Is there a common American culture?

RN Bellah - Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 1998 - JSTOR
RN Bellah
Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 1998JSTOR
I MIGHT BEGIN MY talk this morning somewhat facetiously by asking the question, not
whether there is a common American culture, but how is it that a plenary session of the
American Academy of Religion is devoted to this question in a society with so powerful and
monolithic a common culture as ours? The answer, however, is obvious: it has become part
of the common culture to ask whether there is a common culture in America. K. Anthony
Appiah, Professor of Afro-American Studies and Philosophy at Harvard, in a review of …
I MIGHT BEGIN MY talk this morning somewhat facetiously by asking the question, not whether there is a common American culture, but how is it that a plenary session of the American Academy of Religion is devoted to this question in a society with so powerful and monolithic a common culture as ours? The answer, however, is obvious: it has become part of the common culture to ask whether there is a common culture in America.
K. Anthony Appiah, Professor of Afro-American Studies and Philosophy at Harvard, in a review of Nathan Glazer's recent book We Are All Multiculturalists Now (whose very title makes the point) quotes the book as saying" The Nexis data base of major newspapers shows no reference to multiculturalism as late as 1988, a mere 33 items in 1989, and only after that a rapid rise-more than 100 items in 1990, more than 600 in 1991, almost 900 in 1992, 1200 in 1993, and 1500 in 1994..."(7). Appiah adds," When it comes to diversity it seems we all march to the beat of a single drummer"(32). There is something very congenial to multiculturalism in common American culture, but such congeniality is not to be assumed as natural or shared in all societies today. It is worth looking at the contrast case of France. Rodney Benson, a graduate student in my department, is
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