American Values
American values encompass a range of beliefs and principles that are considered fundamental to American society, including individualism, equality, freedom, and democracy. These values have shaped the nation's history, culture, and institutions, influencing everything from politics and economics to social interactions and personal aspirations. While interpretations and applications of these values may vary, they continue to play a significant role in shaping American identity and societal norms.
4 Key excerpts on "American Values"
eBook - ePubPolitical Philosophy
Fact, Fiction, and Vision
- Mario Bunge(Author)
- 2017(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...3 Values and Morals: Individual and Social Most political issues are about social problems, and these in turn involve such values as security, fairness, inclusiveness, equality, and freedom, every one of which can be either expanded or shrunk. Values have recently become all the rage in American politics. Indeed, many Americans have been persuaded that politics has suddenly become a clash between those concerned about values and those who are not. Moreover, the Christian Right claims to have a monopoly on values. Sanctimony is cheaper than virtue. Even the prestigious Science echoed that vulgar opinion about the recency of values. In its February 11, 2005 editorial the publication claimed that “science and its products are intersecting more frequently [than in the past] with certain human beliefs and values.” And it added that “certain recent experiences [presumably President Bush’s reelection two months earlier] suggest that the values dimension is here to stay.” In fact all purposive human actions have always had a “values dimension.” Indeed, every time we do something deliberately—whether fishing or trading, conjecturing or checking a hypothesis—we make more or less explicit value judgments. One takes action A because one values either A in itself or an expected consequence of A. In particular, scientific research has always been pulled by secular values, such as knowledge and peer recognition. And politics may be regarded as the social action that endeavors to either implement or block value systems. The question is not whether we hold values but whether we can justify and debate rationally about them It is here where scholars differ. Max Weber (1988a) warned his colleagues against making value judgments, for he believed them to be incurably subjective. By contrast, Gunnar Myrdal (1969) enjoined social scientists to start by declaring their values...
eBook - ePubUnderstanding American Icons
An Introduction to Semiotics
- Arthur Asa Berger(Author)
- 2016(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...Chapter 2 Perspectives on American Society and Culture Amongst the novel objects that attracted my attention during my stay in the United States, nothing struck me more forcibly than the general equality of condition among the people. I readily discovered the prodigious influence which this primary fact exercises on the whole course of society; it gives a particular direction to public opinion, and a peculiar tenor to the laws; it imparts new maxims to the governing authorities, and peculiar habits to the governed. I soon perceived that the influence of this fact extends far beyond the political character and the laws of the country, and that it has no less empire over civil society than over the government; it creates opinions, gives birth to new sentiments, founds novel customs, and modifies whatever it does not produce. Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America Americans by 1815 had formulated three major beliefs, each a complex of ideas. The first tenet assumed the dignity of human personality and asserted the conviction that that dignity could be realized only when the individual was free to express himself and to participate in decisions of vital importance to him. The second tenet assumed that principles of universal validity underlie the common life of men in society, the application of which to affairs makes possible the realization of freedom and dignity. The third tenet asserted that the nation created in 1776 exists as a corporate entity not only to further the peace and security of its citizens but to aid—at home and, by example, abroad—the cause of freedom and humane living. Ralph Henry Gabriel, The Course of American Democratic Thought Now that I’ve discussed icons and semiotic theory, let me say something about the second topic in my title: American culture and society...
eBook - ePubAmerican Society
Toward a Theory of Societal Community
- Talcott Parsons, Giuseppe Sciortino(Authors)
- 2015(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...The functional necessity of the social system for the “good life” for individuals is much more deeply grounded than traditional common sense has appreciated. A great deal of evidence has accumulated that only through social interaction is a personality that can be called human able to develop at all (Freud 1935; Leakey and Lewin 1977). Not the least of the conditions is language, which is above all a social phenomenon 7 and which of course must be learned from others. 8 There is a sense in which this interdependence and interpenetration of individuality and sociality is found in all human action systems. Existing and historically known societies, however, may and do vary in the balances among these and other emphases. It is my view that modern Western society in general, and American society in particular, have gone further in the institutionalization of this particular kind of individualistic emphasis than any other we know. 9 Historically, institutionalized individualism, like other aspects of the value system, is rooted in the cultural and religious traditions of our national background. For the American case it has been brought to a head by the development of the liberal version of ascetic Protestantism and its combination with the influence of the Enlightenment, as discussed in the last chapter. Its immediate source of legitimation lies in the civil religion (Bellah 1967); indeed the cult of the individual, in Durkheim’s sense, is itself an integral part of the civil religion. 10 Furthermore, it underlies the legitimation of the balances within and between two pairs of concepts that will serve as a major part of the analytical framework of this book. These are the balance between freedom and constraint on the one hand and the balance between equality and inequality on the other. 4.3. T HE V ALUE P ATTERN OF THE A MERICAN S OCIETAL C OMMUNITY Let us now return to the societal community...
eBook - ePubResearching Values with Qualitative Methods
Empathy, Moral Boundaries and the Politics of Research
- Antje Bednarek-Gilland(Author)
- 2016(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...Chapter 1 Values in the Social Sciences DOI: 10.4324/9781315605623-1 Values are an integral part of our everyday lives. Most people would admit that values are important to them and that having values is valuable in and of itself (cf. Wuthnow, 2008). Yet at the same time, values are abstract things which it is difficult to talk about with any degree of specificity (Hechter, 1992). Not many people can, when prompted, instantly provide a list of the values they themselves hold. And yet, when some of our cherished values are at stake, we know it instantly and we rise to the challenge. Some people place central importance on some values, e.g. moral values or political values. For some, their values form the basis of who they are in their own eyes, for others values subjectively don't matter as much as does good behaviour or the ‘right attitude’. Notwithstanding this diversity, provided we would find a way to become aware of our values, the list each one of us would compile might not necessarily mark us out from our peers. In vital respects, our lists would be quite similar: honesty, openness, patience, kindness, diligence, ambition, courage, justice – these and similar values or virtues would most likely appear on all our lists. Values, valued character traits and moral virtues are terms which seem to refer to the same things a lot of the time, and all of these we usually have a hard time becoming aware of. In part, this is because in everyday life, a range of values or things that are valuable play a role simultaneously, so it is not easy to tell exactly which values are involved in specific situations. Furthermore, the term ‘values’ is used in a variety of ways, so when talking about values, regardless of substantive differences (e.g. I value honesty a bit less highly than my neighbour because I realise that it is necessary to lie sometimes), what I think of as values may be slightly different from what the next person considers values to be...
