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America, USA > Iconic words
American, jeep, cowboy, Super Bowl...
VIDEO
The Speech that Made Obama
President
Video THNKR
30 August 2012
In 2004,
a one-term senator from
Illinois took the stage
to deliver the keynote speech
at
the Democratic National Convention in Boston.
By the time Barack Obama had
finished speaking,
Democrats across the country
knew
they had seen the future of their party.
YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFPwDe22CoY
United States > from confederation to nation
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/10/
books/review/the-quartet-by-joseph-j-ellis.html
@POTUS
https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2017/01/20/
510784802/on-the-day-of-white-house-transitions-twitter-shifts-potus-to-donald-trump
Why America Is Just Okay
NYT 1 July 2019
VIDEO
Why America Is Just Okay
Video NYT Opinion
The New York Times 1 July 2019
America is the greatest country on earth.
It’s a phrase, a slogan, a dogma for patriots.
And as we stare down
the barrel of an upcoming election,
we’re prepared to hear this refrain echo.
In the video Op-Ed above,
we argue that the myth of America
as the greatest nation on earth is at best outdated
and at worst, wildly inaccurate.
Comparing the United States of America on global indicators
reveals we have fallen well behind Europe
— and share more in common with “developing countries”
than we’d like to admit.
YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mjef8NsNfU
America UK / USA
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2023/nov/29/
i-thought-i-knew-america-the-mother-of-all-road-trips-in-pictures-
florence-montmare
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2022/nov/22/
cars-bars-and-burger-joints-william-egglestons-iconic-america-
in-pictures
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/29/
us/jo-carroll-dennison-dead.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/02/
opinion/america-racism.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/11/
travel/a-long-lonesome-look-at-america.html
https://theintercept.com/2021/01/09/
america-trump-violence-bosnia/
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/05/
opinion/trump-supporters-election-2020.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/07/
podcasts/the-daily/trump-mount-rushmore-speech.html - NYT podcast
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/09/
opinion/coronavirus-inequality-america.html
https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=6mjef8NsNfU -
NYT - July 1, 2019
https://www.npr.org/2018/07/04/
625351953/one-song-glory
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/25/
opinion/america-is-the-gun.html
http://www.npr.org/2017/06/28/
534765046/smithsonian-exhibit-explores-religious-diversitys-role-in-u-s-history
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/14/
opinion/i-thought-i-understood-america-then-came-trump.html
https://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/02/23/
a-lesson-from-the-1940s-america-is-capable-of-being-un-american/
http://www.npr.org/2017/01/20/
510746700/donald-trump-sworn-in-as-the-45th-president-of-the-united-states
http://www.npr.org/2017/01/19/
510491692/the-america-donald-trump-is-inheriting-by-the-numbers
http://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/02/
opinion/america-becomes-a-stan.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/22/
opinion/dont-retreat-into-fortress-america.html
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/16/us/
politics/the-two-americas-of-2016.htm
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/13/
opinion/he-made-america-feel-great-again.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/10/
opinion/america-elects-a-bigot.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/09/
business/media/media-trump-clinton.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/16/
opinion/campaign-stops/make-america-great-again-
for-the-people-it-was-great-for-already.html
http://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2016/02/17/
466950838/america-is-obsessed-with-identity-thanks-obama
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/15/
opinion/how-america-was-lost.html
http://www.npr.org/2016/02/09/
466210908/new-hampshire-primary-the-polls-begin-to-close
http://www.npr.org/2016/02/09/
465334832/on-her-new-album-lucinda-williams-is-driven-not-comfortable
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/21/
opinion/invitation-to-a-dialogue-america-in-decline.html
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jul/01/
gary-younge-farewell-to-america
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/23/
opinion/charles-blow-who-loves-america.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/22/
opinion/nicholas-kristof-reagan-obama-and-inequality.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
America_(Simon_&_Garfunkel_song) - 1968
USA > Cars, bars and burger joints:
William Eggleston’s iconic America – in pictures
UK
The landmark series Outlands
created a new visual language of gas stations,
diners and signage
that inspired a generation of photographers
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2022/nov/22/
cars-bars-and-burger-joints-william-egglestons-iconic-america-in-pictures
rural America
http://www.npr.org/2017/02/06/
512037502/rural-america-supported-trump-but-will-his-policies-support-them
USA > BBC > Letter from America by Alistair Cooke
UK
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00f6hbp
Trump's America
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/16/us/
politics/the-two-americas-of-2016.htm
Miss America
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/29/
us/jo-carroll-dennison-dead.html
USA > Americana UK
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2022/dec/15/
ernst-haass-american-west-in-pictures
violence
https://theintercept.com/2021/01/09/
america-trump-violence-bosnia/
country/Americana
music
https://www.npr.org/2021/12/14/
1063781819/how-black-women-reclaimed-country-and-americana-music-in-2021
Americana > folk songs
https://www.npr.org/2012/07/04/
155856961/neil-youngs-fascination-with-americana
Americana > The Saturday Evening Post
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/24/
arts/design/saturday-evening-post-norman-rockwell-archive.html
Walter Elias Disney / Walt Disney
1901-1966
https://www.nytimes.com/topic/person/
walt-disney
https://www.nytimes.com/topic/company/
walt-disney-company
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/13/
business/media/walt-disney-a-visionary-who-was-crazy-like-a-mouse.html
Disneyland
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/25/
books/review/disneys-land-richard-snow-disneyland.html
'America first'
UK / USA
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/jul/14/
behold-america-history-of-american-dream-sarah-churchwell-review
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/02/
opinion/trumps-valueless-foreign-policy.html
http://www.npr.org/2017/02/28/
517565701/trumps-america-first-agenda-marks-sharp-break-in-u-s-economic-policy
http://www.npr.org/2017/01/21/
510877650/trump-vows-policy-vision-of-america-first-recalling-phrases-controversial-past
http://www.npr.org/2017/01/20/
510746700/donald-trump-sworn-in-as-the-45th-president-of-the-united-states
God bless America
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/07/
opinion/sunday/sick-and-tired-of-god-bless-america.html
USA > Americanism UK
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/feb/03/
americanism-us-writers-imagine-fascist-future-fiction
Dearborn, Michigan G 4 August 2017
VIDEO
Dearborn, Michigan
Video
The Guardian 4 August 2017
YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEoVHfqxHio
American UK / USA
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/11/26/
style/united-states-faith-rituals.html
https://www.npr.org/sections/allsongs/2018/07/03/
625369721/american-anthems-the-songs-that-unite-us
http://www.npr.org/2017/10/16/
557338355/im-an-american-radio-show-promoted-inclusion-before-world-war-ii
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/26/
upshot/nearly-half-of-americans-dont-know-people-in-puerto-ricoans-are-fellow-citizens.html
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2017/aug/04/
dearborn-michigan-divided-muslim-american-donald-trump-documentary
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEoVHfqxHio - Guardian - 4 August 2017
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2017/aug/04/
dearborn-michigan-divided-muslim-american-donald-trump-documentary
http://www.npr.org/2017/04/07/
523044253/during-world-war-i-u-s-government-propaganda-erased-german-culture
http://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2017/03/21/
520948428/chuck-berry-taught-me-how-to-be-an-american
https://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/02/08/
rarely-seen-photos-japanese-internment-dorothea-lange/
http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2017/02/03/
513263766/budweiser-s-super-bowl-ad-misses-the-real-timelier-story-about-immigrants-and-be
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/10/
opinion/being-american-in-the-trump-years.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/17/
opinion/who-are-we.html
USA >
American UK
http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/jun/10/
sonic-youth-1990-say-are-you-anti-american-i-think-
its-pretty-cool-people-should-be-anti-american
American identity
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/02/
opinion/the-collapse-of-american-identity.html
American disorder
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/23/
books/death-of-joan-didion.html
American icon
http://www.npr.org/2017/08/24/
545771819/jeep-why-this-american-icon-could-soon-be-part-of-a-chinese-company
American anthems
https://www.npr.org/2018/07/04/
625351953/one-song-glory
https://www.npr.org/sections/allsongs/2018/07/03/
625369721/american-anthems-the-songs-that-unite-us
A National
Association of Managers billboard
in Dubuque, Iowa,
1940.
Photograph:
Universal History
Archive/Universal Images Group
via Getty Images
Freedom’s Just
Another Word for … What Exactly?
NYT
Dec. 17, 2021
5:00 a.m. ET
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/17/
opinion/freedom-liberty-racial-hierarchies.html
American way
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/17/
opinion/freedom-liberty-racial-hierarchies.html
un-American (adjective)
https://www.npr.org/2018/06/17/
620628547/former-u-s-ambassador-to-mexico-calls-trumps-immigration-policies-un-american
https://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/02/23/
a-lesson-from-the-1940s-america-is-capable-of-being-un-american/
House
Committee on Un-American Activities (HCUA)
The
House Committee
on Un-American Activities (HCUA),
popularly dubbed
the
House Un-American Activities
Committee (HUAC),
was an
investigative committee
of the
United States House of Representatives,
created
in 1938 to investigate
alleged
disloyalty and subversive activities
on the
part of private citizens, public employees,
and
those organizations suspected
of
having either fascist or communist ties.
It
became
a standing (permanent) committee in 1945,
and from
1969 onwards it was known
as the
House Committee on Internal Security.
When the
House abolished the committee in 1975,
its
functions were transferred
to the
House Judiciary Committee.
- April
16, 2022
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
House_Un-American_Activities_Committee
hyphenated American > German-Americans
http://www.npr.org/2017/04/07/
523044253/during-world-war-i-u-s-government-propaganda-erased-german-culture
USA > anti-American UK
http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/jun/10/
sonic-youth-1990-say-are-you-anti-american-
i-think-its-pretty-cool-people-should-be-anti-american
I am an American
https://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/02/08/
rarely-seen-photos-japanese-internment-dorothea-lange/
the American idea
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/25/
opinion/david-brooks-the-american-idea-and-todays-gop.html
American idealism
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/07/
opinion/the-end-of-american-idealism.html
USA >
native American UK / USA
http://www.npr.org/2016/04/13/
473264076/for-native-americans-health-care-is-a-long-hard-road-away
http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2016/feb/17/
native-american-wounded-knee-massacre-in-pictures
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2015/03/31/
396664863/federal-judge-says-south-dakota-officials-
violated-native-american-families-righ
native American > Navajo / Navajo nation
http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/04/10/
473547227/for-the-navajo-nation-uranium-minings-deadly-legacy-lingers
http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/06/25/
kenji-kawano-40-years-with-the-navajo/
a nation of immigrants
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=wejt939QXko&index=4&list=UUqnbDFdCpuN8CMEg0VuEBqA
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/22/
opinion/blow-still-a-nation-of-immigrants.html
become American
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/18/
opinion/sunday/how-mexicans-became-americans.html
American dream
America’s Red States
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/04/
opinion/sunday/is-life-better-in-americas-red-states.html
the land of the free
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/11/
us/coronavirus-california-lockdowns.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/19/
opinion/an-apology-for-slavery.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cUZO8ffNcpg
a / the land of opportunity
http://www.npr.org/2017/04/11/
523019764/to-ray-davies-america-is-still-a-land-of-opportunity
http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2017/02/24/
517023337/deported-with-a-valid-u-s-visa-jordanian-says-message-is-youre-not-welcome
rust belt
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/21/us/
niles-michigan-trump-no-women-march.html
US Supreme Court
“equal justice under law”
https://www.supremecourt.gov/about/
constitutional.aspx
E Pluribus Unum
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
E_pluribus_unum
https://www.gocomics.com/pricklycity/2023/04/05
https://www.gocomics.com/claybennett/2022/11/24
https://www.gocomics.com/stevebreen/2022/10/29
http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2017/01/26/
511625609/for-a-stark-contrast-to-u-s-immigration-policy-try-canada
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/05/
opinion/krugman-e-pluribus-unum.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFPwDe22CoY - 30 August 2012
A truck driver making a pit stop in Conway, Texas,
which is in the 13th District.
Photograph: Damon Winter
Gerrymander U.S.A.
NYT
July 12, 2022
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/12/
opinion/texas-redistricting-maps-gerrymandering.html
eagle
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/12/
opinion/texas-redistricting-maps-gerrymandering.html
https://www.gocomics.com/stevebenson/2016/11/09
bald eagle
— the U.S. national symbol
https://www.npr.org/2022/04/06/
1091250692/esi-energy-bald-eagles
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/19/
magazine/bald-eagle-national-burden.html
I'm a Black Cowboy. This is My
Story.
NYT 5 August 2020
VIDEO
I'm a Black Cowboy.
This is My Story.
Video Op-Docs The New York Times 5 August 2020
Cowboys
are among
the most iconic figures of the American West.
They’re
mythologized as strong, independent people
who live and die by
their own terms on the frontier.
And in movies,
the
people who play them are mostly white.
But as with many
elements of Americana,
the idea of who
cowboys are is actually whitewashed
— scholars estimate
that in the pioneer era,
one in four cowboys
were black.
The historian
Quintard Taylor writes about how before then,
enslaved people
"were part of the
expansion of the livestock industry
into colonial South
Carolina,
passing their
herding skills down through the generations
and steadily across
the Gulf Coast states to Texas."
In Dillon Hayes's
"All I Have to Offer You Is Me,"
we meet Larry
Callies,
who comes from a
long line of cowboys. Growing up in Texas,
Callies dreamed of
becoming like Charley Pride,
the first
African-American inductee
in the Country Music Hall of Fame.
As with the cowboy,
there’s an assumption of who makes up country music,
despite its diverse
history.
The breakthrough of
artists like Lil Nas X,
Jimmie Allen and Kane Brown
has returned
attention to the contributions of black artists to the genre.
Callies’s journey
shows what we lose
when we don’t
acknowledge the full breadth of history.
YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWlLNIGIbd0
Arizona Territory cowboys in
1879.
Often what real range riders
wore in the 19th century
bore only a passing resemblance
to the get-ups symbolic of
cowboys today.
Photograph:
C.S. Fly/Buyenlarge,
via Getty Images
What Is a Cowboy, Anyway?
Cowboy style means something
different for every group and era
— from the vaqueros to Buffalo
Bill, Madonna to the Marlboro Man,
Lil Nas X to Louis Vuitton.
NYT
April 23, 2024
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/23/
style/cowboy-fashion-beyonce.html
cowboy
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/23/
style/cowboy-fashion-beyonce.html
https://www.npr.org/2023/12/13/
1218803510/cowboy-beyonce-barbie-bass-reeves
https://www.npr.org/2022/01/28/
1075932919/storycorps-los-angeles-black-cowboys
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWlLNIGIbd0
video - NYT - August 5, 2020
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/05/
682318409/dom-flemons-presents-a-new-image-of-the-american-cowboy
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/02/
opinion/fake-cowboys-and-real-indians.html
http://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2016/08/21/
488673962/south-floridas-seminole-cowboys-cattle-is-in-our-dna
http://www.npr.org/sections/npr-history-dept/2015/09/03/
433194190/the-indian-cowboys-of-florida
yeehaw
https://www.npr.org/2019/05/17/
724339197/lil-nas-xs-old-town-road-video-is-here-
to-lasso-the-yeehaw-agenda
gun
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/25/
opinion/america-is-the-gun.html
gunslinger
https://www.npr.org/2016/09/29/
495913292/old-west-gunslinging-meets-futuristic-androids-
in-hbos-westworld
gunslinging
https://www.npr.org/2016/09/29/
495913292/old-west-gunslinging-meets-futuristic-androids-
in-hbos-westworld
guns >
Winchester
https://www.nytimes.com/1950/06/08/
archives/the-screen-in-review-cowboy-wins-loses-recovers-rifle-
in-winchester.html
USA >
American west UK
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2022/dec/15/
ernst-haass-american-west-in-pictures
old West
https://www.npr.org/2016/09/29/
495913292/old-west-gunslinging-meets-futuristic-androids-in-hbos-westworld
wild West
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/11/
us/politics/sexual-assault-school.html
western
https://www.nytimes.com/1950/06/08/
archives/the-screen-in-review-cowboy-wins-loses-recovers-rifle-in-winchester.html
The Wild Wild West
is an American Western espionage
and science fiction television series
that ran on the CBS television network
for four seasons
from September 17, 1965 to April 11, 1969.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
The_Wild_Wild_West
- Jan. 13, 2021
American West / the West
https://www.npr.org/2021/01/12/
955665162/roots-of-u-s-capitol-insurrectionists-run-through-american-west
Indians
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/02/
opinion/fake-cowboys-and-real-indians.html
Signe Wilkinson
political cartoon
GoComics
April 28, 2021
https://www.gocomics.com/signewilkinson/2021/04/28
Yankees
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yankee#Early_usage
https://www.gocomics.com/signewilkinson/2021/04/28
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/31/
the-birth-of-dixie/
the American South
http://www.npr.org/2016/02/09/
465334832/on-her-new-album-lucinda-williams-is-driven-not-comfortable
the South
http://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2015/07/25/
425315875/q-a-with-chuck-reece-a-bitter-southerner-reimagines-the-region
USA > the Deep South
UK
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2023/apr/05/
sweetness-and-solace-baldwin-lees-portrait-of-the-deep-south-
in-pictures - Guardian pictures gallery
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2022/jun/26/
curran-hatlebergs-humid-hallucinatory-images-of-the-deep-south
Southern
https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2015/07/25/
425315875/q-a-with-chuck-reece-a-bitter-southerner-reimagines-the-region
Southern roots
https://www.npr.org/2016/02/09/
465334832/on-her-new-album-lucinda-williams-is-driven-not-comfortable
Southerners
https://www.npr.org/2016/03/17/
470824030/reverence-and-rage-southerners-battle-over-relics-of-the-confederacy
the Jim Crow South
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/11/us/
claude-sitton-times-reporter-who-covered-south-in-civil-rights-era-
dies-at-89.html
in the Jim Crow South
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/29/
arts/maya-angelou-lyrical-witness-of-the-jim-crow-south-dies-at-86.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/25/us/
willie-louis-who-named-the-killers-of-emmett-till-at-their-trial-dies-at-76.html
1944 > in the Jim Crow era of the South
http://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2014/mar/22/
george-stinney-execution-verdict-innocent
during the Jim Crow
era of racial segregation in the US >
The Negro Motorist
Green Book, published 1936-1964
http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2015/feb/27/
green-book-south-west-usa-route-66-civil-rights
Jim Crow
https://www.thirteen.org/wnet/jimcrow/index.html
https://www.thirteen.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_events_enforce.html
https://www.virginiahistory.org/collections-and-resources/
virginia-history-explorer/civil-rights-movement-virginia/world-jim-crow
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/18/
books/review/stony-the-road-henry-louis-gates.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/03/
opinion/sunday/the-horror-of-lynchings-lives-on.html
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/gallery/2016/oct/29/
civil-rights-photography-north-of-dixie
http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2016/10/18/
blogs/photographing-civil-rights-up-north-and-beyond-dixie/s/
18-lens-civilrights-slide-SHBR.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/30/
movies/13th-review-ava-duvernay.html
http://www.npr.org/2016/08/09/
489311892/jacqueline-woodsons-brooklyn-is-full-of-dreams-and-danger
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/25/
opinion/tearing-down-the-confederate-flag-is-just-a-start.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/29/
opinion/when-jim-crow-drank-coke.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/07/
books/michelle-alexanders-new-jim-crow-raises-drug-law-debates.html
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/16/
jim-crow-on-west-broadway/
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/
story.php?storyId=12819237 - August 15,
2007
Jim Crow laws
Jim Crow was the name
of the racial caste
system
which operated primarily,
but not exclusively
in southern and border states,
between 1877
and the
mid-1960s.
Jim Crow
was more than a series
of rigid
anti-black laws.
It was a way of life.
Under Jim Crow,
African
Americans
were relegated to the status
of second class citizens.
Jim Crow represented
the legitimization of
anti-black racism.
Many Christian ministers and theologians
taught
that whites were the Chosen people,
blacks were cursed to be servants,
and God supported racial segregation.
Craniologists, eugenicists,
phrenologists, and
Social Darwinists,
at every educational level,
buttressed the belief that blacks
were innately intellectually
and culturally inferior to whites.
Pro-segregation politicians
gave eloquent
speeches
on the great danger of integration:
the mongrelization of the white race.
Newspaper and magazine writers
routinely referred to blacks
as niggers, coons, and darkies;
and worse, their articles reinforced
anti-black stereotypes.
Even children's games
portrayed blacks as
inferior beings
(see "From Hostility to Reverence:
100 Years of African-American Imagery
in
Games").
All major societal institutions
reflected and
supported
the oppression of blacks.
http://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/what.htm
https://americanhistory.si.edu/
brown/history/1-segregated/jim-crow.html
https://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/what.htm
https://www.nps.gov/malu/learn/education/jim_crow_laws.htm
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/25/
opinion/tearing-down-the-confederate-flag-is-just-a-start.html
http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2015/04/10/
398806751/painting-the-epic-drama-of-the-great-migration-the-work-of-jacob-lawrence
The Lost Cause of the Confederacy
/ The Lost Cause
https://www.loc.gov/resource/pga.01734/
https://www.loc.gov/resource/rbpe.24502100/?st=text
https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2001696840/
https://www.loc.gov/item/2002709961/
https://www.loc.gov/item/11032055/
https://www.loc.gov/item/2010717215/
https://www.loc.gov/resource/cph.3c28619/
https://www.npr.org/2020/06/15/
876962140/times-are-changing-as-tolerance-weakens-for-confederate-monuments
https://www.npr.org/2020/06/06/
871404659/richmond-to-remove-confederate-statues-from-historic-avenue
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/21/
686547376/the-very-particular-history-being-presented-at-confederate-sites
Ku Klux Klan KKK
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/20/us/
a-confederate-generals-final-stand-divides-memphis.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/19/us/
ku-klux-klanprotests-at-south-carolina-capitol.html
redneck
http://www.npr.org/2016/09/06/
492183406/a-resurgence-of-redneck-pride-marked-by-race-class-and-trump
jazz
https://www.npr.org/2016/08/22/
490940271/toots-thielemans-jazz-harmonica-baron-has-died
Hollywood
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/01/01/
507800502/merry-prankster-in-l-a-wants-to-start-2017-on-a-high-note
jeep
http://www.npr.org/2017/08/24/
545771819/jeep-why-this-american-icon-could-soon-be-part-of-a-chinese-company
New Black Panther Party
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/19/us/
ku-klux-klanprotests-at-south-carolina-capitol.html
“In God is our trust”
https://amhistory.si.edu/starspangledbanner/the-lyrics.aspx
national motto > "In God We Trust,"
https://www.npr.org/2019/07/25/
744909500/south-dakota-public-schools-add-in-god-we-trust-signs-to-walls
https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=F34Vlqtv0lQ - The Obama White House - 20 Oct. 2016
characters, personifications > USA > Uncle Sam
Alamo
Texans or Texians,
according to some sources,
began fighting
for independence from Mexico
in 1835.
By December
the small Texas army had captured
the important crossroads town
of San Antonio de
Bexar
and seized the garrison
known as the Alamo.
Mexican General
Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna
recaptured the town
on March 6, 1836,
after a thirteen-day siege;
the Mexican army suffered
an estimated 600 casualties.
Of the official list
of 189 Texan defenders,
all were killed.
Historians continue to debate
the number of defenders
inside the
Alamo.
The defense of the Alamo
is well-known
for those who fought for Texas.
David Crockett,
James (Jim) Bowie,
and William Barret Travis
were among those remembered
by the "Remember the Alamo"
reported to be yelled
at the victory at San Jacinto.
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/today/mar06.html
https://www.history.com/topics/mexico/alamo
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/alamo/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GU-Rj7k3U8U
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/12/
opinion/gail-collins-rick-perry-meets-his-alamo.html
Cajun
https://www.npr.org/2022/08/10/
1116386405/le-bon-temps-continue-to-roll-on-cajun-radio-in-southern-louisiana
USA > diner UK
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2022/sep/17/
the-melancholy-of-an-empty-american-diner-
in-pictures
Super Bowl
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Super_Bowl
https://www.npr.org/2024/02/12/
1197961698/we-recap-the-2024-super-bowl
Corpus of news articles
English language > America, USA >
Iconic
words >
America, American, jeep, cowboy...
Income Inequality
Is Costing the U.S.
on Social Issues
APRIL 28, 2015
The New York Times
Eduardo Porter
Thirty-five years ago, the United States ranked 13th among the 34
industrialized nations that are today in the Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development in terms of life expectancy for newborn girls. These
days, it ranks 29th.
In 1980, the infant mortality rate in the United States was about the same as in
Germany. Today, American babies die at almost twice the rate of German babies.
“On nearly all indicators of mortality, survival and life expectancy, the United
States ranks at or near the bottom among high-income countries,” says a report
on the nation’s health by the National Research Council and the Institute of
Medicine.
What’s most shocking about these statistics is not how unhealthy they show
Americans to be, compared with citizens of countries that spend much less on
health care and have much less sophisticated medical technology. What is most
perplexing is how stunningly fast the United States has lost ground.
The blame for the precipitous fall does not rest primarily on the nation’s
doctors and hospitals.
The United States has the highest teenage birthrate in the developed world —
about seven times the rate in France, according to the O.E.C.D. More than one
out of every four children lives with one parent, the largest percentage by far
among industrialized nations. And more than a fifth live in poverty, sixth from
the bottom among O.E.C.D. nations.
Among adults, seven out of every 1,000 are in prison, more than five times the
rate of incarceration in most other rich democracies and more than three times
the rate for the United States four decades ago.
The point is: The United States doesn’t have a narrow health care problem. We’ve
simply handed our troubles to the medical industry to fix. In many ways, the
American health care system is the most advanced in the world. But whiz-bang
medical technology just cannot fix what ails us.
As economists from the University of Chicago, M.I.T. and the University of
Southern California put it in a recent research paper, much of America’s infant
mortality deficit is driven by “excess inequality.”
American babies born to white, college-educated, married women survive as often
as those born to advantaged women in Europe. It’s the babies born to nonwhite,
nonmarried, nonprosperous women who die so young.
Three or four decades ago, the United States was the most prosperous country on
earth. It had the mightiest military and the most advanced technologies known to
humanity. Today, it’s still the richest, strongest and most inventive. But when
it comes to the health, well-being and shared prosperity of its people, the
United States has fallen far behind.
Pick almost any measure of social health and cohesion over the last four decades
or so, and you will find that the United States took a wrong turn along the way.
How did we get here? How do we exit?
As the presidential campaign draws the political debate to our national
priorities, these questions must take center stage. As candidates argue over the
budget deficit and the national debt, debate what to do about income inequality,
address the problem of mass incarceration or refight the battles over the
Affordable Care Act and the minimum wage, they should be forced to address how
their policy wish list adds up to an answer.
Looking at how the United States compares with other nations is illuminating. As
I noted in last week’s column, over the last four decades or so, the labor
market lost much of its power to deliver income gains to working families in
many developed nations.
But blaming globalization and technological progress for the stagnation of the
middle class and the precipitous decline in our collective health is too easy.
Jobs were lost and wages got stuck in many developed countries.
What set the United States apart — what made the damage inflicted upon American
society so intense — was the nature of its response. Government support for
Americans in the bottom half turned out to be too meager to hold society
together.
The conservative narrative of America’s social downfall, articulated by the
likes of Charles Murray from the American Enterprise Institute, posits that a
large welfare state, built from the time of the New Deal in the 1930s through
the era of the Great Society in the 1960s, sapped Americans’ industriousness and
undermined their moral fiber.
A more compelling explanation is that when globalization struck at the jobs on
which 20th-century America had built its middle class, the United States
discovered that it did not, in fact, have much of a welfare state to speak of.
The threadbare safety net tore under the strain.
Call it a failure of solidarity. American institutions, built from hostility
toward collective solutions, couldn’t hold society together when the economic
underpinning of full employment at a decent wage gave in.
The question is, Is there a solution to fit these ideological preferences? The
standard prescriptions, typically shared by liberals and conservatives, start
with education, building the skills needed to harness the opportunities of a
high-tech, fast-changing labor market that has little use for those who end
their education after high school.
Ensuring everybody has a college degree might not stanch the flow of riches to
the very pinnacle of society. But it could deliver a powerful boost to the
incomes and the well-being of struggling families in the bottom half.
And yet the prescription — embedded in the social reality that is contemporary
America — falls short. In contemporary America, education is widening inequity,
not closing it. College enrollment rates have stagnated for lower-income
Americans. Sean Reardon from Stanford University notes that the achievement gap
between rich and poor children seems to have been steadily expanding for the
last 50 years.
On the left, there are calls to build the kind of generous social insurance
programs, which despite growing budget constraints remain largely intact among
many European social democracies. Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of
Massachusetts, for example, is calling for an expansion of Social Security, paid
for by lifting the cap on payroll taxes so the rich pay the same share of their
income to support the system as everybody else.
That may be desirable, though at the moment, our greatest problems are not about
the elderly. And at least for the foreseeable future, it remains a political
nonstarter in a nation congenitally mistrustful of government. Just in time to
kick off the presidential campaign, Republicans in the House and Senate were
working on a budget that would gut Obamacare — most likely increasing the pool
of the nation’s uninsured — and slash funding for programs for Americans of low
and moderate income.
Yet despite the grim prognosis, there is hope. The challenge America faces is
not simply a matter of equity. The bloated incarceration rates and rock-bottom
life expectancy, the unraveling families and the stagnant college graduation
rates amount to an existential threat to the nation’s future.
That is, perhaps, the best reason for hope. The silver lining in these dismal,
if abstract, statistics, is that they portend such a dysfunctional future that
our broken political system might finally be forced to come together to prevent
it.
Email: eporter@nytimes.com; Twitter: @portereduardo
A version of this article appears in print on April 29, 2015,
on page B1 of the
New York edition with the headline:
Income Inequality Is Costing the Nation on
Social Issues.
Income Inequality Is Costing the U.S. on Social Issues,
NYT,
28 APRIL 2015,
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/29/
business/economy/income-inequality-is-costing-the-us-
on-social-issues.html
Related > Anglonautes >
Vocapedia
characters, personifications > USA > Uncle Sam
America, USA, Americana > iconic words
describing / talking about
language, actions, things, facts, events, trends, ideas,
sounds, pictures, places,
people, personality traits, behaviour
USA > segregation > 19th-20th century >
Jim Crow era / laws
USA > segregation > 19th-20th century >
Jim Crow era > Blackface
slavery,
eugenics,
race relations,
racial divide, racism,
segregation, civil rights,
apartheid
immigration > USA
day
> USA > Independence Day > July 4th, 1776
day > state holiday > USA
Juneteenth / 19 June 1865
enslaved African-Americans in Galveston, Texas,
were told they were free
day
> USA > Thanksgiving >
Black Friday, Cyber Monday
day > USA > Thanksgiving day
Related > Anglonautes >
History
USA > late 19th
- early 20th
century
Immigration > Ellis Island