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Excerpts

Contents

Foreword

Part I: The Issues of Identity

Chapter 1. The Crisis of National Identity
Salience: Are the Flags Still There?
Substance: Who Are We?
The Global Identity Crisis
Prospects for American Identity

Chapter 2. Identities: National and Other
The Concept of Identity
Others and Enemies
Sources of Identity
The False Dichotomy

Part II: American Identity

Chapter 3. Components of American Identity
Change, Continuity, and Partial Truths
Settlers Before Immigrants
More Than the Creed
"No Attachment to Place"
Race and Ethnicity

Chapter 4. Anglo-Protestant Culture
The Cultural Core
"The Dissidence of Dissent"
The American Creed
Individualism and the Work Ethic
Moralism and the Reform Ethic

Chapter 5. Religion and Christianity
God, the Cross, and America
A Religious People
Protestant America and Catholicism
A Christian People
Civil Religion

Chapter 6. Emergence, Triumph, Erosion
The Fragility of Nations
Creating an American Identity
National vs. Other Identities
Nation and Patriotism Triumphant
Fading Nationalism

Part III: Challenges to American Identity

Chapter 7. Deconstructing America: The Rise of Subnational Identities
The Deconstructionist Movement
The Challenge to the Creed
The Challenge to English
The Challenge to the Core Culture

Chapter 8. Assimilation: Converts, Ampersands, and the Erosion of Citizenship
Immigration With or Without Assimilation
Assimilation: Still a Success?
Sources of Assimilation
The Immigrants
The Immigration Process
American Society: Americanization Is Un-American
Ampersands and Dual Citizenship
Citizens and Noncitizens
Alternatives to Americanization

Chapter 9. Mexican Immigration and Hispanization
The Mexican/Hispanic Challenge
Why Mexican Immigration Differs
How Mexican Assimilation Lags
Individual Assimilation and Enclave Consolidation
The Hispanization of Miami
The Hispanization of the Southwest

Chapter 10. Merging America with the World
The Changing Environment
The Search for an Enemy
Dead Souls: The Denationalization of Elites
The Patriotic Public
Diasporas, Foreign Governments, and American Politics

Part IV: Renewing American Identity

Chapter 11. Fault Lines Old and New
The Shaping Trends
The Ending of Ethnicity
Race: Constant, Blurring, Fading
White Nativism
Bifurcation: Two Languages and Two Cultures?
Unrepresentative Democracy: Elites vs. the Public

Chapter 12. Twenty-first Century America: Vulnerability, Religion, and National Identity
The Creed in an Age of Vulnerability
Americans Turn to Religion
The Global Resurgence of Religion
Militant Islam vs. America
America in the World: Cosmopolitan, Imperial, and/or National?

Notes

Index