What is it to be American

What does it mean to be American? Over history in this country we have struggled to find this identity. In the founding years of what made this country to be who it is today, when immigrants were coming from all over (by force or will), ambiguity ran high in distinguishing who got to title them-selves as Americans. People from different countries felt sometimes that they live in America so they should be able to be receiving the label. But this is definitely not the case. There are many cases in which you can be called an American.

First off, an American is a person born in America. To have any chance of being American you have to be born here, but it gets tricky. Canada and South America are included in what we call North America. So for short, they could call themselves Americans if they want. This is usually not the case though. The United States and its citizens are usually known as the Americans around the globe. This is probably because of our popularity (good or bad) and power that we have globally.

This is around America, but in America its gets tricky also. Because of the diversity that fills the melting pot itself, we are not all considered just American even if you were born here. We are grouped into different categories and groups. People are Latin-Americans, African-Americans, and Asian-Americans and so on and so forth. But that’s just being political in the big picture. Really people are just classified as their prefix. People see others as just Black, Asian, White, or Latino. We are not just all seen as plain Americans. That’s not the way society or this country works because of the history of it. We were separated in the past, and will remain for ages.

The government and people of power have the citizens of this country trained to think a certain way. And it is considered the right way with no discrepancy. The labels that groups receive are justifiable. I don’t have a problem with it because it makes sense. But what if one was to think outside the box or people were brought up to think different. Why isn’t anybody who is born here (and their parents) just considered an American? It’s just the way things are. Around the world your American, but in your own home your ethnic.

Song of The Sky Loom

Oh our Mother the Earth, oh our Father the sky,
Your children are we, and with tired backs
We bring you the gifts that you love.
Then weave for us a garment of brightness;
May the warp be the white light of morning,
May the weft be the red light of evening,
May the border be the standing rainbow.
Thus weave for us a garment of brightness
That we may walk fittinggly where birds sing,
That we may walk fittingly where grass us green,
Oh our Mother the Earth oh our Father the Sky!



I like this poem by Tewa because it is about the nature around us. The author gives power to things that have power in our lives unknowingly. Calling Earth and Sky mother and father because we depend on these things to live in peace. If any of these things mentened like morning, evening, and rain began to falter, we would have problems. Big problems

This poem is loaded with figuerative language. From metaphors to personification. The personification comes in where Tewa says the Earth is our mother, and the sky is our father and we are its children. The author gives human like qualities to something not human. The tone of the poem is very calm and nomadic. The author just make connections/comparisions of things the Earth provides with things that she knows (sewing and knitting).
My favorite area of the poem starts at line three. I start to make connections of things that we could do to make the Earth's Health good enough to continue to take care of us. If we cut down on bad things like fossil fuel usage, global warming would not be a problem and the Earth could continue to bring us fair weather without outragous changes that we have witnessed lately. If we didnt spill things like oil and such in the sea, we would have healthier fish to catch and eat so we could feed our families. The weather would not be on constant rise and dicrease which causes sea levels to rise and glaciers to melt. Which happens to have a domino effect. It effect animals which effects mammals(which includes us). If we continued to bring gifts to the Earth and not destroy its habitats and tree's, our Earth's health would be at a better level. Who knows now how crazy it will get in my lifetime. It's crazy and it's not fair because it's not even my (generation's) fault. But we are the ones who are going to have to deal with it. Hopefully our Mother and Father will hold strong and take care of us.