As an outsider, I find myself repeatedly fascinated and challenged by the American experience. For all its opulence, opportunities, and grandiose displays of national pride (from which I benefit), my observations continue to reinforce the long-standing notion of an identity struggle that underscores the American psyche. 

At the time of writing, America faces a monumental and unpredictable presidential election in less than a week. The identity of “the world’s greatest nation” totters on a knife’s edge, and yet other than the occasional “remember to vote” stalls, it is business as usual in Austin. Perhaps this is the result of my lack of engagement in the political scene or a customary practice in avoiding political discourse, but I would like to explore a different narrative. Perhaps the question of what it means to be American is presently so fraught with uncertainty and instability that it transcends politics, policies, and the nation’s perception on the international stage. I am almost exclusively around students who are still navigating the adult world, and therefore, the struggle in understanding one’s national identity pales in comparison to the struggle in understanding one’s personal identity. While I want to make obvious the parallels connecting personal identity to national identity, the question, “Where do I fit into American culture and society?” takes precedence over the question, “What is America’s identity in the eyes of the world?” Therefore, the struggle for an American identity raised by the first question shall be my starting point in unpacking this curiosity.

Across the Atlantic Ocean, socialisation on university campuses seem to take a different form. Back home in Britain, parties tend to be the convergence of various groups of friends crammed in a flat, drinking until the host gets sick of it all and boots everyone out. The States differ not just in terms of scale, but also officiality. Fraternities exist as student-run, party-manufacturing entities. They charge for entry, hire front door security, have special access areas, fraternity member privileges, etc. They have insider and outsider status and a social hierarchy overtly displayed throughout the event. Then there are “alternative” parties, who, in an attempt to separate themselves, import the same ideas of insider/outsider, paid entry, and a social hierarchy of their own. Amidst the parties, you can observe subgroups of the jocks, skaters, sorority girls, burnouts, “frat bros”, and so on. 

Outside of parties, societies and clubs transcend a space for pursuing interests and meeting friends. They are often tailored to being integral to formalizations of identity (such as the Texas Asian Students Business Association). In Britain, my university provides spaces for the convergence of identities whereas in the US social spaces are choices of identity. From bars of different aesthetics to my philosophy classes, it seems as though people assume the identities of their surroundings. From my albeit limited observation, the social space appears to be uniquely officialized in its sorting of people into identity categories, and the higher one can climb up the hierarchy of that category, the more frictionlessly they seem to fit into a facet of American society. These categories contain an allure, as they allow for a simple solution to the daunting question of “Where do I fit into my country’s culture and society?” But to seamlessly slot into one category is often to make foreign the other. To make one tribe home is to make another alien, thus creating an obstacle to social cohesion. So why does America seem to insist on dividing people into categories? What of the all-encompassing American identity? Is there no overriding ethos under which all citizens of the stars and stripes can be united?

The answer seems to be that clearly there is: America is uniquely steeped in ethos and identity. Integrated into the United States Constitution and Declaration of Independence are the post-enlightenment liberal qualities of liberty, equality, democracy, and the pursuit of happiness and opportunity. If ever there was a country that had a strong identity, it would be the United States of America. However, this “strong identity” is the very problem. Whilst I’m sure those principles were appealing at the time, and for many they still are, there is a danger in tethering yourself to a set of principles and becoming overly entrenched in them. Britain has had over one thousand years as a nation to forge and mold its identity through wars, plagues, literatures, kings, and religions into an ineffable quality that cannot be constricted into a set of principles and put into any document, hence the non-existence of a British constitution. There is no British identity for me to capture in words, but it certainly exists. It may vary and fluctuate between times and people, but there is a common uniting thread of “Britishness” fragmented and present in the identities of its citizens. I feel similarly about my own identity. While I may be able to throw out some descriptive adjectives or detail some aversions or interests, I could not tether these descriptions to a box or category. I sense there is an elusive, numinous quality to identity that the American psyche hasn’t had the time (or patience) to achieve. 

Within these non-flexible and categorized identity types, there comes a point when the entity outgrows its identity box. For so much of its history, America was sure of the political superiority of its founding principles, and it was happy to let the world know it. During the Cold War, America was relentless in defending its ideology around the world. Yet, the recent emergence of non-interventionist politics from both the left, who find American elitism laughable, and the right, who want to build walls around the nation, suggest that confidence in national identity is wavering. Growing internal ideological divisions and different interpretations of America’s founding principles suggest America is realising its complexity beyond the simple identity it originally prescribed itself. In the event of the US growing out of its identity box, Donald Trump looms around the corner, noting America’s growing pains and offering himself as a transcension of the uncomfortably small box of the past. However, his ego-centred identity box is just as turgid and out-growable as the one he inherited. 

Last weekend I attended a frat party. I was introduced through a mutual friend to the old vice-president of the fraternity, who is now 27 and works in a bar. I watched him, with his backwards baseball cap and white T-shirt hugging his large biceps, dance and talk to younger girls throughout the night. The conversations he had with girls were brief, and his dances seemed performative. He had an unease in his eyes as he stood, alone, at the back of the garden watching the revelry unfold before him. He removed his baseball cap and looked at it intently. He then threw it into a bush and left, in search of some other drunken cesspool to call home.