Is America The Greatest Country in the World?
Detroit Today with Stephen Henderson explores patriotism and the notion of American exceptionalism.
Is America the greatest country in the world?
What does it mean to be patriotic?
Every four years we take a look — as a nation — at what makes America special, and we decide who will lead that vision for the next four years.
In your estimation, is America the greatest country in the world? Is there such a thing as American exceptionalism? What does it mean to be patriotic.
Jim Grossman, executive director of the American Historical Association writes:
I will continue to disagree with thoughtful colleagues who consider celebration and exceptionalism the cornerstones of a patriotic history education. But that disagreement is not over whether history education ought to be patriotic; it is about what constitutes patriotism in a nation founded on dissent and notable (even if not quite exceptional) for its deep and vibrant traditions of activism and debate from every corner of the country and the political spectrum.
America was founded on an exceptional idea of democracy, says Shikha Dalmia of Reason.org.
“There isn’t any other country in the world that has attempted a project like that,” she says. And yet America has never truly lived up to the ideal it set forth, she says.
“Right from its inception it was based on a system of violence, of slavery.”
On Detroit Today host Stephen Henderson discusses American greatness and patriotism.
To hear more of the conversation, click on the audio player above.
