‘E pluribus unum’ or ‘E pluribus plura’?

Unity and Diversity in American Culture

Edited by Hans-Jurgen Grabbe Edited by David Mauk Edited by Ole Moen Associate editor Carsten Hummel Associate editor Julia Nitz

Book cover: ‘E pluribus unum’ or ‘E pluribus plura’?

Extent: 306, 306 pages

Publisher: Universitätsverlag Winter

Subjects: Communications, Film, & Media Studies

Series: European Views of the United States

Series volume number: 3

Language: English

Hardback (Published)

(July 2011)

ISBN: 9783825358570

5.28 x 8.27 inches

Price: $46.00

In stock

The essays collected in this volume are derived from the 2008 EAAS biennial conference in Oslo. They explore the many-layered pluralism of American life by addressing questions like the following: How does the United States negotiate the inner tensions that, because of its constitutive diversity, might threaten its unity? How do traditions, modes of consensus building, the feeling of a wished-for common good counteract potential strife and the tensions of particular interests and particular groups? Could it be that there are indeed several Americas? Is being an American necessarily being in many ways double? Can the politically unifying, centripetal power of the State, hidden under the neutral ‘unum,’ accommodate the centrifugal forces that might generate a societal and cultural ‘plura’ out of the hallowed political and territorial ‘pluribus’? Do diversities imply, for their survival and development, a ‘middle ground,’ a ‘mainstream,’ a ‘tradition’-some kind of American norm?

  • Edited by Hans-Jurgen Grabbe
  • Edited by David Mauk
  • Edited by Ole Moen
  • Associate editor Carsten Hummel
  • Associate editor Julia Nitz