Blog Post Written by Maria Malaver Class of 2027

Miramar, FL- Collective Thoughts is a blog published once a semester by our UIC students, and features fiction, creative writing, and creative nonfiction pieces of work submitted by our undergraduate students.

Today we embark on a compelling exploration of American values through the unique lens of immigration, as presented by Maria Malaver in her insightful essay.

American Value through an Immigrant’s Perspective by Maria Malaver

We can define value as a person’s morals or ethical standards; their assessment of what matters in life. Those values define the behaviors of human beings in society, their relationships with others, their beliefs, and their achievements. For American people,  as I have observed for the past five years, there are some values that they follow like; individualism, the importance of time, direct communication, and freedom.

We can interpret individualism as a value that emphasizes the rights, freedoms, and autonomy of the individual. Americans often prioritize personal choices, self-reliance, and the pursuit of individual happiness and success. This value encourages independence, entrepreneurship, and personal responsibility. This is something that you can see in any atmosphere around, for example, I’ve noticed that now of paying a bill at a restaurant, they prefer to do it separately. For example, they don’t want someone else to pay for something that they consume even though it’s a celebration or something important.

Another value is the importance of time, if you invite any American to your house or a meeting in a restaurant, they will be on time at exactly the hour that you said. For me as a Latin woman, that was new and more respectful than what we do in Latin America. Because if someone tells you to arrive home at 7, that means to arrive at 8, I know that does not make any sense!! But that is not how we grew up and now I have tried to change that to the American way. You can’t play with people’s time and should consider all Latinos around the US.

Generally, Americans value clear and factual communication. Of course, this can vary depending on the individual, but overall, you will find that Americans will choose to be direct, even if it means hurting or embarrassing another person. For me, it seems rude at the beginning, but through the years I found that important because sometimes people don’t take you seriously or they expect that you say what they want to hear and not what they really need.

Last but not least we have freedom value, a fundamental American ideal, freedom comes from the idea of liberty. The freedoms of expression, assembly, speech, and religion are greatly valued in America. This principle supports the notion that people must be free to live their lives following their own morals and convictions, so long as they do not violate the rights of others. I would say that one is my favorite one, the peace that you can breathe here talking about freedom than in my country Colombia is huge. Not only in the religion, but it is also more about what you really want to do with your life and there’s no one around judging you for that.

To conclude these statements, it seems that those values came years ago when the Founding Fathers of the United States provided valuable insights into the values and ethics that shaped the nation and continue to be influential today. They work so hard to make this country free and have those important values that make this a good society.