Talk:Americana (culture)/Archive 1

recent change log 2018 january
I've done a number of changes to the article over the last couple of days to try and improve the focus and better convey the subject. I reworked the first section, which I think better explains the term "Americana". It is an admittedly ambiguous term and represents ideals as much as does material items, such as memorabilia. I've made additions I hope help tie the subject together. Making the article more inspiring and connected to the related subjects was my priority. I noticed some other changes come in that expanded on mine and were great additions. This article, I think, still could use a more filled out article. It's sparse on the text, due to the subject being hard to cite, due to the terms ambiguity. But I think the article better illustrates the subject than it did a couple of days ago. - Thanks, Cheers! :)

Examples
It might be worthwhile to add a section of examples of literature, TV shows, or movies that could be called "americana". Off of the top of my head, Huck Finn, To Kill a Mockingbird, That 70s Show, Field of Dreams, etc. The positive I see to a seciton like this is that "Americana" is such a broad term and so hard to define without examples. By having this section, which would allow people to add examples of their own, we would give a much more complete picture and definition. --Cms479 20:28, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Need to expand this article
This has to be expanded. Amusement parks, dark rides, American comedy, Roadside monuments, Swamp rock, comic books, Mickey Mouse, Disneyland, Rollerskating rinks, mom and pop businesses, etc are all things we could add to expand this section.
 * Expasionisme is Americana... maybe >:-) but besides Disney things you mention are not. Spesific examples are but the general idea of what Americana is is clear.--Puppy Zwolle (Puppy) 06:15, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I added some relevant examples and some images and formatting. I do still agree the historical aspects could be better highlighted. The nostalgia section could use a rework for better focus and overall description and timeline. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.213.27.23 (talk) 23:34, 4 March 2018 (UTC)

Gothic-Americana
Needs to be expanded beyond a comment about a Denver scene that began in the 1990's. Sound's like someone is just trying to promote their band. Perhaps they mean Alt-country music which is a nickname for a genre known as alternative country. Other terms Gypsy-Punk.

Alt-country music has roots in the country music style of artists like Johnny Cash and Hank Williams, but is also based in the rock and punk music movements. Alt-country music is also sometimes referred to as Americana music, or as No Depression, after an album title by early alt-country band Uncle Tupelo. Goes further back than the 1990's. Aimese 20:51, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Role of The Band
Not sure how much this group needs to be mentioned, but the subjective ranking of it above Elvis Presley and the overstated importance of "The Last Waltz" is certainly overkill that would be better talked about in The Band's own entry.

Moving musicians without their own articles here
I'm removing musicians without their own articles from the list in the article. If they are notable enough to warrant an article, create it, then put them back in the list. I'm putting the list I cut here, so as not to destroy the information. Aleta 02:33, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
 * The May Petals
 * Strawfoot
 * the Monads
 * William Elliot Whitmore

picture suggestion
Just a suggestion: there is a picture of apple pie/ baseball/ U.S. flag all together toward the bottom of the Apple Pie article -- it looks like it would be a great fit on this article.

Symbols
The Americana would appear to be everyone's favorite bit of Original Research. Needs a few sources, *badly*. Jack Merridew 10:35, 27 July 2009 (UTC)


 * I agree. Apart from a few of them, a lot of them are just opinions. I think the whole list should be removed, indefinitely. Wm.C (talk) 01:02, 28 July 2009 (UTC)


 * It's an interesting subject and I've been gathering material for a comprehensive overhaul of the article. The difficulty so far is that the term 'Americana' is not that widely used, apart from the music aspect, and I'm wondering if this is even the right place to talk about symbols. Is that opening paragraph even true? What exactly is 'Americana' - is the scope actually closer to historic memorabilia than the wide range of things mentioned here? Is the subject actually covered somewhere else? ProfDEH (talk) 07:21, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Drastic cuts needed?
Americana is on the list of articles in need of attention. There is a basic problem here and I need some help from project members (or anyone else come to that). The article refers to Americana as a music category and that is well established, with its own article. Apart from that, what does the term mean?
 * Mirriam Webster: materials concerning or characteristic of America, its civilization, or its culture ; broadly : things typical of America and 2: American culture.
 * Dictionary.com: (books, papers, maps, etc., relating to America, esp. to its history, culture, and geography, a collection of such materials, ''materials relating to American history, folklore, or geography or considered to be typical of American culture: Americana are featured in the exhibit. The culture of America: "[Hip-hop is] as much of a fixture in Americana as hot dogs, apple pie, and Chevrolet" (quoting music blogger Ken Capobianco).
 * AskOxford.com: things associated with the United States.
 * Wikipedia: Americana refers to the culture, history and heritage of the United States (etc).
 * 'Americana' is a trade name for various hotels, a font etc.

I've looked a lot further than that. Using the term in a wide sense of American culture as defined by the article in Wikipedia, is not backed up by anything else that I can find. It's just not verifiable. I propose drastic cuts which will reduce the article to a stub, don't see any option unless someone cares to defend the current approach? On the other hand, Icons of American culture could be an interesting new article where all those miscellaneous cultural references might properly belong? ProfDEH (talk) 07:20, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I tagged it as needing attention. Yes, I think drastic cuts are needed unless someone appears with the sources that have been lacking for so long. Given how long they've been lacking, I'd be very surprised if they suddenly appear now. Lady  of  Shalott  07:28, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Scope of the article narrowed to what can be verified
As above, there is apparently no justification for the wide-ranging but unreferenced scope of the article as it was. Now severely reduced to the actual usage of the term. All those iconic films, places, songs and perhaps people belong somewhere on Wikipedia, but they don't belong here. I may not necessarily have time to study the many collections of Americana and write about their contents, but I hope someone will. Please don't revert just because your contribution is no longer here, most likely it will turn up in Icons of American culture.ProfDEH (talk) 21:24, 1 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Thank you. Wm.C (talk) 03:06, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I approve; terima kasih. Cheers, Jack Merridew 14:25, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Here we go again
Look up Americana (music) and you get the following definition:

''Americana is an amalgam of roots musics formed by the confluence of the shared and varied traditions that make up the American musical ethos; specifically those sounds that are merged from folk, country, blues, rhythm and blues, rock and roll and other external influential styles such as bluegrass. Americana is popularly referred to, especially in print, as alternative country, alt-country or sometimes alt. country.''

So why have the recent edits introducedLounge music as an additional category here? Apparently just to include references to Lana Del Rey. Despite references this appears to be incorrect and misleading. Similarly, contentious references to David Lynch. The article could be expanded to include some sections with examples, but this is not the place for speculation and promoting personal favourites. The article used to be a mess of random unreferenced lists and was greatly improved by removing all that and just keeping a core definition. I suggest the recent additions should be deleted, pending a proper encyclopaedic expansion. ProfDEH (talk) 07:32, 17 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Lounge music was added because of the Del Rey references not the other way around. It seems that wherever the artists is talked about "Americana" also appears. There are dozens upon dozens of references there were excluded for the simple fact of overkill; it's not about promoting a favorite, it's about documenting a very real trend. It seems to me that you're interested in demoting your non-favorites, but that's neither here nor there. I've added less "contentious" sources for the Lynch mentions -- sources that directly involve him and not his comparisons to Del Rey. As far as including her goes, I think the article would be lacking without it, since it's very recent and widely reported. I don't see the problem here. There are several other artists listed here. I don't think the article gives undue weight to Del Rey. If anything, she's the most notable of any of the included artists. --Thevampireashlee (talk) 08:18, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

"Americana" not "Icons of American Culture"
Please leave the tag for now until some more editors decide to take an interest. I don't want to get into deleting well intentioned and referenced contributions, at least not immediately, but there are some basic issues with what's been added recently.

At one time this article was a complete mess of more or less random examples of things that people thought represented the topic. I can't even remember why I got involved, but I researched the subject thoroughly and discovered the term as it's actually used is about collectables, more or less. It's not about all those iconic things that you would think of as representing American culture. So my conclusion had to be that the article was choked up with completely misleading and irrelevant subjects. Contrary to what is sometimes assumed, the use of the term is much more limited. The proper accepted use of 'Americana' is for antiques and collectables old or new, and museum collections of folk art, historic memorabilia etc. It would be great to see more information that is relevant to that stuff.

I tried pulling together some of that iconic American stuff for a separate article but it never got off the ground - it's still in sandbox form at User:ProfDEH/Icons of American Culture and maybe someone with more time might start a proper article on the topic.

Then there's the Americana Music thing, which is quite separate, it's adequately covered by the main article and I don't think it needs more than a footnote here. ProfDEH (talk) 17:06, 20 October 2012 (UTC)
 * The music one is definitely a mess. It has a lot of coverage by one  artist who is not even listed as being Americana genre, and even if she was the the coverage would be massively wp:undue. North8000 (talk) 18:46, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

Music Section - Lana Del Rey
I removed the following from the "Music" section, which in context read almost explicitly as an advertisement. I further suggest that the whole section has very little content, and functions largely as an advertisement to some current bands that happen to fit the description.Thegeniusboy05 (talk) 04:04, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Reverted
I don't like to dampen the evident enthusiasm that clearly went into the recent edits but they have not helped this stub article one bit. The information added was all either misplaced or just plain wrong (listing BBC presenter Bob Harris as an Americana musician, to name just one mistake). The article is not about music, and that has its own article and there is no need for anything more than a mention here. I will trawl backwards to see if anything useful got missed in the history. It would be very useful if anyone has the time, to go into detail about the artworks and artefacts that genuinely are known as Americana. ProfDEH (talk) 13:14, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Image choice
Why is the image on this page la Liberté éclairant le monde? I know it's an iconic image and all, but doesn't it kind of imply that American culture is largely derivative of French? --Andrewaskew (talk) 03:37, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Here we go - yet again
The temptation to add random examples comes up again, completely ignoring the definition in the article. Are American presidents 'Americana'? At least if you include people they would come close to the top of the list. But orange chicken? buck knives (identical to knives available worldwide)? etc. I notice the term is being used more widely recently so perhaps there is scope to widen the definition, with appropriate references of course. If anyone cares enough to research the topic rather than sticking in the first thing they can think of. ProfDEH (talk) 18:42, 12 August 2014 (UTC)

Expanding the Concept of Americana
I'm trying to collect sources for an expansion of the explanation of the concept of Americana. Through the latter half of the 20th Century, the term "Americana" was largely associated with a nostalgia for small town life, mostly New England/Mid Atlantic/Midwestern, from about 1890 until 1914, with the drug store/soda fountain, ice cream parlor, and barber shop being some of the central town institutions that were idealized. Examples of nostalgia for this place and time can be found in Disneyland's Main Street, USA, the popularity of movies/musicals like Meet Me in St. Louis and The Music Man. The nostalgia came from the fact that many people who had reached middle age or later in the mid 20th century had been children during this time, and it was seen as an idyllic, innocent time when America was on the rise. The Civil War was becoming a distant memory, the Census Bureau had declared the Frontier officially closed in 1890, we had just won the Spanish-American War (which Teddy Roosevelt's friend John Hays called "a splendid little war,") and the horrors of two world wars, a Great Depression, and an atomic Cold War were still unforeseen. This topic was covered by Henry Seidel Canby in "The Age of Confidence", Steven Sears in "Hometown USA", and other sources. I don't have a copy of Canby, I believe it's out of print but I am trying to find one. I have a copy of Sears, and am looking for other sources. If anyone has Canby or any other sources that support this notion of nostalgia for small town America circa 1890-1910 as being the crux of Americana nostalgia, could you post some salient passages here? Thanks. Mmyers1976 (talk) 19:05, 16 June 2015 (UTC)