led to the signing of the United States Constitution , an important document in American political and legal philosophy
The J. Edgar Hoover Building is the headquarters of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), in Washington, D.C.
Pin-up girl nose art on the restored World War II B-25J aircraft Take-off Time
Early full-scale model of the James Webb Space Telescope on display at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt , Maryland (2005)
U.S. astronaut Buzz Aldrin saluting the flag on the Moon during the 1969 Apollo 11 mission. The United States is the only country that has sent crewed missions to the lunar surface .
Thomas Edison and his early phonograph. Edison was credited for inventing many devices, including the lightbulb.
Los Angeles Times Festival of Books is the largest book festival in the United States, annually drawing approximately 150,000 attendees.
Harvard Yard , the oldest part of the Harvard University campus in Cambridge , Massachusetts [ 157 ]
Lady Justice , Shelby County Courthouse , Memphis, Tennessee , United States
Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan is the most expensive shopping street in the world. [ 204 ]
Film by Edison Studios showing immigrants at Ellis Island in New York Harbor , historically the major entry point for European immigration into the U.S. in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. [ 221 ]
Chinatown, Flushing in Queens , New York City has become the present-day global epicenter receiving Chinese immigration as well as the international control center directing such migration, as Asian immigration has surpassed European immigration to the U.S. in the late 20th into the 21st century. [ 222 ]
Median household income along ethnic lines in the United States
The plurality ethnic background in each county in the U.S. in 2000: German English Norwegian Dutch Finnish Irish French Italian Mexican Native Spanish American African American Puerto Rican
A street in South Central Los Angeles , the site of the 1992 race riots
" Pony car ": 1965 Ford Mustang "fastback", introduced in September 1964 for the 1965 model year
Automobiles on the streets of New York in 1915
The Smithsonian Institution Building was the first building of the Smithsonian Institution , a cultural institution in Washington, D.C. created by the US government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". [ 263 ]
Aircraft on display at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. , including a Ford Trimotor and Douglas DC-3 (top and second from top)