1. What is culture?
Culture - has been called "the way of life for an entire society." As such, it includes codes of manners, dress, language, religion, rituals, norms of behaviors and systems of belief.

2. Where does our American culture come from?

3. Sources of American Culture
During the Colonial Period
Native Americans
Europeans –primarily English speaking, but also Spanish, French, German, Dutch
West Africans

4. 4 Waves of English Speaking Settlement in the Colonial Period 1607-1775
Jamestown, Virginia 1607 – 1st Permanent English settlement in America
Plymouth, Massachusetts – 1621 – Pilgrims
Puritans – Massachusetts New England
Cavaliers – Virginia & South Atlantic Coast
Quakers Pennsylvania & Delaware River Valley
Scots-Irish Appalachian Backcountry

5. Native Americans Technologies: Canoe, snow shoes, toboggan
Foods: Corn, Potatoes, Squash, Pumpkins, Beans, Tomatoes, Sweet Potatoes, Sunflowers
Words: skunk, raccoon, moose, squash, hickory, cougar, barbeque, coyote, jerky, hurricane, tobacco,

6. Native Americans
Confederation – the structure for the government of the United States of America
Freedom – to travel, to hunt, to make own decisions

7. West Africans
By 1775 one of every five people in British America was of African ancestry
Crops: Rice, Indigo, Yams, Okra
Music: rhythmically complex, “blue note” – source of the
Blues, Jazz, Rock & Roll, Hip Hop
Words: banjo, gumbo, OK, banana, jazz, hip, jive, juke box, bug, tote, jamboree, mojo, mumbo jumbo, zombie…
Expressions: sweet talk, bad mouth, every which way…