The Linguistic Culture LECTURE N 6.

Introducing the Usa

It is common to say that the USA is the country with a short history but vast, abundant geography and diverse population. Only five hundred years ago the USA was a wilderness, inhabited by Indian tribes. After the discovery of America by Europeans the immigrants from Europe and then almost all over the world streamed to the new continent seeking happier life and so-called “American Dream.” As a result of the mass immigration, the struggle of the young nation for independence from former motherland Britain, formation of the new country with democratic rights and great opportunities, the acquisition of the new territories, fast development of industry and agriculture, the USA turned into a superpower with the strong economy, the most advanced and innovative technologies, diverse national culture and arts, influencing the other countries of the globe. The life of the USA is so complex, controversial and dynamic that it would be impossible to present all its aspects in every detail. However, we hope that the materials collected from many different sources and included into this textbook may help the students see the American historical formation and political structure, education and science, cultural and lifestyle peculiarities with better understanding.

Some snapshots of geography

The total area of the US is 9,826,630 km² (3,794,080 sq mi) in 2007 (territorial waters added). By total area area the United States is the world's third largest country, after Russia and China, with Canada in fourth.

General characteristics]

The USA are bounded by the Atlantic Ocean on the east, the Pacific Ocean on the west, and the Gulf of Mexico to the southeast. Alaska borders the Pacific Ocean to the south, the Bering Strait to the west, and the Arctic Ocean to the north, while Hawaii lies far to the southwest of the mainland in the Pacific Ocean.

The Appalachian Mountains form a line of low mountains separating the eastern seaboard from the Great Lakes and the Mississippi Basin. The five Great Lakes are located in the north-central portion of the country, four of them forming part of the border with Canada, only Lake Michigan situated entirely within the United States. West of the Appalachians lies the Mississippi River basin and two large eastern tributaries, the Ohio River and the Tennessee River. The Ohio and Tennessee Valleys and the Midwest consist largely of the Great Plains.

The Great Plains come to the Rocky Mountains that form a large portion of the Western U.S., entering from Canada and stretching nearly to Mexico. The highest peaks of the Rockies are found in Colorado, the tallest peak being Mount Elbert (4,400 m). The Rocky Mountains contain some of the most spectacular and well known scenery in the world. In addition, instead of being one generally continuous and solid mountain range, it is broken up into a number of smaller mountain ranges, forming a large series of basins and valleys. West of the Rocky Mountains lies the Intermontane Plateaus, the desert lying between the Rockies and the Sierra Nevada ranges. There are a lot of national parks as Grand Canyon, Arches, Mesa Verde National Park and Bryce Canyon, among others.

T he Grand Canyon is among the most famous locations in the country.

Due to its large size and wide range of geographic features, the United States contains examples of nearly every global climate. The climate is temperate in most areas, subtropical in the Southern United States, tropical in Hawaii and southern Florida, polar in Alaska, semiarid in the Great Plains west of the 100th meridian, Mediterranean in coastal California and arid in the Great Basin.

Some First Significant Stages of the USA History. The First Explorers and Settlers of America.

H ow did American history begin? For thousands of years America lay unknown to Europeans beyond the Atlantic Ocean. The very first discovery of the continent is supposed to have been made by Norsemen from Greenland who reached the New World and encamped there. The actual material on the voyages is very small and covered with mystery. But the voyage of Thor Heyerdahl’s papyrus craft, Ra 11, did demonstrate that ancient sailors could have crossed the Atlantic Ocean even before the Christian era. Both archeological evidence and ancient sagas do reveal the activities of courageous Norsemen who could reach North America around year 1100. An old Scandinavian saga tells that the Norsemen found there a lot of grapes and grape vines. They filled their ships with grapes and a cargo of timber and sailed away, naming the country Vinland. Another saga tells about a group of the Vikings who spent a winter in Vinland but failed to establish peace with the natives and returned to Greenland with their son, the first European born in what is now America.

It is well known that the Italian navigator Christopher Columbus (1451-1506) rediscovered the “New World” in 1492 by accident while looking for a shorter route to the spice places in Asia. An all-water route to the Indies might reduce the cost of Oriental products, inflated by various middlemen along the traditional land-sea way. Finally the queen of Spain Isabella of Castile sponsored Columbus to sail westward with the fleet of three small ships. A navigational genius, Columbus made four successful voyages from Spain to the islands now called West Indies and claimed the land in the New World for Spain.

The continent however was named America for another Italian explorer – Amerigo Vespucci (1454-1512) who completed many voyages to South America and was the first to understand that he had not reached India but a new continent, so-called the New World. After Vespucci’s accounts, published in Europe, geographer Martin Waldseemuller produced a world map (kept in the Library of Congress) on which he depicted the new continent and named it America after Vespucci’s first name.

After Columbus’ voyages, a lot of other brave and skilled adventurers, driven by a search for personal glory as much as by a desire for wealth, repeated the initial contacts with the New World.

Italian explorer John Cabot commanded the first European ship to reach the shores of North America. Like Columbus, Cabot hoped to reach Asia by sailing west. Like Columbus, Cabot had unsuccessfully offered his service to several countries before finding financial support from England’s port Bristol and formal authorization of King Henry Y11. In May 1497 Cabot sailed from Bristol with two small ships and made a remarkably quick journey to the coast of Newfoundland. He spent a month there exploring American waters. Another Italian seaman Giovanni Verrazzano reached the eastern coast of North America in 1524 in the service of the French king.

Until the 17^th century it was Spain that founded its colonies in America (in South America).In 1528 five Spanish ships under the command of Panfilo Narvaez reached the west coast of Florida, staying on the continent in search of gold for several years. In 1539 Spanish legendary explorer Fray Marcos de Niza was sent to America and described “very beautiful land” as one of the “Seven wonders”.

The First Wave of North America Immigration

The English did not attempt to “share the American pie” and inhabit North America until the 17^th century settlements in North America. English first colonization steps were stimulated by their hostility to Spain. Queen Elizabeth’s advisers Sir H. Gilbert, Walter Raleigh and Francis Drake proposed a more aggressive policy toward Catholic Spain and persuaded the Queen that New World colonies would serve as bases for attacks on it.

The first English attempts at colonization in Newfoundland and North Carolina however failed. Sir H. Gilbert’s expedition in 1583 was destroyed by a storm. It was bound to be unsuccessful from the start as the boats were too light for the trans-Atlantic passage. Walter Raleigh’s first expedition to America in 1587 brought back glorious reports of the coast of Virginia, but the outbreak of war between England and Spain in 1588 postponed the mission of England’s transatlantic ventures.

Only two decades later King James I authorized the chartering of a joint stock company to colonize Virginia. In 1607 Virginia Company landed 144 men near the mouth of the James River as a site for permanent settlement. The English pictured the new land of America as New England – a region not noticeably different from old England. The Virginia Company resembled English joint-stock companies of Africa and Asia, but the small Jamestown colony proved to be economic “white elephant” for investors and a nightmare for many of its earliest inhabitants. The location was low, swampy, covered with trees full of malaria-carrying mosquitoes. During the first six months fever and disease killed approximately half the settlers. Still in 1609 the reorganized Virginia Company petitioned for a charter, fixing the limits of the colony at two hundred miles north and south and including all islands within one hundred miles of the coast.

Over the years, the company established more liberal land grants, encouraged immigration of men and women, and slowly but steadily built strong economy based on growing and selling tobacco. Finally the British Crown recognized Virginia, and as the population increased the planter class created effective units of local government.

The next group of the immigrants to the New World consisted of the English who disagreed with the teaching of the English Church and fled from persecution at home to Holland. In July 1620 a group of 102 so-called pilgrims sailed on the ship “Mayflower” to North America with the hope to set up a colony and find there civil and religious freedom. After a long Trans - Atlantic crossing the pilgrims landed in a place now called Province Town and started building one of the first permanent Massachusetts’s villages called New Plymouth. The group was badly prepared for the rugged existence of the New World. Many of the pilgrims were weakened by the journey, had little skill in hunting and fishing and survived through the following winter only thanks to the help of the neighboring Indians.

The first religious group was followed by a thousand so-called English Puritans who came to Massachusetts Bay and founded some communities in the place where now is Boston. Like the Pilgrims, the Puritans had been against the policies of the English crown, alarmed over growing immorality in English society and beset by economic anxiety. But unlike the Pilgrims, the Puritans claimed not separating from the English church, but establishing a purer version of it. Puritans built the first small towns centered around a church and a meeting house. The colony’s political leaders were also church leaders who tried to create the orders based upon true and strict Christian rules and the family as the basic unit of society. Good harbors, especially at the new town Boston, provided the foundation for a thriving commerce. The growth of trade and the development of shipping industry assisted the colony’s prosperity.

While the English settlers were adjusting to the new region, France and the Netherlands also tried to acquire the territories in America. In 1609 an English adventurer Henry Hudson employed by Dutch East India Company in his small vessel the “Half Moon” sailed up the river in North America, which now bears his name. In 1624 the Dutch ship “New Netherlands” brought thirty families to the mouth of the Hudson River. In 1626 the governor of the Dutch Colony bought Manhattan Island from the Indians for the trinkets and little trifles valued approximately $24. There he built a trading fort and a town, which he called New Amsterdam. The defenses of New Amsterdam were poor and later when English warships appeared in the bay the Dutch had to surrender the fort and the town to the English. In 1664 King Charles II gave a large area of Manhattan Island to his brother Duke of York and New Amsterdam was turned into New York in honor of the duke.

English settlements spread to the north, west, and south, populating the gap between New England and other British settlements.