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American Identity In Ernest Cline's 'Ready Player One'

973 Words4 Pages

American Identity Research Paper Being an American does not only refer to one’s nationality or ethnicity, it is more about the American spirits and dreams. Gary Johnson has once said, “We live in America. We live in a free society where we are able to make choices. It's about giving individuals freedoms and holding them accountable”, and this is completely true as in what being an American means. Although America is often seen as “a melting pot” in which people from all over the world can all fit in and unite together, Americans actually seek uniqueness and self-freedom because they value individualism, and equal opportunities are available for everyone. Many people would see America as one and unite, because despite the fact that America are …show more content…

Wade Watts grown up in a extremely harsh environment, being poor and an orphan at a young age, but the virtual utopia, OASIS, helped him achieve his dreams freedom because “anonymity was one of the major perks” in OASIS (Cline 28). Cline portrayed Watts as a low-class person to further emphasize the power of equality and freedom of OASIS, in which “[one] can give [his] OASIS avatar any name [he] liked”(Cline 28). Names determines one’s identity, and in the virtual world of OASIS, having a different name so that other people would not know what the real name is, indicates that many concerns in the real world, either appearance or social status, will be neglected, allowing a person to be unique and free from judgement of others. This aspect of the virtual world is very similar to America in a way that everyone have the opportunities to be whoever they want without being concerned about others’ comments which could sway one’s …show more content…

Back in China, communities should be considered before oneself always; usually, this is just a sense of respect for the others, but, the communities around you can affect everything you think and do. Whenever I got a bad grade in any subjects, not only my parents, but everyone around me will know and instinctively started to judge or comment. That is why, back in China, I would think of individualism more along the line of isolation, however, coming to America changed my aspect on individualism. In America, no one would really care about my actions enough to talk about it behind me, and this gave me a lot of personal space to actually do what I like to do and be who I want to be. One simple example is that no matter if one drives a BMW or walks half an hour everyday to school, people around would not think of him or her differently. This is why I feel relieved and free instead of left out during these three years in America, and this is what I believe as in being an American mean — being unique is typical and

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