Castaneira 1 Ceasar Castaneira Ms.

McLean Period 5 English 11 September 22, 2013 Americana When it comes to deciding how American you are on the inside, it can become very intricate and tedious. Nonetheless, it is a question that arises a lot and needs an answer. Can the answer really be so specific and precisely on the dot? To help decide on a definition, the class read four pieces of work known as E Pluribus Unum by John Steinbeck, Fredrick Douglass Speech, I Hear America Singing by Walt Whitman, and I, Too, Hear American Singing by Langston Hughes. However, I did cite any evidence from the poem by Hughes. A sensible definition to use to define oneself as American can be, to do what you want as you please when it comes to a lot of things even from the past. It is a definition that can be used by being supported by the correct evidence. Americans did what they wanted even back in the past when setting up the nation of America. From E Pluribus Unum Steinbeck wrote, This land was no gift. The firstlings worked for it, fought for it, and died for it. They stole and cheated and double-crossed for it, and when they had taken a little piece, the way a fierce-hearted man ropes a wild mustang, they had then to gentle it and sooth it and make it habitable at all. (Steinbeck page 1) Americans did what they wanted which was to do whatever is possible to get the land even being a fierce-hearted man. However, that is what they wanted and that is what they did. Steinbeck also wrote, He had little for the land; he ripped it, raped it, and in some cases destroyed it. He cut and burned the forests, fired and plowed the plains, dredged the beautiful rivers for gold, leaving a pebbled

Castaneira 2 devastation. (Steinbeck page 1) Even though these actions were not best for the land, the American did as he pleased with it. He wanted to do things to his benefit. Even today with how we live we do as we please for example hypocrisy or anger towards the weak. Douglas gave a speech during Independence Day in 1852 and wrote, To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. (Douglas paragraph 4) America at that time wanted to live with irony celebrating their independence and claiming it is a joyous thing, yet they still have slaves themselves. It must have been obvious as to what they were doing, but they did not care, the Americans, that they kept slaves because that is what they wanted and did. Douglas also wrote, I answer a day that reveals to him more than all other days of the year, the gross injustice and crueltyyour boasted liberty an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockto him mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy- a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation of the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of these United States at this very hour. (Douglas paragraph 6) To get out of context, this would be an example of Douglas doing as he pleases by mocking the rest of America of their ways of living. With-in the context Douglas was explaining how the independence holiday is to an American slave and how the Americans live and treat them. They want to live the way Douglas explained, but it does not sound very good. The definition of American can reach a far down as to the occupation one desires. In the poem I Hear America Singing by Whitman he wrote, The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deck-hand singing on the steamboat deck. (Whitman line 5) The boatman

Castaneira 3 and the deck-hand chose their occupations and love to and want to do their job. Whitman also said, Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else. (Whitman line 9) They wanted to work in the occupation and enjoy their work. The singing represents them working and for Whit to connect singing which people like to work, then that means the person likes his work. So the definition of how American are you is something someone would want to know. The definition of how American is very vague, but it can reach very high or low in terms of how specific it is. For example with a job, the American wanted that job. Why he got a job was because he wants to make money. Why he is making money is because he wants to survive. Why the American wants to survive is because it will make living easier. So even though the answer is very general, the definition and how American you are is to do as you please.