The popular US movie Brooklyn (2015) is based on a book by Colm Toibin. In the 1950s, a pretty, good-hearted, apparently simple Irish girl gets on a boat to the United States to fulfill the American dream and help her family. After Eillis Lacey lands in Brooklyn, New York, she struggles with limited living conditions and low self-esteem.
Slowly, her hard work pays off. With some help, she gets a job, finds an Italian boyfriend, and attends night school to enrich herself. She slowly achieves her American dreams.
She fits into the society more and more. She becomes ever more socialized with other Americans. People love her. She even improves the living conditions of her family in Ireland. In every sense, without realizing it, she fulfills the American dream.
In the climax of the story, she returns home to Ireland, gets married there and does not return.
The unexpected ending might not be so obvious at first, but observant readers suddenly realize that she returns to Ireland not because of disappointment, but because she has fulfilled her American dream. Her goal is complete in that sense for her. American ideals are made real and even transportable by the shaping force of the reveries of Americans.
Unity is only one American national aspiration. There are different American ambitions for each population and each evolving era.
Emerging out of its colonial beginnings, a revolution and then four score and seven years later a great moral struggle there appears the continent-wide truly United States of America. The hard-won conclusion of the Civil War made it clear the American dream could not be extinguished.
With the settlement of the frontier, the victories in the Mexican and Spanish wars, the founding of an industrial empire and the absorbing of millions of new immigrants, divergent forces molded the young country, within 120 years of the revolution, into a world power with far-reaching, ever-growing influence.
During the 20th century, America’s role became one of leadership, mentorship, and example. The goal, if not the realization, became one where American warriors rebuilt what they had, only yesterday, laid waste
During the 20th century, America’s role became one of leadership, mentorship, and example. The goal, if not the realization, became one where American warriors rebuilt what they had, only yesterday, laid waste. They went to the moon, even while they forgot how to save. They borrowed against the future, even at the cost of necessarily cheating their children. But always there were hopes, and dreams, at least, that remained noble, and always represented intention and motive, if sometimes cynical and even hypocritical.
That is, just as in the movie Brooklyn, America may have decided it has achieved so much, so fast, has been a model for so many for so long, has held itself out as mentor and pilot for so many otherwise moribund traditions, that it may cease to search the heavens for any new guiding stars.
Reminiscent of the Brooklyn story, a grand dream came true. The achievements that made real what had been only wishes and goals are all around us. But was the accomplishment almost too great? From technology, economics, weapons, politics and its relationship with the other countries in the world, American successes are so grand and undeniable we fear a sense may arise that there is little need to imagine and reach for even more.
The sense of the completion happened, metaphorically speaking, just this morning. Even before September 11, 2001, powerful social media had emerged. Previously invisible individuals would get thousands of followers just by posting a photo with a celebrity.
After 9/11, the US was under constant attack. For a while, the immediate, terrible vision of the smoking ruins of the Twin Towers did better unite the nation. But when the explicit terrorist threat was over, the greater pressure exerted by ever-constant, technologically induced super-individualism worked its way into the idea of America.
Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat are tools that supposedly tighten the bonds and improve relationships among people. They are said to shrink the distance separating people. Instead, the new technology allows us to anonymously troll one another. Internet bullies target their unsuspecting victims only in order to get themselves additional followers.
Young people get the sense that it is worthwhile to gain personal fame – something they value greatly – even at the cost of insulting and defaming innocent others (who in an earlier time would have been neighbors, but are now lost on the far side of a computer screen) in the process. The uniting spirit contained in the old notion that “we are all Americans,” despite our differences, is at risk. What does it mean for the future of American aspirations?
American dreams made Americans who they are. Americans will become strangers to themselves and as well to the rest of the world if they ever stop dreaming.
Countries that are already developed move further ahead slowly, since to do so, they must create new technological, political and social pathways. They must become “ice-breakers” or “gold miners.” They must cut a path, mine out of hidden places deep beneath the mountain of unknown things in order to discover hidden ideas and techniques. Only after such a process of discovery can the developed nation undertake the process of refinement and application that must precede the act of making use of the new pathways, ideas, and markets.
In contrast, less developed nations can skip the discovery stage, and simply make use of what the gold miners have extracted in the past. There still is work to do: The existing ideas must be reworked and made appropriate to the new condition found in the less developed places.
How does this connect with the Brooklyn-as-America story? America has, for a long time, been well ahead. Most other nations are, at least in terms of the American-connected ideas of liberty, equality, balanced individualism and progress, less developed.
Oddly enough, this state of affairs might tempt the Americans into a state of rest. They might take their eyes off the stars. It would not be good for the world.
Note: Thanks to the person who inspires in us the idea of America’s goals and its relationship with development. Also thanks to the person who introduced us to the book Brooklyn by Colm Toibin.
Yes, the world has suffered due to the American capitalism that bosted one half of the global population out of pverty for the first time in the history of humanity, including China. The world has suffered from the Post WW2 liberal international organizations that America formed, which have produced the longest running era of peace for a good deal of the globe, in their history. The regions of the world not at peace, just happen to be pursuing alternative, extremist lifestyles and politics. And, yes we have done it while being free to pursue our own goals and dreams on an individual bases, exercise intellectual autonomy, and control our on destiny. Having traveled in 47 nations, I can think of no place I would rather live, than the USA.
I worked myself up from humble beginnings, and was able to retire at age 48 in total finacial security, even while a sigle woman, and live in beautiful a crime free town, right on the ocean, surrounded by moutains and forrests, where a strong and cooperative community prevails. I belong to over 21 clubs, and travel half the year. I do not even cook, because the local diners on the waterfront prepare better meals at roughly the same cost. My home is paid for, and my health care is great. Best of all, I thank God I live in a nation where one adult does not depend on another adult to chart their destiny, let alone run their life or tell them what to believe, read, and think, or otherwise subordinate other adults into the position of a child. At the end of the day, that is what has made America successful, and what has enabled people such as me to go from poverty, to a very comfortable life, without a goverment overseer.
It’s obvious that the authors of this article did not see the movie Brooklyn–the young Irish woman Eillis had already married her Italian boyfriend in America before returning to Ireland, and after a period of doubt and indecision decides to leave Ireland and return to America and her husband, thus giving an entirely different metaphorical meaning to the movie–see the film’s Wikipedia site for its usual plot-spoiling description: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooklyn_(film). So the use of this movie to exemplify an America based on the development of idealistic dreams is weak, as is your thesis.
This is what I would call an ‘American fable’. It sounds good to the few, but rings hallow to the many. The gap between rich and poor is growing by the day, and nothing is done about it. It does not matter for the ruling class, apparently.
Apart from the physical boundary, America is not a well-defined meaningful notion. It is amorphous. For many living in that physical space, the dream is long gone. It is anything but certain that it will ever come back. The wages for the working class are stagnating, and the middle class is dwindling. The US is the only industrialized country that does not have free health care for its people. The funding for it is gone to a small fraction of the top one percent. In one estimate, the ten wealthiest Americans have assets that are equivalent to the combination of the bottom fifty percent. The recent tax cut gives $33,000 to the rich, and $40 to the least fortunate.
The statement that after 9/11, the US was under constant attack is woefully oblivious to the causes. The US has been in perpetual wars since the end of WWII. The blood and lives that were lost in that atrocity pale disproportionately by comparison with the destruction and human suffering that the US might brought about. Hundreds of thousands of civilians were instantly killed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Untold millions of lives perished in Korea where there were no more targets left to bomb and in Vietnam where the tonnage of bombs dropped in that little poor country exceeded the total in WWII. The effect of Agent Orange is still now visible in birth defects. Millions were paid to the veterans, but nothing for the Vietnamese. The devastation of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria is no less comparable. All these of course do not belong to the American dream, but to the worst nightmare.
It takes a lot of moral corruption to ignore these obvious facts.
As George carlin said " The American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it."
What a pile of hogwash. The US was spared the catastrophic consequeces of two world wars. As a matter of fact they sat on the sidelines until they made all the profit that could be made from both sides and then jumped in on the winning side. It was the only country left intact after the wars. Thats where their global leadership came from. Not because they were better, smarter, more moral or more idealistic. The world has suffered a great deal under the jackboot of American Capitalism, Militarism and government overthrows. if something were to happen and the USA were to sink beneath the waves of the Pacific and atlantic oceans, the entire planet would breath a sigh of relief,
The author of this article has a limited knowledge of American history, and leaves out many, many turbulent and chaoitic times. Indeed, America thrives in chaos, and has always opperated under the premise that an upheaval every thirty years or so is neccessary for clearing out the rot in society, and pruning tyranny, bad habitts and corruption, as well as outdated ideas. President Thomas Jeffersoon advocated for America doing it at leastevery 30 years. This habit has prevailed since our founding, beginning with the showdaown between Adams and Jefferson, and the absolute chaos of the Andrew Jackson era, who turned out to be one of America’s top five Presidents, even in the estimation of other Presidents.
Our chaotic times have always been ttmes of great change, including today. However, as with the proper pruning of a tree or plant that promotes healthier growth, the outcome has always fueled a healthier, stronger, freer, more creative and dynamic America. We call these times of major chaos, "awakenings." Our first awakening produced the American Revolution with many more small and large awakenings coming afterwards. The second major one ended slavery and made us a stronger nation. The next produced humane working conditions and rights, more liberty, and a strong middle class as a result. Many others followed. Our last before this one, was the civil rights movementt of the 1960s and 1970s. Out of that grew the entire global high tech movement.
At this point in our history, America is culturally comfortable with, and long adapted to thriving in chaos, thus does not feel the need to preclude it all. We have the confidence to know we have been here before, will survive and be the better for it, and we will be here again as well. It is nations which have little chaos and tolerate no upheaval that eventually suffer due to failure to clear out the dead undergrowth, and prune their plants or outdated ideas. Just as with many new gardeners, they make the mistake of not pinching back blossoms and being too timid with the pruning, because they enjoy the current appearance of the plant. In doing so, they are newer able to have truly beautiful flowers and trees. Moreover,as every expert gardener knows, plants which are not pruned and do not have dead blossoms removed and debree cleared, eventually get diseased or terminally infested with parasitic bugs that kill the plant or dramaticaly stunt it’s growth.