Blackwell Reference Online

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The word “Americanization” has been in use since US colonial times, but its ideological meaning has changed repeatedly. Shortly after the Revolutionary War, it was used to describe two aspects of the new nation. On one hand, the united colonies needed to create a common culture and to embrace further self-fashioning. Common denominators in law, weights and measures, currencies, and even building materials had to be agreed upon, and people had to adopt these standards, embracing the new and giving up the old. Even Benjamin Franklin underwent this process, as Gordon Wood details in The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin (2004). But to “Americanize” was also an internal ideological dynamic of new citizens, carried forward by discussion, debate, and simple expediency. The Americans needed systems of governance, roads, trade, schools, and social conventions. What would these be? The strongest sense they had of themselves as Americans came from the contrasts they felt to their homelands (if they remembered them) and to newer immigrants, who were a serious problem. The latter soon became the major focus: How could the foreign-born pouring into the country be naturalized? From 1790 onward, dictionaries tell us, to “Americanize” meant to acculturate foreigners. Overseas, a second meaning of “Americanize” developed, for the world watched the new country curiously. “Americo-mania” was ... log in or subscribe to read full text