Preface
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Preface
Dear reader, student, scholar The text before you is a culmination of a series of classes on the topic of American Culture and Society at the University of Ljubljana (Slovenia), Faculty of Arts, Department of English. Having to design a curriculum for the American culture class made me gather all of my insights into the American culture and reevaluate all of my experiences in order to create a series of classes with a fresh and contemporary take on the subject matter. As a person born in the 1970s, and thus belonging to the Generation X, I have built my understanding of, and developed my attitude towards American culture on the impression that the USA is a powerful country, which can prove helpful in resolving global conflict. The USA was not in any sense a country or a culture that my generation would dislike or feel animosity towards. Quite the contrary. If anything, the USA was considered a hero and a savior in reference to the Second World War, which the generations of our parents and grandparents still had a vivid memory of and were not willing to let it slip into oblivion or have their descendants forget about it. Anything American was considered of great value. Even the smallest things, such as, for instance, hearing American English in the streets of Ljubljana, would have spurred a bout of admiration and awe. Knowing someone who has been to the States or was wearing something that was brought directly from the US would endow you with a feeling of great pride. Travel to the USA at the time was wishful thinking rather than a serious option, since it required a lot of paperwork, money and an invitation from a family member or a friend from the US, which not many of us had the privilege of having access to. There were addresses published in local newspapers and magazines of foreigners from all over the world who were seeking a pen-friend in Europe, or specifically Yugoslavia, and the American ones were extremely popular. In some respect, they represented the hope of maybe someday having the chance to visit the USA or even living the American Dream. This, of course, changed over the course of time. Slovenia won its independence from the former Yugoslav federation in 1991 and from then onward, politically and economically, things progressed in a different direction. Slowly, travelling to the USA was becoming more of a realistic option and, most importantly, a more affordable one. The attitude of admiration started to change. In the early 2000s, I had the opportunity to move to the USA for a couple of years with my family, which proved to be a valuable inter-cultural encounter, affording a plethora of experiences and insights into the American way of life. This kind of first-hand experience ensures a more critical approach to understanding
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