Culture of the United States

The social behaviors, institutions, and norms of the United States—spanning speech, literature, music, visual and performing arts, cinema, food, sports, religion, law, technology, and other customs and beliefs—form its culture. This culture has been molded by the nation’s history, geography, internal and external pressures, and immigration. The country’s foundations were initially Western, primarily English in origin, but also drew heavily from French, German, Greek, Irish, Italian, Scottish, Welsh, Jewish, Polish, Scandinavian, and Spanish regional influences. Hispanic American cultures have shaped regions since colonial times. Non-Western influences, including African and Indigenous cultures, and more recently Asian cultures, have become deeply embedded. Since 1776, successive waves of immigrants have made the “melting pot” a defining trait. Americans pioneered or greatly advanced musical genres like heavy metal, rhythm and blues, jazz, gospel, country, hip hop, and rock ’n’ roll. The “big four sports” are American football, baseball, basketball, and ice hockey. Religiously, most Americans are Protestant or Catholic, with a growing number of irreligious people. Cuisine includes hot dogs, milkshakes, and barbecue, along with many class and regional preferences. English is the most common language; a 2025 executive order made it official, though no law had previously designated it as such. Distinct cultural regions include New England, the Mid-Atlantic, the South, the Midwest, the Southwest, the Mountain West, and the Pacific Northwest.

Politically, the country’s values stem from the American Revolution and American Enlightenment, emphasizing liberty, individualism, and limited government, as well as the Bill of Rights and Reconstruction Amendments. The First Amendment provides strong free speech protections, and American popular opinion is the most supportive globally of free expression and internet access. Most of the U.S. legal system is based on English common law. On the Inglehart–Welzel cultural map, the U.S. leans heavily toward “self-expression values,” blending “secular-rational” traits (a strong focus on human rights, the individual, and anti-authoritarianism) with “traditional” ones (high fertility rates, religiosity, and patriotism). Culture varies by region, race, ethnicity, age, religion, socio-economic status, and population density. Aspects can be considered low culture, high culture, or part of various subcultures. The United States is a cultural superpower with major global influence.

**History**

The European roots of the United States come from English, Spanish, and French settlers during British, Spanish, and French rule. English people from Southern England were the overwhelming majority in the 17th century (the colonial population in 1700 was 250,000) and made up 47.9% of the total 3.9 million by 1790. At the first census, whites were 60% English, with smaller percentages of Welsh, Scotch Irish, Scots, Irish, German, Dutch, French, and Swedish. The English ethnic group shaped the major cultural and social mindset that became the American character. Their share of each colony’s population ranged from 30% in Pennsylvania to 85% in Massachusetts. Large non-English immigrant groups from the 1720s to 1775—Germans (100,000 or more) and Scotch Irish (250,000)—enriched and modified this English substrate. African culture, transmitted through the enslavement of the African diaspora, and contributions from African Americans, are also foundational.

Jeffersonian democracy was a foundational American cultural innovation, still core to national identity. Thomas Jefferson’s *Notes on the State of Virginia* was perhaps the first influential domestic cultural critique by an American, written in response to European views that America’s native flora and fauna (including humans) were degenerate. Historical immigration brought other non-indigenous influences, especially from Germany across much of the country, Ireland and Italy in the Northeast, and Japan in Hawaii. Latin American culture is pronounced in former Spanish areas and has been introduced by immigration, as have Asian American cultures (especially in the Northeast and West Coast). Caribbean culture, increasingly introduced by immigration, is pronounced in many urban areas; since the abolition of slavery, the Caribbean has been the source of the earliest and largest Black immigrant group, a significant source of Black population growth, and has major cultural impacts in education, music, sports, and entertainment. Indigenous cultures remain strong in reservation and urban communities, including traditional government and communal property management legally handled by Indian reservations (large ones mostly in the West, especially Oklahoma, Arizona, and South Dakota). The fate of indigenous cultures after European contact varies widely.