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Notes -
I think media saturation is a big part of this. It’s almost impossible to get to the “real you” when you are soaking in content. There are no real folk traditions because most of the sources of those traditions have long been outsourced to businesses and the rights to the products they create are owned by big companies practically forever. But the old organic version is dead. We don’t have the older traditions of singing old folk songs or telling folk tales or inventing games. It’s all products for sale. I’d be shocked if any Americans knew old folk stories like Paul Bunyan or Robin Hood or King Arthur. They probably don’t know any songs that aren’t pop songs either. All we have is corporate culture. It’s plastic and fake.
But then there’s another part to this. Americans move around quite a bit. We change jobs, change cities, and change regions quite a bit. And if you’re always uprooting yourself, you end up in the introductory phase of living. You are always introducing yourself to everyone around you, always trying to be impressive enough to fit in or be worth getting to know. You aren’t Jack Jackson who’s lived in the same village as his father and his father’s father as far back as anyone can remember. You aren’t doing the same thing your ancestors did. You’re Jack the new guy in the office, just moved into town. Maybe you’ll stick around a few years before you switch jobs again. Without a root you can’t really relax into being yourself. You’re in a sense always in tryouts for the team. You can’t let up like the veteran players who have been there forever.
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