The "City on a Hill" conception is quintessentially Yankee, and for the most part the core of a Yankee identity that doesn't exist organically anymore. While that Yankee ethos was instrumental in forging America, it's far from the only contribution, and looking at everything through the Yankee looking glass misses a great deal.
I think the two most valuable US history books I've read in the past decade are Albion's Seed and American Nations. Everything makes a great deal more sense when broken out of the monolithic "American" or bipolar North vs South narrative.
It's kind of the point, in two ways. First, the constant usage of the Bible to justify political discourse is both a staple of the USA and also painfully stupid. It doesn't matter how nice of an imaginary picture is painted by the "city upon a hill"; it's still a religious and rose-tinted portrait. Exodus probably didn't happen, and so it is a nice story (like Harry Potter) but not worth bringing to the policy table.
Second, the Bible is just not very well-translated. Consider this instead:
> You are the salt of the earth.
> Your flavor brings merit and mirth.
> But use too much extra, anybody could tell ya
> Oversalted food has no worth.
> You are the light of the world.
> Like a town on a hill, you are pearled.
> But in light we bask, only while it's unmask'd
> So fly your town's flags high and unfurled.
Still terrible, but at least now it rhymes correctly.
With KJV at least, the a goal was to create a work that was dignified and resonated with the public. Doggerel rhymes don't really fit that scheme. Please don't take that as an insult - I actually like your version, but it lacks dignity.
I read through several translations, my personal favorite for general readings is CSB (formerly HCSB). Otherwise I prefer some of the Messianic translations that are not afraid to admit that some verses are properly lost to the ages, such as the Camel going through the eye of a needle, in Aramaic the same word for rope and camel exists, if you say a rich man trying to get into heaven is much like a rope going through the eye of a needle, immediately I understand what you're saying, you're saying that they have to lose all the unnecessary threads just to go through, whereas with a camel I have no idea and could assume that it would never happen.
There's Aramaic scrolls that are old and translate better than most Greek New Testament scrolls most mainstream bibles are derived from. KJV has a lot of the same flaws as modern translations.
And yes, the CSB still has the same flaws, but it's simple to read.
>… The White House has requested that Congress appropriate $33.4 million to the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) for the orderly closure of the agency. …
Closure of the agency, along with the NEA, is long overdue. The arts and humanities are politically vastly outside the mainstream of American culture. As a result, there is no practical way for these agencies to operate. If the government doesn’t carefully oversee how the money is used, you end up with a government funded platform for academics and artists to peddle fringe views. There is something deeply wrong about using public money to fund something that has neither functional utility nor aesthetic value to the majority of the public. The alternative is even worse. If the government does actively curate the work funded by these agencies, you end up with propaganda: https://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/is-the-n....
“Government funded culture” is literally how all of Europe and Canada pays for their culture. Art tends not be a profit driver, but provides intrinsic social value and therefore thrives when funded socially. The problem isn't where the money comes from, there may well be need of a "Chinese wall" setting out how it's used, but tearing it down isn't the answer.
> Government funded culture” is literally how all of Europe and Canada pays for their culture
America isn’t Europe. For one thing, it’s not nearly as culturally homogenous. More Americans want their state to leave the union (about 1 in 4 nation wide) than people in Basque Country want independence from Spain (about 1 in 6). The French have an idea of what “French culture” is and what’s desirable about it. Americans have highly divergent views on what is American culture or what’s desirable about it (or even if anything is desirable about it). In practice, the NEA and NEH end up funding not “American culture” but “coastal urban culture.”
Now, I happen to like coastal urban culture. My wife and I take the kids to the MOMA when we’re in NYC. But a federally funded agency picking sides in an active and ongoing culture war is wrong. The government shouldn’t be putting a thumb in the scale when it comes to influencing the evolution of culture. But that’s exactly what NEA and NEH end up doing in practice. They hand an elite cultural minority a $300 million a year platform.
Maybe. However, that yields art in the private interest. The people shouldn't have to hope for the scraps of the upper class to showcase their culture.
Ultimately, this leads to exactly what the parent is worried about: a culture of the coast for the coast. I doubt that the "coastal elites" are out in Louisiana and Nebraska paying for art galleries, or even interested in showcasing rural work in urban galleries. That's solved via broad-based social contributions.
The people who don't like the NEH / NEA are arguing that that's what they're getting already. Only now, the people in Lousiana and Nebraska are being forced to pay for it as well.
The people on the coasts don't get any benefit out of rural broadband initiatives but it got funded anyways... People outside of the eastern corridor don't benefit from I95 being resurfaced, people outside of texas don't benefit from national park funding there.
The US is a country, not everything directly benefits everyone - the NEH and NEA actually do funnel quite a bit of money into the center of the country, but their funding is lopsided toward urban centers because those are the locations that attract and can sustain artists. But, tomorrow, someone from LA can head to NY, become an artist, and work on qualifying for a grant - they can secure a grant where they are if they can demonstrate their research topic and get in contact with the NEH.
I think it is the governments job to fund culture in the same way it's their job to fund science, education, and public transportation. Government funded cultural projects help society by bringing its citizens together in a productive, collaborative way.
We can't push and both say "You folks should do this fun stuff for free" while concurrently cutting the social safety nets and, tbh, you get what you pay for. If all the artists are forced to either peddle for money or have a main gig for food and shelter then they have less time to devote to art. In our modern (i.e. not subsistence agrarian) society, we have the excess needed to fund these things and to allow people to specialize into artistic professions.
Currently there is a lot of comedy out there for free(ish) if it became more heavily capitalized, and there were constant steep costs to consume comedy, what would we lose out of society? Nothing super important, the trains would run, factories wouldn't shut down, but we'd lose a source of expression and joy that helped up think differently and approach hard questions in life... Art adds value to all of us and it's so insanely cheap to fund.
I don't see the reason both can't be done. Historically, prosperous societies produce more art. We may not be producing as much art in classicly prestigious formats like paintings, pottery, etc. But one look at the entertainment industry seems to refute the idea that art needs to be sponsored. I simply don't see why we give this significance to certain forms of art as if they fill a societal hole that no other format could. Your example of comedy was perfect because the manifestation and growth of standup comedy is a good example of how new arts can come into being without needing some sort of state sponsored intervention.
Again you've missed my point. I'm saying where the money comes from is irrelevant if left in the hands of the folks in each state to create and showcase what they consider is their culture. The problem you identify is based more on how it's spent not where it comes from. It's much more interesting to tweak the former than throw it all out.
There are three articles suggested for further reading on the "City on a Hill" excerpt. One is about Henry Louis Gates Jr. in quite a contrast to Perry Miller.
NEH ends-up funding a wide gamut instead of being a kingmaker. In fact it funds a lot that would not be paid for otherwise. When criticizing something it's best to critique the thing for what it is rather than what it is imagined to be.
Alan Lomax-like folk & traditional arts programs (and actually sometimes Lomax himself IIRC) don't exactly scream coastal urban culuture. And I've never seen more arts grants looking for projects (nationally sourced, locally administered) than when I was living along the Wasatch Front, which is only coastal if big inland lakes count.
I'm sure the NEA does end up funding coastal urban culture because... a lot of people live in urban centers, maybe even an above average population of artists, so there's lots of art that happens in that context. And those of us who live in that context will probably see even more of it.
But even living in an urban center now, I see a lot of art that looks towards other places and times in the United States, and the people I know creating/practicing art do too. Where I've encountered elitism it's almost always adjacent to the private art market and/or certain historic treasures, and even in that context you will find people who fit the general rule that most of the arts-involved are some of the most open people I've met, as curious about shape note singing as conceptual art.
In fact, I suspect most of them would find your conception of art as culture war odd. It's possible that you're the one who needs to get outside any MOMA bubble and look around more.
It's easy to like the idea of "government funded culture" when you can reasonably expect they will fund things that you like or that you agree with.
Now imagine that some Trump appointee comes in and declares that their theme for 2020 will be "AMERICA FUCK YEAH". They're going to fund a bunch of 1960's style "cowboys and Indians" movies about brave settlers who conquered the West.
Then would you still be as comfortable with the concept? Most people here would not.
Being educated in the humanities seems to encourage a lot better critical thinking in students along with supplying society with art and culture for an absolutely insignificant amount of money.
The cost of granting 3k to an artist to build a golden toilet statue with the constitution on a toilet roll is so incredibly insignificant compared to the cost of curtailing critical thinking abilities - especially for a country that is so reliant on it for continued economic health.
Private sources decently fund these things, but public money makes sure we have a diversity of artists. Those artists certainly do include those peddling fringe views, in fact, from a certain angle, we've all got fringe views - exploring that diversity does us all a service.
It appears this is only a reproduction from the original source:
> From City on a Hill: A History of American Exceptionalism by Abram C. Van Engen. Published by Yale University Press in February 2020. Reproduced by permission.
>Abram Van Engen received a Research Fellowship and a Public Scholar grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, which supported his book City on a Hill: A History of American Exceptionalism (Yale University Press, February 2020).
> The irony of history—one that Miller might well have appreciated—is that in promoting Winthrop’s sermon, he caused it to become the key statement of all that he most feared and lamented. In the years to come, Winthrop’s “city upon a hill” sermon would become “the shining city on a hill” of President Reagan: a celebration of individual freedom, material prosperity, and American power
This is the problem with nationalistic rhetoric. Because it is about a place, and not about any real principle in particular, it easily spirals out of control (with vigor!) in whichever random (or maliciously designed) direction. It's like gasoline without a container: some of it may make it into the engine and move things forward, but it's just as likely to light everything on fire.
> This is the problem with nationalistic rhetoric. Because it is about a place, and not about any real principle in particular, it easily spirals out of control (with vigor!) in whichever random (or maliciously designed) direction.
A nation is not merely a place, and America is a nation based on principles; mere loyalty to the abstract of the territory is not recognizably American.
America is a word, and a place, and a group of people, and a government. All of these are fallible. Everything beyond these is subjective and constantly in flux.
"American Values" have meant countless different things to different people at different times. Like Miller you can try to wrap them up in a coherent story, but it will eventually reveal itself to be at best incomplete, at worst delusional.
If you want to advocate for values then advocate for values, not Americana. The concept of Americana does not exist in any concrete reality, and can (and will) be co-opted by whichever politician, or corporation, or individual, who can use it for their own ends. By stoking the flames one is only sharpening a weapon that can be used by anybody, for anything.
Every American should really learn about the post civil war reconstruction period before making any claims about moral superiority. In my experience most Americans want to pay attention to just the civil war, and pat ourselves on the back for ending slavery. It’s far less comfortable to see the rule of law subverted by southern KKK and militias and northern moral fatigue in the decades that follow.
Events like the civil war and civil rights movement in US history are notable as exceptions of the rule of racism or apathy towards racial injustice.
> Every American should really learn about the post civil war reconstruction period before making any claims about moral superiority.
Was the pre-civil war period a shining bastion of morality? Pre, post or during the civil war, you can choose any time period and see unwarranted self-righteousness. I can't think of any period in US history where we could genuinely consider ourselves the moral superiors. But you don't get to be the wealthiest and the most powerful nation on earth by being morally superior.
> It’s far less comfortable to see the rule of law subverted by southern KKK and militias and northern moral fatigue in the decades that follow.
"Northern moral fatigue". That's cute. You make it sound like the north was any less racist.
41 comments
[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 94.1 ms ] threadI think the two most valuable US history books I've read in the past decade are Albion's Seed and American Nations. Everything makes a great deal more sense when broken out of the monolithic "American" or bipolar North vs South narrative.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_5:14
> You are the light of the world. A city
> located on a hill can't be hidden.
Second, the Bible is just not very well-translated. Consider this instead:
> You are the salt of the earth.
> Your flavor brings merit and mirth.
> But use too much extra, anybody could tell ya
> Oversalted food has no worth.
> You are the light of the world.
> Like a town on a hill, you are pearled.
> But in light we bask, only while it's unmask'd
> So fly your town's flags high and unfurled.
Still terrible, but at least now it rhymes correctly.
> Ye are the light of the world. A city
> that is set on an hill cannot be hid.
Both translations are in alliterative, enjambed verse. Try reading each aloud, then consider which was more pleasing to your ear.
There's Aramaic scrolls that are old and translate better than most Greek New Testament scrolls most mainstream bibles are derived from. KJV has a lot of the same flaws as modern translations.
And yes, the CSB still has the same flaws, but it's simple to read.
>… The White House has requested that Congress appropriate $33.4 million to the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) for the orderly closure of the agency. …
https://www.neh.gov/news/neh-statement-proposed-fy-2021-budg...
[1] https://www.nfb.ca
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Department_of_Canadian_Heritag...
America isn’t Europe. For one thing, it’s not nearly as culturally homogenous. More Americans want their state to leave the union (about 1 in 4 nation wide) than people in Basque Country want independence from Spain (about 1 in 6). The French have an idea of what “French culture” is and what’s desirable about it. Americans have highly divergent views on what is American culture or what’s desirable about it (or even if anything is desirable about it). In practice, the NEA and NEH end up funding not “American culture” but “coastal urban culture.”
Now, I happen to like coastal urban culture. My wife and I take the kids to the MOMA when we’re in NYC. But a federally funded agency picking sides in an active and ongoing culture war is wrong. The government shouldn’t be putting a thumb in the scale when it comes to influencing the evolution of culture. But that’s exactly what NEA and NEH end up doing in practice. They hand an elite cultural minority a $300 million a year platform.
Ultimately, this leads to exactly what the parent is worried about: a culture of the coast for the coast. I doubt that the "coastal elites" are out in Louisiana and Nebraska paying for art galleries, or even interested in showcasing rural work in urban galleries. That's solved via broad-based social contributions.
The people who don't like the NEH / NEA are arguing that that's what they're getting already. Only now, the people in Lousiana and Nebraska are being forced to pay for it as well.
The US is a country, not everything directly benefits everyone - the NEH and NEA actually do funnel quite a bit of money into the center of the country, but their funding is lopsided toward urban centers because those are the locations that attract and can sustain artists. But, tomorrow, someone from LA can head to NY, become an artist, and work on qualifying for a grant - they can secure a grant where they are if they can demonstrate their research topic and get in contact with the NEH.
Don't they though? Those are new potential customers and users. ie. market growth?
Currently there is a lot of comedy out there for free(ish) if it became more heavily capitalized, and there were constant steep costs to consume comedy, what would we lose out of society? Nothing super important, the trains would run, factories wouldn't shut down, but we'd lose a source of expression and joy that helped up think differently and approach hard questions in life... Art adds value to all of us and it's so insanely cheap to fund.
With "All of the private wealth sloshing around needs a home" there are lots of homeless who needs a home?
There are three articles suggested for further reading on the "City on a Hill" excerpt. One is about Henry Louis Gates Jr. in quite a contrast to Perry Miller.
NEH ends-up funding a wide gamut instead of being a kingmaker. In fact it funds a lot that would not be paid for otherwise. When criticizing something it's best to critique the thing for what it is rather than what it is imagined to be.
I'm sure the NEA does end up funding coastal urban culture because... a lot of people live in urban centers, maybe even an above average population of artists, so there's lots of art that happens in that context. And those of us who live in that context will probably see even more of it.
But even living in an urban center now, I see a lot of art that looks towards other places and times in the United States, and the people I know creating/practicing art do too. Where I've encountered elitism it's almost always adjacent to the private art market and/or certain historic treasures, and even in that context you will find people who fit the general rule that most of the arts-involved are some of the most open people I've met, as curious about shape note singing as conceptual art.
In fact, I suspect most of them would find your conception of art as culture war odd. It's possible that you're the one who needs to get outside any MOMA bubble and look around more.
Now imagine that some Trump appointee comes in and declares that their theme for 2020 will be "AMERICA FUCK YEAH". They're going to fund a bunch of 1960's style "cowboys and Indians" movies about brave settlers who conquered the West.
Then would you still be as comfortable with the concept? Most people here would not.
The cost of granting 3k to an artist to build a golden toilet statue with the constitution on a toilet roll is so incredibly insignificant compared to the cost of curtailing critical thinking abilities - especially for a country that is so reliant on it for continued economic health.
Private sources decently fund these things, but public money makes sure we have a diversity of artists. Those artists certainly do include those peddling fringe views, in fact, from a certain angle, we've all got fringe views - exploring that diversity does us all a service.
> From City on a Hill: A History of American Exceptionalism by Abram C. Van Engen. Published by Yale University Press in February 2020. Reproduced by permission.
>Abram Van Engen received a Research Fellowship and a Public Scholar grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, which supported his book City on a Hill: A History of American Exceptionalism (Yale University Press, February 2020).
This is the problem with nationalistic rhetoric. Because it is about a place, and not about any real principle in particular, it easily spirals out of control (with vigor!) in whichever random (or maliciously designed) direction. It's like gasoline without a container: some of it may make it into the engine and move things forward, but it's just as likely to light everything on fire.
A nation is not merely a place, and America is a nation based on principles; mere loyalty to the abstract of the territory is not recognizably American.
"American Values" have meant countless different things to different people at different times. Like Miller you can try to wrap them up in a coherent story, but it will eventually reveal itself to be at best incomplete, at worst delusional.
If you want to advocate for values then advocate for values, not Americana. The concept of Americana does not exist in any concrete reality, and can (and will) be co-opted by whichever politician, or corporation, or individual, who can use it for their own ends. By stoking the flames one is only sharpening a weapon that can be used by anybody, for anything.
Events like the civil war and civil rights movement in US history are notable as exceptions of the rule of racism or apathy towards racial injustice.
Was the pre-civil war period a shining bastion of morality? Pre, post or during the civil war, you can choose any time period and see unwarranted self-righteousness. I can't think of any period in US history where we could genuinely consider ourselves the moral superiors. But you don't get to be the wealthiest and the most powerful nation on earth by being morally superior.
> It’s far less comfortable to see the rule of law subverted by southern KKK and militias and northern moral fatigue in the decades that follow.
"Northern moral fatigue". That's cute. You make it sound like the north was any less racist.