4th AISNA Graduates Conference: “What is an American?” (1782-2024) Narratives and Counternarratives of an Imagined Nation
In a period of tumultuous changes like the ones brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic, the rise of far-right governments, racism, and international tensions caused by the war in Ukraine and Gaza, a great reckoning is happening in the Western cultural context, especially with regard to the Atlantic and Transatlantic world. No nation has undergone more rapid and sometimes contradictory transformations than the US, showing tensions between its foundational narratives and counternarratives rising from its too often neglected socio-cultural realities. Culturally embedded American ideals have always emphasized a single unifying narrative capable of synthesizing the plurality of voices on US soil.