I think there's a little more to it than that.

Yes, there's the fact that American culture is very dominant in pop culture and we've exported our culture around the world. As the Rammstein song goes, "We're all living in America"

But there's also the fact that we're a melting pot and we've happily appropriated bits and pieces of culture from everywhere else and integrated them into our own, and the lines get murky about where those other cultures end our our own begins.

And there's not really one American culture, we're rugged cowboys, and we're Hollywood movie stars, we're fat assholes and we're health conscious hippies, we live in modern cities, suburban sprawl, rural farmland, mountains, forests, frozen hellscapes, wide open plains, deserts, we're gun nuts, and we're pacifist vegans, jocks and nerds, some of the richest people on earth, and homeless on the streets and everything in between, and every part of the country does things just a little differently, so it can be hard to pick out things that are truly emblematic of Americans as a whole.

Ehhhhh, I don't know if I agree with this.

American "culture" has had a whole bunch of definitions, usually changing with the decades. For most of the 20th century, you could point to something and say "That's American"; things like milkshake bars and greasers, anything surrounding the hippie movement (that we actually probably stole from somewhere else), and... Whatever that strange design of random shapes the 90s had.

After 2000, there hasn't been really anything that stands out, in part due to the rise of the internet, and in another, the dangerous build environment. In order to have culture, people need to congregate in a place and create something meaningful. Because Americans go to work and then go home, often with little-to-no time in between from long commutes, they have no time to create the next "culture moment".

I bet it's more to do with how little Americans own their own culture. Copyrights in the USA used to expire after 30 years, after which it became public domain. Or in other words, culture was returned to the people as a whole.

Nowdays the copyrights last beyond a lifetime, and Americans grow up in a world where they almost never experience relevant pop culture outside of being owned or controlled by someone. When you find American content, you don't think of "American culture" you think of "This is owned by Disney" or "This is owned by Paramount" and so on and so forth. You have original authors and content creators, being the gods of the world they created, and everyone else are "fan artists" or "fanfic writers," being implied to be lesser. Those fan artists will be fan artists their entire lives, and their works will never be 'canon' in the eyes of the Owners. If you like Harry Potter but not Rowling, too bad. The public cant reclaim it.

That's not how culture works though. Culture remixes, reinspires, deconstructs, rebuilds, and memes on. That's how everyone did stuff before the advent of recorded media. The good stuff is repeated and boosted. In a way, the Internet culture that emerged in the 90s sought out to rebuild what was lost after the 1890s.

The US has tons of culture, both exported and not, and definitely distinct from other cultures.

If anything, US culture differs from others in that the story/identity of the culture is relatively rootless. The American Dream is based on the idea that your heritage can't define who you are, and the rise of post-war consumerism also significantly changed the story of the USAmerican.

That doesn't mean there isn't culture being done (guns, milkshakes, jazz, jeans, Florida man, Burning man, tech bros), it just means that where other cultures find identity in their deep heritage, the US has made a point of not doing that. Which comes off as shallow from their point of view, and narrow from the US point of view.

I assume when you say "American culture" you are referring to the "United States of America culture" not one of the other countries in the Americas. USA culture does exist and is very distinct. They are very patriotic, car loving, highly consumeristic, distrusting of government, believe their nation is superior in every way, and believe that everyone can succeed in the USA thru hard work. (Source: I am a citizen. This is not an exhausive list, and of course it's all in my opinion and I've made generalizations) Some people say there is no USA culture because the USA is also a melting pot of cultures from around the world. As different groups immigrated they brought their cultures. So within the USA there are many variations of culture. For example, if you walk around Manhattan you will experience a very different USA from walking around downtown Dallas. But many USA citizens share similar beliefs (culture).

I think there is something else as well, something touched on by Andy Warhol.

There is a certain care and attention given to low culture that isn't given as much in other cultures. A lot of the valued and treasured culture that is American isn't for the elites, but for the commoners.

American culture can create high art, but it is often in the forms of low art that other countries will create distance from. Quentin Tarantino is a playwright making 70's B movies. Lady Gaga is a talented composer writing catchy pop hits.

American high culture is relatively shallow because its low culture is so deep.

Not really. Americans of course have a culture as does any sufficiently large group of people. It's just that most people don't consider it to be anything worth mentioning.

I mostly think of guns and (some) god as american culture… oh and everyone wants to be famous

I think part of it is being just a general mismash. Of course the prevalence too helps with making it seem blander.

Damn, this thread got real responses that all sound like they came from resonable and educated people...expect for that one guy.

Really seems like it's all become so carefully curated and commoditized that the personality and rough edges and accidents that made any of it noteworthy have been hewn away. American culture is populated by what might as well be walking, talking avatars designed solely to billboard for Disney and Nestle and a few big corporate interests. But, wtf do I know. Maybe I'm just too old for this shit.

Yeah. No-one else really had that many school shootings. Has that proportion of population locked up. Has failed that badly with teaching the basics to it's children.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding as I'm an American. What does it mean to have "culture" and why don't Americans have any?