This is a topic that's always troubled me. I was born in the former USSR, and came over with my family before its collapse. Due to the timing of the immigration, I've always felt as though I belong to no country. I'm a permanent resident in the U.S., and there's no risk of me losing my status, but I struggle to feel a sense of real nationality in the U.S. Even once I do become a citizen, I think that I will always struggle with the pull between feeling "Russian" or feeling "American."

Hi,

I would just to add the comment that the United States isn't the only nation "where you can come over from any other country in the world and assimilate into the culture here." Canada is very much a nation where every other nationality in the world is readily welcomed and encouraged to assimilate into the culture. And although I do know what you are saying, I think assimilate is not the best choice of words, given both of our countries history with forced obligatory assimilation and the subsequent destruction of many cultures to create one. As a Caucasian Canadian though, I feel I am on a similar quest for a nationality. Canadian means so many many different things, it feels without identity for me. My family have been in Canada for less than 100 years, and in terms of lifetimes and generations that really isn't all that long a time. What I wish I had most, was a mother tongue other than english! A second language, is always a good yardstick to measure ones nationality by - I feel.

I am a black American who's family has been in this country for many, many generations. I visited Africa last year, and when I came back a lot of people asked me how it felt. Did I feel African, did I feel at home, did it change me? My response surprised a lot of people - visiting Africa as a black American made me feel more American than at any other time in my life. It wasn't that the Africans treated me differently - in fact, in some parts of Northern Africa I looked so much like the people who lived there that many people assumed I WAS from there. What made me feel American was the little things - no matter what anyone says, you only need to be overseas for a few weeks before you realize that there is an American culture - and if you have lived in the US for any amount of time, you are part of that culture. Not only do I feel more American, I love the US more too - this country has it's problems and when I came home, the economy was in shambles, there was political infighting, things looked rather bleak, but there was no where in the world I wanted to be more.

As a third-generation Japanese-American, I can state truly that I have never really felt at home either here or in Japan. My grandfather (first generations are called "Issei") came to Hawaii as an 11 yr old orphan to work in the pineapple and sugar cane fields. He moved to the mainland, married and raised 7 kids, including my father. Dad (second generations are called "Niesi"), was the first to go to college and law school. He was looking at a blindingly bright future, until Executive Order 9066 changed the course of his and Mom's lives as well as over 110,000 other Japanese-American citizens. The internment camp was a hellhole, as Mom, Dad and my aunts and uncles have described it in words and drawings. Dad volunteered to join the 442nd RCT, and came home with 2 Silver Stars and 3 Purple Hearts, but his and Mom's citizenship was not restored until I went to Vietnam. Dad could have been a senior law partner or a Federal Judge, like many of his classmates, but because he wasn't a citizen, he was blocked from taking the Bar Exam.
It's this that colors our family's attitude towards being "American".

I wonder if Dad is still inwardly bitter, even though he volunteered to come out of the internment camp, to fight, bleed and maybe die for a country that imprisoned him and his entire family, just because the powers that be felt they couldn't count on their loyalty in a time of war. Dad and my uncles who also volunteered, put it all on the line for America, and essentially were treated as an embarrasement to be hidden from the public.

"But a Cambodian could move to the US and eventually become one of the 300,000,000 other Americans."

And so Mom, Dad and everyone in my family thought, until Executive Order 9066 stripped them of everything and imprisoned them for nothing more than who they were and where their families came from. Just because you can become an American, doesnt' mean that you'll continue to be one, if the powers that be have decided your loyalties are in question and that you might pose a threat to the rest of America.

Just ask anyone with an Arabic or Muslim background.

People assume I'm of Irish descent. Which I am. I am also of Scottish, English, Welsh, Spanish, French, and Chinese-Filipina descent. I have ancestors who were here in the 1600s, and I have ancestors who were here because they married American citizens in the 20th century.

I recognize that it's much easier to have people assume that you're part of the more traditional majority, but there are assumptions going on all over the place, all the time, and generally they are at best only partly accurate.

But to me, one of the things that's great about being an American is that we can be from anywhere originally--centuries ago, or last week.

Great discussion! I've lived in both Chile and China, and it's been so interesting for me to see the completely different reactions I've gotten when introducing myself in these countries.

In Chile, when people asked where I was from, I would always say California. The next question was almost always, "Did you vote for Bush?" "Why did Bush get re-elected?" or "Do you agree with the war in Iraq?" This was in 2005, and I developed a simple but intelligent response that referred to the way that Bush referred to religion in his speeches.

In China, the reaction could not be more different. The Chinese word for America translates to beautiful country, and people often say, "beautiful country, beautiful girl" or "America has money." Really common questions are "Do you like basketball?" (The NBA is HUGE in China!) or "Did you go home for Christmas?"

The contrast between Chilean political skepticism and Chinese cultural admiration has been so striking to me.

I must say that I have been WAY prouder to introduce myself as American since the election. "Obama hen cu!" (That's Obama very cool, in Chinese...)

This is so refreshing to read. I am a 40 year old African-American male. I have enjoyed reading all of your responses and it makes me proud to be an American who just happens to have African ancestory.

While reading jrandom posts I could not help but think about my people's history here in America. In my past I was the poster child of the "Angry Black Man"

Life will teach you some things ... if you let it. Through the years I've learned to see the good in all people. It took a long time to realize that everyone was not my enemy

Its my wish that with the rise of our new president that people begin to see past skin color. It's not going to change overnight but it has to change

Just my $.02 worth

And all the racial profiling that has been taking place is just the "last throes" of racism in America, right?

Nisha,

A delayed response for you! Today I have some new insights on being American in China. For my new job I will be coaching Chinese lawyers to speak "American." The textbook really opened my eyes to the specific ways that Americans speak English -- blurring together some syllables and emphasizing others. By speaking "American" these professionals will be able to communicate more effectively with their American clients. In China I think that America represents business opportunities and modernization.

By contrast, when I lived in Chile, people viewed the US with a lot more skepticism. I think that this is related to a history of imperialism, particularly in terms of the political connections that Pinochet had with Henry Kissinger. This is an enormous topic about which many books have been written. Of course there are business connections between the US and Chile but I think that history has a stronger influence on how many citizens view the US.

Thanks for all your great articles!
Leslie

Can i take a one small photo from your blog?

When the Web began 70-620 in the 1990s, a 642-825 typical web page 117-101 was stored in completed form on a web server, formatted with HTML, 70-686 ready to be sent JN0-531 to a user's 156-315 browser in response to a request. Over time, the process 1z0-050 of creating and serving E20-340 web pages has become more automated and more dynamic. Websites 650-575 are often PK0-003 created using content management or wiki software with, initially, very EX0-103 little content. Contributors HP0-J36 to these systems, who may be paid staff, HP2-E24 members of a club or 000-086 other organization or members of the public, fill underlying databases 000-833 with content using editing pages designed for that purpose, while casual visitors JN0-141 view and read this content in its final HTML form. There may or may not be editorial, JN0-342 approval and security systems built into the process of taking newly 1z0-032 entered content and making it available to the target visitors.World Wide Web 1K0-002 browser software, such as Microsoft's Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, 117-202 Apple's Safari, and Google Chrome, let users navigate from one web page to another via hyperlinks embedded in the documents. These documents may also contain any combination of computer data, including graphics, sounds, text, video, multimedia and interactive content including games, office applications and scientific demonstrations. Through keyword-driven Internet research using search engines like Yahoo! and Google, users worldwide have easy, instant access to a vast and diverse amount of online information. Compared to printed encyclopedias and traditional libraries, the World Wide Web has enabled the decentralization of information.