Who We Are Now
The Changing Face of America in the 21st Century
-
- $11.99
-
- $11.99
Publisher Description
A revealing view of America and its citizens at the dawn of a new century, by the author of the New York Times Notable Book Who We Are
For more than two centuries, America has taken stock every decade, producing a statistical self-portrait of our population. In Who We Are Now, Sam Roberts identifies and illuminates the trends and social shifts changing the face of America today.
America is in the midst of a fundamental transformation. The nation's complexion changed significantly over the twentieth century, creating more varied and intermingled identities, and with the baby boomers nearing retirement and their children entering college, the graying of America has been balanced, precariously, by the youth culture. And in the wake of welfare reform in the 1990s, the fate of the working poor has become all the more tenuous. Roberts masterfully weaves stories of individuals from all corners of the country alongside the data from the latest U.S. census, creating a compelling guided tour of the places, personalities, and politics that will shape America as the new century stretches before us.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Expanding and updating Who We Are: a Portrait of America Based on the Latest U.S. Census (1994), New York Times editor Roberts interprets demographics from Census 2000. Since the results of the last census have already been widely interpreted and disseminated, there are no surprises. But Roberts does do a competent cull, thoughtfully pulling sociological trends out of raw data, although the amount of data he does present, aided by 34 b&w illustrations, is close to overwhelming. Some facts: more and more respondents have identified themselves as coming from a mixed heritage; immigration, Roberts finds, is in part responsible for a population surge and for the fact that Hispanics now outnumber blacks; and although economic conditions have improved, many black and Hispanic children are still living in poverty. Roberts comments on the social implications of a growing elderly population and the dramatic transformation of the so-called nuclear family of the past. Less than one in four households are now made up of married couples with children, as younger people are delaying or forgoing marriage. Roberts includes an inquiry into how the U.S. fits into the demographics of the global community and is careful to refrain from making either overly positive or negative predictions for the future.
