Wednesday, November 16, 2005

Three words for Americans

I posted this as a thread at the Grapevine just now. I'm curious what sort of responses I will get.

I was helping my middle son's friend with his English homework today via teleconference. He's from Pakistan and he had to write a paper in which he described three strong characteristics of Americans and then back it up with examples from reading he had done for the class. He had some poetry and some essays to choose from but since I didn't know if I had read any of them and if I did I probably wouldn't remember them very well, we decided to use the book The Jungle. I'm sure any of you who read this book will have at least some memory of it and it did have a strong impact on business in the US.

After some discussion we chose these three words.

Independent. I think that this is a word that a lot of us would choose to describe ourselves. Examples would be refusal to rely on charity and a strong belief that you can get it done on your own.

Optimistic. I believe that one of the basic credos of our country is that anyone can better himself or herself and better their family. If that's not optimistic I don't know what is.

Industrious. This goes with the other two words. Not only do we believe we can do it for ourselves and improve our lives, we are willing to do the work required to accomplish this lofty goals.

Certainly the character in the book is all three of these things, constantly working and striving in the face of terrible adversity and horrific circumstances.

What words would you choose to describe us as a people?

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home