"Culture encompasses religion, food, what we wear, how we wear it, our language, marriage, music, what we believe is right or wrong, how we sit at the table, how we greet visitors, how we behave with loved ones, and a million other things," said Cristina De Rossi, an anthropologist at Barnet and Southgate College in London.
The United States is the third largest country in the world, with one of the most diverse topographies and climates of any region.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, it has a population of 337 million, a child is born every 8 seconds, and a person dies every 10 seconds.
In addition to Indigenous Americans, who were already living on the continent, the country was built on immigration from other countries. Now, a new immigrant moves here every 27 seconds.
Because of this, the United States is one of the most culturally diverse countries in the world. You could argue that nearly every region of the world has, in some way, influenced American culture, but most notably it was the English who colonized the lands in the early 1600s.
The United States is sometimes described as a "melting pot", in which different cultures have formed their own distinct "flavors" of American culture.
But the way people "melt" in the United States differs. "Different groups of immigrants integrate in different ways," De Rossi said. "For example, ... Catholic Spanish-speaking communities might keep their language and other cultural family traditions, but are integrated [into] the urban community and have embraced the American way of life in many other ways."
Nearly every known religion is practiced in the United States, which was founded based on religious freedom, but at least 70% of Americans identify themselves as Christians, according to information gathered by the Pew Research Center. They also found that about 23% had no religious affiliation at all and around 6% of the population is made up of non-Christian religions.
Many holidays are celebrated just in the United States. For example, Americans commemorate their independence from Britain on July 4; Memorial Day, held on the last Monday in May, honors those who have died in military service; Labor Day, which comes on the first Monday in September, celebrates the country's workforce; Thanksgiving, another distinctive American holiday, falls on the fourth Thursday in November and dates back to colonial times to celebrate the harvest.
