Chapter 4 of Who Are We? discusses Anglo-Protestant Culture. Huntington asserts an interesting point that America would not the same as it is today if it had not been inhabited by British Protestants. If it were inhabited by French, Spanish, or Portuguese Catholics, America would be a very different place. Expanding on this idea, Huntington explains that originally, almost all parts of America were fundamentally English. This makes sense considering the settlers came from England. Further, Huntington argues the idea of “anglo-conformity”, which is the idea that people who were not white Anglo-Saxon protestants were expected to assimilate and became Americans by adopting the Anglo-Saxon culture that started with America’s British settlers.
Huntington also discusses “The American Creed”, which is an idea that all Americans have a “something in common: a social ethos, a political creed”. Huntington argues that the principles of the creed have three outstanding characteristics, in particular that the principles have remained remarkably stable over time. This is an expansion of something Huntington argues prior, which is the idea that America was founded on Anglo-Saxon ideals and not much has changed since. Common ideas and principles have persisted from the early American times.
A portion of the chapter is titled “Individualism and the Work Ethic”. Here, Huntington argues that Americans are very individualistic. This individualism comes from the idea of the Protestant work ethic, Huntington argues. Through various sources, Huntington demonstrates that Americans take great pride in work and individual achievement. These points further expand on the idea that many American ideals are from the settlers that came to America from Britain. For example, Huntington shows a graph that demonstrates how much pride different countries take in work that they do. America and Great Britain have scores that are so much higher than any other country, which validates Huntington’s argument that a lot of Anglo-Saxon ideals still exist in American culture. I pose the following questions: what areas of American culture are different than British culture? Also, has America improved on or made worse the Anglo-Saxon values that British settlers brought to America.