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Originally Posted by mavillav
Greetings everyone, as a foreigner I have a different perception of American culture mm... every time I use the demonym of the USA in English it gives me a strange feeling because being Ecuadorian I consider myself American, but that's something else.
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Somehow one man ended up having two continents named after him, and technically, we ought to be named The United States of
North America. Various Central American countries did unite under one flag a few times, under the names United Provinces of Central America, The Federal Republic of Central America, etc.
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There is no doubt that the US during the 20th century had an important generation of culture, unfortunately in the 21st century it has declined significantly and has lost its identity.
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This has happened for a variety of reasons. The phones have shattered the gatekeeping of the Los Angeles-based movie studios and record companies.
Youth culture, specifically, was channeled through music for 50+ years, since it was too expensive for the studios to shoot more than a handful of movies each year that appealed only to 13-23 year-olds. The collapse of the record business, FM/college radio, and MTV has been disastrous for traditional American-born musical forms like jazz, blues, and rock & roll. It is becoming hard to hear American music played by Americans. You now have to go on a cruise ship to hear foreigners play American music.
The majority of distinctly "American" music came out of the cities along the Mississippi River and the Great Lakes,
not the coasts. Most know that blues and jazz came from these areas, but so did funk and what is now called techno or house music.
The first funk recordings were made by James Brown in Cincinnati, OH:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEtXoVHjnpk
Here is the building where the above recording was made:
https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1443...7i16384!8i8192