Living in the USA

Alison R. Lanier, Charles W Gay, Jef Davis

• Publisher: Intercultural Press
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN: 9781931930192
• eBook ISBN: 9781473643963
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

As William Gay, distinguished adviser to the last edition, so aptly notes, the United States is "a country that is never what you think it is." Since that edition was introduced nearly ten years ago, the country has been struggling with troubling, divisive events and issues, especially the September 11, 2001, attacks and the resulting War on Terror. Despite these extraordinary times, the United States still holds promise and opportunity for those who take the time to understand it. Jef Davis, a seasoned interculturalist and long-time adviser to international travelers, had succeeded as few could in creating an important new version of Living in the U.S.A. that will guide you through the confusing, conflicted, exciting country and its diverse population at an extraordinary time in history. New material and significantly revised chapters help you understand: American Cultures, such as sections on African Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native peoples, retirees, gays and lesbians and the disables, underscoring the incredible diversity of culture and values that comprise the American population; Twenty-First Century Issues, for example the continued rise in religious fundamentalism in the U.S. and abroad and the tension between security and personal liberties; Getting Here and Getting Settled, including security at the airport and elsewhere and new and trying immigration regulations. Short-term visitors to the U.S. will find advice for surviving customs and immigration, finding as apartment, doing business, obtaining health care, and navigating the supermarket, bank, and post office. If you plan to stay longer, you will find practical pointers for getting along at work, school, and at home; buying a house; making and keeping American friends; and understanding dominant American values in a diverse and complex society. Living in the U.S.A. is a comprehensive guide to attitudes, customs, manners and daily life in the United States.

Part I
American Intangibles

1 First Impressions

It is probably fair to say that almost anyone in the world knows more about the United States than the average American knows about any other person’s country. News channels like CNN broadcast by satellite twenty-four hours a day around the world. American musical forms are still the most popular in many countries, especially among young people. Movies made in Hollywood are available in theaters and on DVD in almost every country, and U.S. entertainment television programs are among the favorites of people from Baku to Bamako. In fact, you may very well feel saturated with—even bombarded by—images of the United States. But while movies and television programs depict distinct aspects of American life, they cannot begin to prepare you for the complexity of real life here. Similarly, books you might have read, even this one, can give only a limited picture of what life will be like. No matter how prepared you think you are for moving to a new country, you can easily be overwhelmed by your first impressions.

Relocation to the United States is frequently a difficult transition, even though a chance to live in a new culture is an exciting prospect for most people. Newcomers have many questions: Where will we live? Where can we find household help? How difficult is it to buy a car? What kinds of taxes must be paid and when? What customs and courtesies are different from those in our country? What medical services are available? The list seems endless.

It is easier and (in relative terms) cheaper than ever to move from one corner of the globe to another by jet. International trade has led to increasing interaction among nations, and with this comes the transfer of diplomats, businesspeople, executives, professors, and students—often accompanied by spouses and families.

Pace

One of the first things many people comment on upon arriving in the United States is the pace of life here. Because they arrive by jet, the first impression visitors usually have of the United States is in one of the major cities, where the pace of life is fast. People are in a rush to get where they are going, waiting impatiently to be served a meal, restlessly seeking attention in a store, bumping into other people as they walk quickly along the street. Bus and taxi drivers may not seem friendly, waiters may hurry you, and department store salespeople may not spend much time with you. You may not see many smiles, it may be difficult to have a conversation with strangers, and you may get lost in the crowds. All this can be frightening and confusing unless you are accustomed to city life in your own country. Don’t take such behavior personally; this is life in the city. The pace is gentler outside the big metropolises, as it is in other countries.

Americans who live in cities assume that everyone is in a hurry and is self-sufficient, and that people know where they are going and how to get there, just as city people do in Tokyo or Paris, Cairo or São Paulo. If you need assistance or want to ask a question, people who work in hotels, department stores, restaurants, shops, and many other places will usually help you if you ask them in a friendly manner. Friendliness will almost always be returned. But you must let people know that you need help; otherwise, they may not notice you because most Americans use a direct style of communication, as we shall see in Chapter 2. While you might see a lost person in need of help, an American might see only a self-sufficient person studying a map. As in any large city, a few people may not respond in a helpful manner. If this happens, don’t be discouraged; just ask someone else. Most Americans enjoy helping a stranger.

People

Unless you have spent time in some of the world’s cosmopolitan centers, the incredible diversity of people in the U.S. is sure to stand out. People of African, Asian, European, and American ancestry all bustle about the city. You will likely hear Spanish, Amharic, Cantonese, Mandarin, and dialects of English you’ve never heard before—all in the space of a few blocks in New York or San Francisco.

Of the more than 290 million people who call the United States home, most have their origins in other parts of the world. The names you see over shop doors tell you so, as do the varied types of faces you pass on the streets. A roll call of schoolchildren will include such names as Adams, Ali, Bykowski, Capparella, Fujita, Gonzales, Mukerji, Nusseibeh, and Wong. Mostly, people from these diverse backgrounds have not been blended in the so-called American “melting pot.” In fact, the idea that the United States is a melting pot is largely a myth. Instead, many ethnic groups retain at least some of their own customs and social traditions (for more about ethnic and cultural diversity in the United States, see Chapter 3). They merge into the American mainstream only in certain aspects of life—in school, sports, and business, to name a few—but keep to many of their own cultural patterns socially and in their homes. Each successive generation becomes a little more removed from its ancestral homeland.

For many Christians of European ancestry, intermarriage eventually blends nationalities together. It is quite common to hear that someone is “mostly Irish, with a lot of French and a little Dutch on my mother’s side” or “Heinz 57—a little bit of everything.” Unfortunately, racial, ethnic, and cultural differences continue to divide Americans, and the option of blending in is not equally available to everyone, nor is it always desired. Many people who are not of European descent resist the idea that they should “blend in,” which can be perceived as giving up their own culture for one that reflects only European values. Many recent immigrants, however, are among the country’s most patriotic citizens.

Many tensions now apparent in American life originate from the interaction of varied cultures. Nonetheless, you will be able to find your own familiar world here—be it in spices or fruits, churches or national groups, newspapers or music.

Another aspect of our people that immediately stands out to newcomers is our friendliness. Especially when you get away from the big cities, you will find it easy to engage us in conversation, you’ll see us letting you go first in line, and you’ll see us smiling—lots and lots of smiling. In fact, we smile so much, even at strangers, that many newcomers become nervous. They may fear that we are idiots, that we are planning to rob them, or that we are making amorous advances. The simple truth is, we simply tend to smile more often and more broadly at strangers than do people in many other cultures.

Size

The United States is big—really big. About half the size of the Russian Federation in area, the U.S. is bigger than China or Brazil and is nearly a third the size of all of Africa. At 9,631,418 square kilometers (according to the CIA Factbook), it is two and a half times the size of Western Europe. Unless you are from a very large country, it is probably difficult to imagine how vast the U.S. is. It is not an easy matter to experience, or “feel” the size of the United States, even when you know the actual number of miles from coast to coast. One way to think about it is to compare distances within the United States with other distances more familiar to you. For example, the distance from New York to Washington, D.C., is about the same as from London to Paris, or Nairobi to Mombassa, or Tokyo to Kyoto; New York to Los Angeles is farther than Lisbon to Cairo, or Moscow to Montreal, or New Delhi to Rome. It takes about the same length of time to fly from New York to Los Angeles as it does to fly from New York to London.

It is difficult for people who come from smaller countries to realize how important this matter of size is in the lives of Americans. Not only is the country vast, it also contains nearly 300 million people. These two factors affect every phase of life, not only creating a highly competitive domestic market for goods, which gives rise to constant advertising, but also causing an equally competitive political arena. Wide geographic differences make for profound differences in attitudes and values. A New Englander, for example, often has a quite different point of view than a Texan, and a Hawaiian may not understand the values of a Minnesotan. Marked differences in geography or weather and widely dispersed ethnic heritages naturally affect people’s attitudes—but in the United States such differences occur within the same nation. An overseas visitor once remarked, “No wonder Americans talk so loud and move so fast. In a place that size you almost have to or you get lost in the shuffle.”

It is not only our land that is big. Our roads, our cars, and our sport utility vehicles are big. Our dinner plates are big. Our Rocky Mountains are big. Our Great Plains are big, and our Great Lakes look more like seas than lakes. For many of us, our waistlines are big as well (see Chapter 13).

Another way to comprehend the vastness of the United States is to be aware of the time changes. There are four different time zones between the two coasts. When it is 12:00 noon Eastern Standard Time in New York, it is 11:00 A.M. Central Standard Time in Chicago, 10:00 A.M. Mountain Standard Time in Denver, and 9:00 A.M. Pacific Standard Time in San Francisco.

Canada, being wider from east to west, adds one more time zone: Atlantic Standard Time for New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, and Labrador. Alaska (the forty-ninth state of the United States, but not adjoining) extends even farther west than Canada and adds an additional two time zones, Alaska Standard Time and Nome Standard Time. Hawaii (the fiftieth state) is a group of islands in the Pacific Ocean, about 2,400 miles (4,000 kilometers) west of the U.S. mainland. Since it is directly south of Alaska, it uses Alaska Standard Time. The American continent is so wide that it encompasses one-third of all the world’s time zones.

The world’s date line is halfway around the world from zero meridian, that is, twelve hours away from Greenwich, on the 180th meridian. East of this imaginary line, the calendar is a day earlier than points west of it. People coming to the United States from Asia will therefore add a day to their lives—until they go home again, when they will lose a day.

Climate

Naturally, with such distances, the climate in the continental United States is also one of great extremes. From New England and New York through Chicago and much of the Midwest and Northwest, temperatures vary from subzero in winter to the high nineties or over (Fahrenheit) in summer.

The South and the Southwest have warmer weather, though even these sections have occasional frosts and periods of moderate cold. Generally, summers are likely to range from 70°F to 110°F (21°C to 43°C), and many areas can be quite humid. However, air conditioning is so widespread that you can expect most buildings—even many private homes and apartments—to be kept at relatively comfortable temperatures. Alaskan temperatures are, of course, extremely cold most of the year, while Hawaii enjoys a very moderate climate year-round. Temperatures there are normally in the seventies and eighties (Fahrenheit).

2 Dominant U.S. American Values

Because the United States is such a diverse country, it may at first seem impossible to describe a central common culture. In one sense, this is true: there are so many cultural groups here that there is no single set of cultural values that represents every group. In addition, there is also tremendous variation within groups, so that the opposite of any true statement might also be true, at least for some members of some groups. That being said, most experts will agree that there is a dominant U.S. American culture, a culture that is pervasive enough among people with influence that social, political, and business life will reflect that culture and its norms.

Because we are a diverse country with a strong emphasis on individualism, we are likely to notice things that make us different from one another. You will most likely soon be able to identify aspects of our culture that bind us together. It should come as no surprise that in the United States, the dominant culture is that shared by European Americans. And because European Americans have long run the institutions of government, education, and commerce, you will likely find that these institutions reflect European American values. In this chapter we will explore some of those dominant cultural traits.

There is no doubt that many of our customs and cultural traits will surprise you; the same thing happens to us when we visit another country. People living in various cultures handle many small daily activities differently. Some differences are minor, and one soon becomes accustomed to them. You may find the transitory quality of much of American life odd—the fact, for example, that one can rent art by the week or the entire furnishings for an apartment, from sofa and beds to the last spoon, on a few hours’ notice. Supermarkets offer a wide variety of packaged foods that busy people can prepare quickly so that they can spend more time in recreational activities than in domestic chores. Large chain stores located in huge warehouses offer discount prices for goods sold in bulk packaging. “Packaged” living is part of today’s American scene, part of its mobility and pace.

At the same time—perhaps even because of a sense of impermanence—houses are of great interest to Americans. We spend much time thinking and reading and talking about the design of houses, their decorations, how to improve them. Many weekend hours are passed in “do-it-yourself” projects around the house. People also love to look at each other’s houses. Since we would thoroughly enjoy visiting and examining a house in another country, we assume that you will probably have the same desire. Don’t be surprised, therefore, if when you visit someone you are shown the entire house from top to bottom, including bathrooms and closets. Don’t make the mistake of declining the offer; the whole house may have been cleaned especially for you.

Because our people have come from so many nationalities, there is a far wider range of acceptable behavior than in countries where the inhabitants have grown up with a common heritage. As a result, you won’t need to feel awkward or uncomfortable in following your own customs. Although Americans are noticeably informal, if you prefer somewhat greater formality, feel free to act in your own way. This will likely be acceptable to those around you. To a very large extent, you can “do your own thing” and be respected here.

However, it may help to have a little guidance in understanding some general cultural patterns in the United States. Cultural traits are much less obvious than everyday customs—and much more important to you in getting along with Americans. The subject is, of course, too broad and the ethnic differences too great to cover fully, but a few common patterns are worth mentioning.

Egalitarianism

If you come from a country where rank is clearly recognized and deferred to, you may miss the lack of protocol. For example, we rarely seat an honored guest in a particular position in the dining room, living room, or in a car. A few formalities do exist, however; you may observe that the honored guest will normally sit to the right of the host or hostess at a dinner party and will probably be shown through a door or into an elevator first. But other than honored, usually first-time guests, Americans expect to be treated equally in social situations.

Informality

American informality is well known. Many new arrivals interpret it as a lack of respect when they first encounter it, especially in the business world. The almost immediate use of first names, for example, may be a shock to those long accustomed to being status conscious, since the use of first names in some cultures signals a fair degree of intimacy.

Don’t be surprised if Americans do not shake hands, especially in informal situations. They often just nod or smile instead. A casual “Hi” or “How are you doing?” or “Hello” often takes the place of a formal handshake but means the same thing. Nor will you find Americans circulating among fellow office workers or people at a party giving each one a personal farewell. Instead—again the different sense of timing and pace—they will just wave a cheery “good-bye” or say something informal to the whole group, such as “Well, see you tomorrow” or “So long, everybody.” Then they will leave, again without handshakes.

You will see even high-level executives working at their desks in shirtsleeves, sometimes without ties. They may lean far back in their chairs in a casual manner while they talk on the telephone. This is not meant to be rude. Once we get out of the tense, hurried city streets, we are an informal people.

Our pace is often either totally hurried, intense, work-absorbed, and competitive (in play as well as work) or else totally at ease and informal, a relaxed manner described as “laid-back.” We tend to swing between these extremes, and you need to understand this pendulum if you are to comprehend the United States and its people.

It has been said that while Americans are friendly, we don’t necessarily make good friends. Researchers have shown that this statement is perfectly true, depending on your definition of friend.

To many Americans, a friend is just about anyone with whom we have friendly relations. This may include co-workers, classmates, friends of friends, and many other acquaintances. In fact, the term acquaintance can be somewhat negative and is usually reserved for someone we have met only briefly or someone we know but don’t particularly like. In many other countries, the term friend is reserved for a few very close individuals with whom you might share the majority of your social activities. You may find yourself disappointed when your new American friend has a different idea of how much time you should spend together.

Personal Questions

Conversational questions may seem to you both too personal and too numerous—especially when you first arrive. “What do you do (for work)?” “Are you married?” “Do you have children?” (and, if you do have children, “How many do you have?”) “Do you play golf? What is your ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Original Preface
• Introduction
• Part I: American Intangibles
• Part II: American Institutions
• Part III: Getting Here and Getting Settled
• Part IV: For Those Who Stay Longer
• Appendix A: National Holidays
• Appendix B: Conversions
• Endnotes
• Internet Resources
• Index
• Footnotes