American Cultures

American Cultures was first offered in 1979 and last revised in 1995.
 
 

Requirements | Counselors | Worksheets, Aids & Resources | Earned By | Return to Merit Badge List

Requirements

Choose TWO groups that have different racial, cultural, national, or ethnic backgrounds. Use these groups to meet requirements 1, 2, and 3. Also complete requirement 4 and either requirement 5a or 5b.

  1. Do TWO of the following, choosing a different group for each:
    1. Go to a festival, celebration, or other event identified with one of the groups. Report on what you see and learn.
    2. Go to a church, clubhouse, school, or other institution identified with one of the groups. Report on what you see and learn.
    3. Talk with a person from one of the groups about the heritage and traditions of the group. Report on what you learn.
    4. Learn a song, dance, poem, or story that is traditional to one group, and teach it to a group of your friends.
    5. Go to a library or museum to see a program or exhibit featuring one group's traditions. Report on what you see and learn.
  2. Imagine that one of the groups had always lived alone in a city or country to which no other groups ever came. Tell what you think the city or country might be like today. Now tell what you think it might be like if both groups lived there at the same time.
  3. Tell about some differences between the religious and social customs of the two groups. Tell about some ideas or ways of doing things that are similar in both groups.
  4. Tell about a contribution made to our country by three different people, each from a different background such as black American, white American, Native American, Hispanic-American, Asian-American, or any other background of your choosing. Their backgrounds may be religious, as well, such as Jews, Muslims, Hindus, etc.
  5. Do ONE of the following:
    1. Give a talk to your troop or school class on how people from different groups have gotten along together. Lead a discussion on what can be done to help various groups understand one another better.
    2. Tell about some achievements of the United Nations accomplished by people of many cultures and beliefs working in one organization. Tell how the U.N. has dealt with some problems caused by conflicts between different groups.

Troop Merit Badge Counselors

The Following individuals are merit badge counselors for American Cultures. Their e-mail addresses and phone numbers are in the Troop Directory.

James Dell
Fred Gervat

Worksheets, Aids & Resources

The latest merit badge pamphlet revision was in 1995.

The following worksheets can be downloaded from MeritBadge.com, and are highly recommended as tools for organizing your work on this merit badge: Worksheet in Acrobat .pdf format or in Microsoft Word .doc format

For those who would like to look at some census data and analysis as a way to gain insight inro the racial, ethnicity and economic class of the Bronx and its neighborhoods, a good start is Prof. William Bosworth's page "Discovering the Bronx" on the Lehman College website.

Bronx Area Connect seems to be a decent portal site for getting information.

Scouts Earning American Cultures

1 Scout currently in Troop 240 have earned this merit badge: Colin F.

Requirements | Counselors | Worksheets, Aids & Resources | Earned By | Return to Merit Badge List

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Last Updated: December 1, 2004
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