It can be argued that a nation has an identity if a good portion of the population represents or embraces the identity. This can be seen whether it is a characteristic, image, or even a song. Additionally, there can be other aspects that are an identity of a nation. With this being said, there will likely never be any situation where each individual of a nation agrees on an identity. Therefore, it is not necessarily essential to a nation, but it still may be important as it could be a good symbol and representation of a nation. Furthermore, it can help describe the people and what they stand for. As previously mentioned, the identity still may not represent every individual, however, it can be considered useful if it is embraced by a good portion of the population. There may be some similarities between national identities and personal identities, as they both can describe certain characteristics of people. However, they are most likely not too similar as it is hard to compare an individual person to an entire nation in pretty much any situation. This can be seen in the movies or other situations through religion and other examples of unity.
Author: Russell Katz
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The Witch
I thought The Witch was a good movie that kept me on the edge of my seat, and I would certainly recommend it to others, particularly to people that enjoy horror movies. Religion played a major role in the movie, as a family gets banished from their village due to their religious differences from the other people who live there. This movie really emphasized how important religion was back then and to the Puritans. As a result of the family’s passion towards their religion, they leave the village and eventually encounter supernatural experiences, which probably made many viewers of this movie scared. As a fan of horror movies, I enjoyed the scary scenes and found them very entertaining. An interesting aspect of the movie was that a family was sent away from a village due to their religion. Looking back at this, some may even consider this slightly ironic, as many people at this time came from parts of Europe to America in order to obtain freedom. In fact, a major freedom or reason to come to America was likely religious freedom. Overall, this was a thrilling movie that was entertaining, scary, and even had some educational insights as well.
In this chapter, Tocqueville describes the condition, relationships, and lifestyles of the three different races (European, African, and Indian) in America. The white people were cruel, unfair, and lived as superiors to the other two races. Tocqueville goes on to explain how the African population had it rough as they were taken from their home country and families. In fact, Tocqueville explained how they became slaves right away when he stated, “The Negro enters upon slavery as soon as he is born, nay, he may have been purchased in the womb, and have begun his slavery before he began his existence.”
Before the Europeans came to America, the Indians lived quietly in the woods and practiced their traditions. However, this soon changed once the Europeans came to America. There used to be Indian tribes covering the country, but this changed as many had disappeared due to moving and being destroyed. The Indians had little options as they could either migrate, civilize themselves, or start a war. Migrating was difficult and often resulted in suffering, civilizing themselves was a possibility but it was not how they were used to living, and war maybe could have been possible for the Indians if they united and fought during the arrival of the Europeans. Tocqueville describes how unfair it was for the Indians when he stated, “they have no longer a country, and soon they will not be a people; their very families are obliterated; their common name is forgotten; their language perishes; and all traces of their origin disappear.”
It is clear that both the Indians and Africans were mistreated and had rough lives. I found it interesting how Tocqueville was pessimistic in his writing, as he does a good job describing the harsh and unfair situations of the different races. With all of this information in mind, do you think it was inevitable that the Europeans would eventually take over America? Also, if the Indians knew how they were going to be treated by the Europeans, how do you think they would have treated and reacted to the Europeans when they arrived in America?
I found this reading by Tocqueville to be very interesting, especially since I have never read his work before. He writes about how humans improve, or at least attempt to. However, the aristocratic system gives people different ranks, and therefore may make improvement more difficult and seem unrealistic for those at the bottom. Therefore, getting rid of this rank can lead to more change and ability to improve. Without rank, each individual will most likely have the confidence that they can achieve whatever they set their mind to. Despite all of this, I believe Tocqueville was also arguing that becoming perfect may not be possible. I found the last paragraph very interesting, where he describes that ships do not last forever, as there will inevitably be improvements. I enjoyed this reading and look forward to discussing and reading more of Tocqueville’s work.