Who Are We?

As Americans--be you born here, naturalized, holding a green card, or somewhere on the margins trying to make your way in--what binds us? What forces are at work that serve to forge an American identity?

Are these forces now different than they once were? Do these forces produce different results than they once did?

Where does "American character" reside? In our institutions? Within individuals? As an abstract concept only observed from a distance? How has it changed over time? Has it changed?

Such questions would appear to belong atop an exam and seem to be an exercise and nothing more. But I can't shake the feeling that questions like these need to enter the public discourse one way or another. Failing to seriously address these questions will leave us vulnerable to forces--internal and external--that will shape us in ways we can't anticipate and leave us wishing that we had.

Can such questions be slipped into movies and television shows? Into speeches by politicians and into the mouths of celebrities? Asked by foreigners traveling among us? Asked by foreigners when we travel among them? Asked and answered by op-ed columnists and comedians? By the crazy and the sane, the sober and the inebriated, the pious and profane?

Explicitly phrased as questions, not as statements shot-through with answers implied and question marks slapped on. With assumptions laid bare, awaiting confirmation, denial or further questions. Things believed to be fundamental thoroughly examined. Purposes of institutions re-evaluated. Inertia stripped of its authority.

I'd like to see a massive civic discourse bubbling up from within. Perhaps I'm unable to see the form such self-analysis will take. Perhaps a dramatic decision or event must occur to precipitate this. Perhaps nothing can penetrate our self-absorption, denial and abnegation.

No matter. This reckoning awaits, regardless.