> The point is that we have, at a macro level, a common, homogenous culture.
Only if you focus on the mass-marketed commercial culture, which reduces your argument to a basic tautology: "We have a shared mass-market commercial culture, therefore we have a shared mass-market commercial culture." Guess what: Europe has a shared mass-market commercial culture, too, and it's partially the same one America has.
If you can go from Maine to New Mexico without noticing any change in the local culture, I posit that you must be not only blind but deaf and lacking an olfactory sense as well.
> We have a common language, shared history, and shared cultural context.
We have a language with multiple dialects, a history which is only shared by those who are not recent immigrants (otherwise the concept of "shared history" loses all meaning), and to the extent a shared cultural context makes sense, that changes based on generation and, yes, region.
There is a certain American cultural context which is shared by most Americans. Sure. However, it isn't as homogeneous as you make it out to be, and it certainly isn't focused entirely on mass-market commercial culture, as you seemed to imply.
I've lived across the various parts of the country. I've never been confused if I'm still in America. I've been through New York. They'll say things like, "Going way up there, eh?" But I still know I'm in the US and not Canada. Drive in New Mexico, there are points that just looking at the landscape, you might think you wandered into Old Mexico. As soon as you hit town there is an American feel; even along border cities.
Never have I been unsure that I'm in Canada. Crossing from Detroit to Canada feels like I'm in Canada. The country has a feel. I bet that there are few Europeans that are unsure they are in a different country. Again to reference the Brits, moving within the UK still can feel like being a different country ('cause you are).
That's what makes the argument that Europeans are so cultured humorous to me. They are cultured in the sense that they have to be. An Italian in a major city HAS TO BE aware of the German ethos. They don't have to like it, they don't have to speak the language, but the feeling is there regardless. America is "uncultured" because Europeans don't realize that we are cultured, it's just that we're versed in a gigantic culture that they will not match for at least 100 years while the EU (if it does) solidifies.
Only if you focus on the mass-marketed commercial culture, which reduces your argument to a basic tautology: "We have a shared mass-market commercial culture, therefore we have a shared mass-market commercial culture." Guess what: Europe has a shared mass-market commercial culture, too, and it's partially the same one America has.
If you can go from Maine to New Mexico without noticing any change in the local culture, I posit that you must be not only blind but deaf and lacking an olfactory sense as well.
> We have a common language, shared history, and shared cultural context.
We have a language with multiple dialects, a history which is only shared by those who are not recent immigrants (otherwise the concept of "shared history" loses all meaning), and to the extent a shared cultural context makes sense, that changes based on generation and, yes, region.
There is a certain American cultural context which is shared by most Americans. Sure. However, it isn't as homogeneous as you make it out to be, and it certainly isn't focused entirely on mass-market commercial culture, as you seemed to imply.