American identity
...st of all I would say that Americans are dynamic and easy-going. If an American stays at one house or place for a long time, he would certainly have a desire to move to another place. If we compare it to Russian people, we’ll see that they are much more attached to their place and wouldn’t like to change it. In my opinion, it somehow due to the times when people in America had to move from place to place not to starve or in order to find better places to live. If we look at Russia’s history, we’ll see that the people have always been settled. Secondly, Americans are patriots. They love their country and are proud to be Americans. It used to be so in Russia during the Soviet times. That time in Russia there were also a lot of flags in the streets and in houses, in any administrative buildings there were the portraits of those who ruled the country. Not it is not so. Americans see themselves as a unique nation, the best one and they are a bit arrogant. It is due to their economical social success, their high technologies and standard of living. Then I would like to mention such feature as practicality. Americans are highly practical: they consider material welfare more important than moral aspect. It can be easily understood by considering an American dream. They dream of money and prosperity, dream to be generally recognized and successful in career. But they are capable of this: they can be independent and successful. This search of success and prosperity sometimes looks like a game, Americans’ favorite one, which shows them as a quite competitive nation. An American dream would not success in Russia, for example. The values here are markedly different. I think that I Russia it is much more important to help your friends and people who need it. Maybe, it is the same in America, but Russians, as I see it, would anyway help, even if they harm themselves. Success and prosperity of American people anyhow leads to necessity of independence and freedom for Americans. And they tend to say they have freedom and independence. Freedom, in general, is a very important feature of Americans. There are a number of American symbols that stand for freedom. Americans feel enormously proud of being free and independent. It entails individualism, which is present in American character. Contrary to some countries, which tend to have collectivism as their key feature, Americans want to do everything by themselves. They unite with other countries, but stay on their own, in fact. This feature disseminates not only on the country and the government, but also on practically each citizen of the USA. He/she tends not to seclude oneself from the society, but also not to show one’s thoughts, ideas and decisions to other people too directly, do things himself/herself. It means that Americans would not be naďve and careless, they won’t entirely trust people, as some Russians do. I don’t know, whether it is good or bad, but being Russian I would better be naďve that practical and prudent. Despite all this Americans are fairly open and informal. In American schools and colleges “Sir” not always heard. They frequently say “Hi” or “Hallo”. For example, our tutor on American literature Maria W...