What is the American Dream?
A House, A Family with Two Kids, A Car in the Drive Way
American Dream常常被理解为:
A house, a family with two kids, a car in the drive way.
这个理解可以被总结为:materialistic。
这个画面象征着对此类stable生活的向往。
随着时间演变,很多人往往将American Dream与money and wealthiness画上等号
但,这真的是the American Dream吗?
The Origin - 追溯根源
这个单词首次由James Truslow Adams在Epic of America中提出,他是这么理解金钱的:
Adams concluded that America had lost its way by prizing material success above all other values: Indeed, it had started to treat money as a value, instead of merely as a means to produce or measure value.
https://www.bushcenter.org/catalyst/state-of-the-american-dream/churchwell-history-of-the-american-dream
以前,金钱是一个可以帮助我们produce value的东西,或者可以说可以帮助我们衡量一个物品的“重要性”;如今,金钱被认为就是value。
比方说:if you own a sports car, is is valuable because of is properties and luxurious nature, determined by factors such as horse power; however, now we believe a sports car is valuable often because of how much it is in terms of money and not its nature.
在这个情景之下,American Dream被曲解了,而人们也开始认为:
Billionaires are the epitome of the American Dream.
因此,在第二次世界大战前,
The American dream was rarely, if ever, used to describe the familiar idea of “Horatio Alger” individual upward social mobility.
https://www.bushcenter.org/catalyst/state-of-the-american-dream/churchwell-history-of-the-american-dream
The American dream往往被理解为向上社会流动,然而American Dream的本质并不是如此。
对于Truslow Adams来说,
the American Dream则是democracy的产物
按Adams的话来说,就是:
It is an image that takes for granted the value of education, of shared knowledge and curiosity, of historical inquiry and a commitment to the good of the whole. It is an image of peaceful, collective, enlightened self-improvement.