America: The Multinational Society

by: Ishmael Reed

Ishmael Reed discusses the fact that many cultures influence the United States more than any one percieves in their everyday life. He gives examples such as the fact that in a Texas airport both English and Spanish language was used to instruct people about where to go. He talked about how one man told him of Detroit and all the differences that lie there. Any from mosques made by Islamic people to Hispanic people. He talked of the paintings in the McDonalds's Restaurant that had been drawn by Afro-Americans. Reed does not believe in this "Western Civilization" instead he believes that this a mixture of many different cultures coming together. He discusses the fact that people have been coming here since the discovery of the United States and has been influencing our culture ever since. He argues that it is being fought that even our government system may not have even come from European government systems but instead from the Native Americans that were originally here.

Ishmael Reeds arguments seem more valid than any other argument I have ever read about the fact that the United States in Westernizing the rest of the world. Instead we are being influenced each and every day by every new comer that steps over that border. Each and everyday we are seeing new styles of clothing, of art work, or even music. Some may be due to the fact that we have so many different cultures in one country working together. Others are just the mere fact that new culture is being brought to us every day. Now with the ease of discovering new culture through the Internet it is much easier to share ideas and become the largely diverse country that we are. Every since the United States was founded new people from new countries have been coming to the Americas and influencing every day life and habits. This only seems fair to not blaim the United States for "Westernizing" culture in other countries, but aplaud the United States for being able to bring all of these different cultures together. There are many days where I see something that may be influenced by another country that I do not even recognize that it is influenced by another country. Like Reed mentioned about the Mosque in Detroit, I have seen a Mosque many times before and never thought anything of it being made by people that were not originally from here. If you think about all of our histories, all of our family backgrounds, there are very limited amount of people that can honestly say they cannot trace their family back to a time when they were not in America. This tells us that not only are we influencing other countries but other countries are influencing us more than we know.