The Car

The automobile is clearly the most obsequious symbol of the Industrial Revolution in America. It touches on many of the key themes of the American ethos. The car represents freedom to go where you want, when you want, at the speed that you want. For young people, it symbolizes a coming of age and the initial entry into adulthood.


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Cars are valued often for their performance, which is tied to power -- another key theme of the American ethos. Perhaps most importantly, the car is the strongest purveyor of individualism and consumerism. There is a car to suit every lifestyle and every unique personality...and if it hasn't been made, it can certainly be customized. It is in this ultimate freedom of choice that the car becomes a neccessity in American culture.



Becoming a car owner is a lifestyle in and of itself that requires the buyer to make a commitment -- to buying the fuel to keep it going, to maintaining it, and sometimes modifying it either to improve performance, fuel mileage, ergonomics, or aesthetics. But more that this, the car is the gateway greater consumer access. It gets you to the mall so you can buy more things that you need. It allows you to visit far away places on your timetable. It simplifies your day by getting you to work on your schedule. It opens doors of romance by making its owner seem more desirable or somehow more worldly than a rival. It creates social cliques of people who share a common lifestyle choice -- for example... the automotive enthusiast.



The car is the most tangible individual convenience of the industrial revolution. It is the artery through which the symbiosis between the individual need for more consumer goods and industry's need for more consumption in order to grow meets.