Gary McDonogh. Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Culture

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Backlash campaign since the 1980s seeking to establish the “official” status of English as

a state and federal

language

to the exclusion of multilingual materials or required

bilingual competence in official settings (sometimes extended into busi-ness as well). By

1999 twenty-five states had passed some form of official English law. Active proponents

have been organized by US English, founded by

California

Senator S.Hayakawa in

1983; opponents include organized ethnic groups, the

American Civil Liberties Union

and the National Education Association. This has become a contested issue in

multicultural metropolises like

Miami, FL,

although some

immigrants

support its ideal

of rapid assimilation.

GARY McDONOGH

environmentalism

In 1992 the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro joined together ideals of environmental

movements with realities of politics in discussing five major headings of global concern:

climate change,

biological diversity,

deforestation, Agenda 21 and Earth Charter. The

summit underscored the diverse environmental interests of developed and developing

countries. Though US organizations are often the most visible in world conferences,

hundreds of governmental and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) concerned with

the environment have been established in other countries. However, many criticized the

summit as little more than a global, political attempt to risk-control and manage

environmental challenges through science and technology without consideration o

cultural and ecological consequences.

Critics of early environmentalism noted that issues generally concerned

middle-aged

people from upper-income levels who were mainly interested in the preservation and

management of wilderness for future generations. Both the focus of environmentalism

and the age group concerned shifted in the 1970s as young people, influenced by antiwar

movements and the counterculture of the time, began to recognize that environmental

degradation threatened the future of life on Earth. Nonetheless, there were still strong

stratifications of the movement with voices of the poor and of minorities notably missing.

The current wave of environmental activities in the US can be traced to the 1960s and

early 1970s when people like Murray

Bookchin

(

Our Synthetic Environment,

1962) and

Rachel

Carson

(

Silent Spring,

1962) began to question the rapid advancement o

technological innovation without social and environmental constraint. In 1970 Americans

celebrated the first

Earth Day,

focusing attention on human interactions with the Earth

and laying groundwork for groups such as the Environmental Defense Fund and the

atural Resources Defense Council. Additionally roots of the National Environmental

Policy Act (1970) (creating the Environmental Protection Agency), Clean Air Act (1970),

Clean Water Act (1972), Ocean Dumping Act (1972),

Endangered Species Act

(1973)

Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Culture 386

and Safe Drinking Waters Act (1974) grew from this early interest. In 1978

Love Canal

(Niagara Falls, New York) refocused national attention on the detrimental effects o

hazardous waste on humans and their environment. Divergences also grew within

environmentalists: The term

“deep ecology”

was coined by Naess in 1973 to champion

self-realization and biocentric equality in contrast to the utilitarian treatment of nature by

Western society This has underpinned radical action in environmental protests as well.

griculture

in the US and worldwide became a focus for modern environmentalism

with soil erosion, aquifer depletions, desertification, saline incursion into irrigated soils,

climate change from land clearing, deforestation, resistance of pests to pesticides and loss

genetic

diversity in food crops as problems with global implications. Despite the

Green Revolution, importing high-yield agricultural techniques to developing countries to

increase food production, concerns grew about population growth and what constitutes

“sustainable development.” The notion that too many humans exist to allow coexistence

with the rest of nature continued as deep ecologists suggested population reduction and a

return to simpler ways of life. Early solutions for population control included zero

opulation growth, the notion that reproduction should be for replacement or reduction in

numbers only.

The 1980s brought more attention to the environment as implications of

acid rain

and

heat pollution were recognized worldwide. Urban heat islands, created from high

concentrations of concrete, human beings and combustion products from transportation,

were identified as major contributors to build-ups of pollutants, especially particulates,

around American

cities

and

suburbs

. Issues of urban pollution mobilized the

Environmental Justice

Movement to emerge from the shadows of mainstream

environmentalism. It focused on racism and exposure to environmental hazards, noting

the general lack of attention by mainstream, predominantly white, environmental

organizations to problems concerning people of color. Out of this split grew the People o

Color Environmental Leadership Summit in 1991 and many

neighborhood

projects,

from

Los Angeles, CA

to the

Northeast

The 1980s and 1990s saw a strong

backlash

against environmentalism with

environmental burdens placed on businesses and governments over-whelming available

resources. The so-called “unholy trinity” of risk assessment, unfunded mandates and

roperty rights emerged through the 1990s to threaten progress in environmental

legislation. When the Exxon Valdez ran aground and dumped its oily cargo into one o

the most pristine marine areas of the United States, there was a flurry of environmental

activity from cleaning wildlife and shorelines to changing regulations for shipping such

substances (see

oil spills)

. However, as pictures of oil-soaked birds and marine mammals

yielded to reports of cleanup fraud and environmental infighting, the even

’s impact

evaporated. During the early 1990s, many environmental organizations showed dramatic

decreases in membership and financial support, perhaps as legislation intruded further

into the lifestyles of the

middle class

. However, during this same time period there was

an increased interest in ideas of

ecofeminism

(a term coined by Francoise D’Eaubonne in

1974) as a part of the environmentalist movement, connecting the domination of women

Entries A-Z 387

and the domination of

nature

as scientific and political issues.

Free-market environmentalism emerged as a part of the backlash from earlier intensive

centralized regulation of environmental concerns. These environmentalists suggest that

decentralized tools such as market-value user fees, environmentally responsible

incentives (such as rewards for

recycling

and waste reduction) and free markets will

solve more environmental challenges than increased regulation and governmental control.

However, many critics of such ideas point to the lack of development of environmental

economics

to incorporate valuation of things such as scenic beauty in contrast with

shoreline development. Further, questions of how to privatize management of assets such

as coral reefs and migratory herds on a broad scale have received little attention. Testing

of free-market environmental ideas in real situations has been conducted on a limited

asis with some success, although strong concerns about the broader applications of such

an approach to environmental problems remain.

Further reading

Fowler, C. and Mooney, P. (1990)

Shattering. Food, Politics, and the Loss of Genetic

Diversity,

Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Sachs, W. (1993)

Global Ecology. A New Arena for Political Conflict,

London: Zed

Books.

Wheale, P. and McNally R. (1990)

The BioRevolution: Cornucopia or Pandora’s Box?,

London: Pluto.

SANDRA GILCHRIST

Environmental Protection Agency

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is the primary federal agency responsible

for enforcing environmental laws, including those governing air and water quality and the

disposal of hazardous wastes. Created by an executive order issued by President Richard

Nixon

in 1970, it consolidated disparate environmental programs previously

distributed among several agencies. The EPA both issues the regulations to carry out the

nation’s environmental laws and, in conjunction with the states, enforces those

regulations. The EPA has been a lightning rod for criticism from conservatives, who have

charged that the agency’s regulations are not based on science, are too expensive and

stifle business. In 1995 one conservative member of

Congress

went so far as to compare

the EPA with the Gestapo. Despite such attacks, the agency’s programs have remained

intact. For example, attempts by President Ronald

eagan’s

EPA administrator to weaken the agency resulted in her resignation.

Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Culture 388

ee also:

deep ecology/Earth First!; environmentalism

DAVID GOLDSTON

environmental racism/justice

“Environmental racism” refers, generally to environmental problems or decisions that

have a disproportionate adverse effect on racial minorities. A classic example o

“environmental racism” would be deciding to locate a hazardous waste dump in a

minority

neighborhood

solely or largely on the basis of

race

The notion of “environmental racism”—and the environmental justice movement that

sprang up to combat it—came of age in the 1980s. While isolated battles over

environmental racism were fought earlier, the issue became a matter of broader concern

to environmentalists, government officials and the general public in 1982 when rural

African Americans

in Warren County NC bitterly protested the state’s decision to locate

a dump for soil contaminated with toxic chemicals in their area.

The protest led to a congressionally mandated study by the US General Accounting

Office in 1983 that found that hazardous waste sites in the

South

tend to be located near

African American neighborhoods. Other landmarks in the environmental justice

movement include a study by the United Church of Christ in 1987 that expanded on the

GAO study; the First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit, which

was held in

Washington, DC

in 1991; a report by the

National Law Journal

in 1992 that

found that under the

Superfund

program, the

Environmental Protection Agency

was

likely to clean up toxic-waste sites in minority neighborhoods more slowly and to seek

smaller penalties against polluters there; and Executive Order 12898, issued by President

Clinton

in 1994, which, for the first time, charged federal agencies with making

environmental justice concerns a priority

Until the advent of the environmental justice movement, the environmental movement

tended to be seen as

white

and

middle class,

and increasingly dominated by large,

national environmental organizations. The environmental justice movement, with its

grassroots, poor minority appeal may change that.

The movement continues to bring up additional, more complex issues, such as the

unexplained fact that poor blacks and

Latinos

have high rates of asthma and that those

rates are rising.

As a movement that combines two politically charged issues—environmental

protection and

civil rights

—the environmental justice movement has been enormously

controversial. Its detractors charge, among other things, that it will make it more difficult

to locate job-

roducing facilities in minority neighborhoods where the jobs are most

needed. In addition, legal battles have arisen over how and whether Title VI of the

Civil

Rights Act

of 1964 can be used to bring environmental justice claims.

Entries A-Z 389

ee also:

deep ecology/Earth First!; environmentalism

Further reading

Bullard, R. (ed.) (1994)

Unequal Protection: Environ-mental Justice and Communities of

Color,

San Francisco: Sierra Club Books.

DAVID GOLDSTON

Episcopalians

Although not governed by the Anglican Church in Great Britain, the Protestant

Episcopalian Church of the United States of America has remained in the Anglican

communion, which has allowed the church to enjoy a richly

multicultural

outlook. More

than half of all Anglicans are non-white, and the world church has worked to ordain local

clergy of whom

Nobel Peace Prize

winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu is a notable

example.

In spite of their origins in the Church of England, Episcopalians had a rocky start on

American shores. Most colonial settlements were started by the Puritans

(Congregationalists),

Baptists

and

Quakers,

with Episcopalians settling primarily in

Virginia and the coastal areas of South Carolina and Georgia. The Church of England

largely ignored the spiritual needs of its colonial members, refusing to permit an

American bishop and the establishment of a colonial church organization. Over half o

those who signed the Declaration of Independence were Episcopalians, but the church

suffered during and after the Revolutionary War because many of the clergy were British

loyalists.

During the nineteenth century, Episcopalians remained largely on the East Coast,

unlike

Methodists

and Baptists who followed waves of settlers into the interior of the

country. The Episcopal Church ordained women as deaconesses, starting in 1855, but did

not officially sanction the ordination of women as priests and bishops until 1976. Both

ordained men and women may be married. The Episcopal Church made few attempts to

include minorities in integrated congregations or in the church’s hierarchy but in the

1950s

African American

men were enrolled in Episcopal seminaries. A black woman,

Barbara Harris, was consecrated as the first female bishop in 1989. Although

Episcopalians of all races now worship together, conservative members have resisted

female clergy and some Episcopalians have converted to the more traditionally

patriarchal Eastern Orthodox and

Roman Catholic

faiths. Conversely roughly half of all

US Episcopalians were not raised in that faith. Controversy over the ordination o

homosexual

clergy and the marriage of

gay

parishioners has also caused internal turmoil

Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Culture 390

for the church. While some congregations forbid openly gay clergy others accept celibate

gay clergy, while a few congregations welcome gay clergy who live in committed

partnerships.

Three pillars sustain Episcopalianism: tradition, faith and reason. Sunday and weekday

services link Episcopalianism to the beginnings of Christianity, despite the church’s

sixteenth-century break from Roman Catholicism and papal authority Religious services,

rites and doctrines are published in

The Book of Common Prayer,

which was updated in

1979. Episcopalians may develop new services, such as rites for healing, and incorporate

rites from other Anglican communion prayer books. Some disagreements are solved by

having two or more forms of services and prayers, from which individual parishes may

choose. The Bible is not considered the literal word of God, and Episcopalians are

encouraged to use reason in their interpretation of the Bible.

Despite its small numbers (only 2.5 million Americans consider themselves

Episcopalian), the church has often taken on the responsibilities of a national church, as

evidenced by the seventy-five-year effort to construct the National Cathedral in

Washington, DC

. Open to persons of all faiths, the cathedral was where Martin Luther

King

. Jr, preached his last Sunday sermon.

Further reading

Bernardin, J. (1994)

An Introduction to the Episcopal Church,

Harrisburg: Morehouse

Publishing.

Prichard, R. (1991)

A History of the Episcopal Church,

Harrisburg: Morehouse

Publishing.

MELINDA SCHWENK

equality

class

Equal Rights Amendment (ERA)

Proposed amendment to the United States Constitution that was designed to do away with

all sexually discriminatory laws and practices. Approved by

Congress

in 1972, it was

never ratified by the requisite number of states and went down to defeat on June 30, 1982

y a narrow margin. The text of the amendment passed by Congress in 1972 declared

simply: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United

Entries A-Z 391

States or by any state on account of sex.”

The amendment was first introduced in Congress in 1923 by a militant women’s

suffrage group, and reintroduced without success each year thereafter through the 1960s.

As far back as the first women’s rights convention at Seneca Falls, New York in 1848,

feminists

had recognized that much of the discrimination women faced was supported

and nurtured by the legal system itself. In the 1970s, led by the then-fledgling women’s

advocacy group

NOW,

feminists revived the push for an equal rights amendment that

would, in one fell swoop, eradicate these long-held discriminatory laws and practices.

Labor

unions,

however, continued to oppose the measure on the grounds that it would

nullify state laws designed to protect the health and safety of women workers. Only after

federal courts had voided many of these protective labor laws under Title VII did

organized labor drop its opposition to the ERA and provide critical support to NOW’s

efforts to urge its passage.

After an unprecedented nationwide feminist campaign, the ERA was finally approved

y a landslide in both the House and Senate in 1972. Before it could be formally adopted

as a constitutional amendment, however, the ERA had to clear one more hurdle: it had to

be ratified by a minimum of thirty-eight of the fifty

states

. It was ratified by only thirty-

five, despite the efforts of a powerful pro-ERA coalition. ERA opponents, consisting

rimarily of conservative religious and political organizations, had managed to convince

ust enough people that the measure would unduly jeopardize traditional lifestyles.

In the end, the ERA’s defeat became largely symbolic. With the rise of feminism,

many of the discriminatory laws the ERA was originally designed to eradicate had

already been struck down, one by one, during the decade-long struggle for the

amendment’s ratification.

Further reading

Ross, S., Pinzler, I., Ellis, D. and Moss, K. (1993)

The Rights of Women,

3rd edn,

Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press.

Schneir, M. (ed.) (1994)

Feminism in Our Time: The Essential Writings, The Second

World War to the Present,

New York: Vintage.

MARY-CHRISTINE SUNGAILA, ESQ.

Erdrich, Louise

b. 1954

Born of a Chippewa Indian mother and

German American

father, Erdrich grew up in

North Dakota and earned a degree in

anthropology

from Dartmouth in 1976. Her first

Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Culture 392

book,

Love Medicine

(1984), won the National Book Critics Circle Award. Subsequent

novels have further developed the characters from her first book, drawing on both sides

of her heritage to explore the interaction of

Native Americans

and their European

American neighbors. Her use of multiple narrators and recurring characters has been

likened to Faulkner. Most of her work has been a collaboration with her late husband,

Michael Dorris, who committed suicide in 1995.

JIM WATKINS

espionage

Espionage is the practice of spying to secretly observe something or someone. This

ancient, universal activity is summed up in the cliché “the second oldest profession.”

Contemporary American culture incorrectly associates espionage with the

Cold War

and

the

CIA’s

creation in 1947; yet America has a rich history of espionage between Nathan

Hale and the appointment of Rear Admiral Sidney Souers, the first director of the CIA.

Espionage studies may concern organizational development, composition, culture and

ethics, domestic and foreign powers and functions, missions, methods, performance,

management, reform and reorganization. American espionage is also influenced by its

enemies

and its allies. For example, America began covert operations in Europe in

response to

Soviet

subversion. America’s pre-eminent ally Britain, played a decisive role

in educating a generation of American intelligence officers during the Second World

War; consequently the Anglo-American intelligence alliance remains unique. The US

also has espionage relationships with other states such as Israel, with alliance partners in

NATO,

coalition partners and the UN. Intelligence sharing is a key issue in America’s

post-Cold War security agenda. Spies may steal political, diplomatic, military, economic,

scientific and technological secrets. Non-governmental organizations, such as

corporations and multi-nationals, also conduct economic, commercial, scientific and

technological espionage. Espionage and counter-espionage are also subject to US and

international laws.

In fiction the spy like the hunter, the scout and the detective, becomes an American

icon, revealing American hopes and fears, and political, moral and cultural attitudes

towards espionage. Espionage conspiracy theories reveal alienation, anxiety and a

rejection of rationalism, symbolized by the popularity of

The X Files

. Spy fiction’s

glamour and thrills distort the spy world, whether the spy is a hero or villain. Reality is

more ordinary. The spy’s survival kit contains clandestine techniques, courage, political

savvy good luck and a sense of humor.

Espionage excites political and ethical debates because espionage requires secrecy and

democracy requires openness. American democracy has been acutely sensitive to these

issues since the mid-1970s. Consequently the US pioneered democratic oversight o

Entries A-Z 393

espionage and leads the field in historical declassification. Intelligence practitioners

debate the relative merits of espionage and technical intelligence collection, and

espionage and open-source information. Sherman Kent, America’s leading theorist o

strategic intelligence, doubted clandestine techniques and argued for open sources and

social-science methods. During the Cold War, American espionage supported

containment, a political, military, economic and psychological strategy designed to

contain Soviet power and protect Western values, not least the right to self-determination

and diversity. In the post-Cold War period, globalization, openness and the

communications revolution revived the debate between open and secret sources, and

human and technical means. All-source, real-time intelligence was the first line o

defense in the new world disorder. Paradoxically as American technology surged ahead,

America faced difficult security challenges in

Somalia

and

Bosnia,

which flagged up the

need for human intelligence. Espionage will remain part of American statecraft, continue

to exercise America’s conscience and engage America’s allies and enemies.

Further reading

Bryan, G.S. (1943)

The Spy in America,

Philadelphia: Lippincott.

Felix, C. (1963)

A Short Course in the Secret War,

New York: E.P. Dutton.

Peterson, N.H. (1992)

American Intelligence, 1775–1990, A Bibliographic Guide,

Claremont: Regina Books.

SHEILA KERR

ESPN

sports media

Estefan, Gloria

b. 1957

Cuban American

singer whose appeal and musical style cut across lingual boundaries

and musical genre definitions. In 1975 she joined the group Miami Sound Machine,

headed by her now husband, Emilio. As her popularity grew, the Sound Machine name

was dropped. Today, the Estefan collaboration has resulted in over twenty albums and

numerous pop hits. In 1990 she was severely injured in a bus crash in Pennsylvania and

was temporarily paralyzed, but has since made a full recovery. Among her most popular

songs are “Bad Boys” (1985), “Coming Out of the Dark” (1991) and “I See Your

Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Culture 394

Smile” (1992).

A.JOSEPH BORRELL

ethnic enclaves

Immigrants to American cities were often confined to

ghettos

outside fashionable

residential and commercial

neighborhoods,

through which they established cohesive

albeit defensive communities. Since the nineteenth century, names of variable dignity

from “Chinatown” or “Little Italy” to “Niggertown” have embodied the dual faces o

American

assimilation

—

eing in America but not quite belonging. In other areas, more

neutral names demarcate complex and dynamic areas—

Italian, Jewish

and

Latino

immigrants to

New York

City, NY’s Lower East Side or the multiple populations o

Harlem

. Moreover, while these enclaves could be seen as havens and creative elements

in the melting-

ot, history cannot ignore the poor housing, exploitative labor, neglected

services and outside rejection, including physical attacks, that kept immigrants in ghettos.

Suburban opportunities after the Second World War offered escapes for assimilated

generations of white enclave residents, while the

civil-rights

movement and urban

renewal in the 1960s sought to eradicate the worst abuses of

segregation

and the poverty

associated with it. Yet, racism continued to block opportunities for some, while after

1965, new immigrants poured into cheap, available housing. The elderly left behind by

families and progress, have also posed special problems of security and services.

Some urban enclaves have found new life in the 1990s metropolises as service centers

for dispersed populations and foci for ethnic-chic restaurants and shopping. New names,

food

and faces also reflect the presence of new immigrant populations making it in

America—

Miami’s

Little Havana/ Calle Ocho, multi-ethnic Central American and

African restaurants and residents of

Washington’s

Adams-Morgan, or “Little Saigon” in

nearby northern Virginia.

Class

is a critical element in ethnic and racial development and

attitudes “Chinatowns” have become

tourist

sites in ways that inner-city black or

Hispanic

neighborhoods have not.

Sunbelt

cities, new enclaves have emerged along suburban

highways

rather than in

older center cities, claiming an alternative locus of cheaper space for stores and

residences. Near

Los Angeles, CA,

meanwhile, suburban cities like Monterey Park and

Alhambra have become the first Chinese-majority cities in the nation. Even Chinatown in

Manhattan, New York faces competition from new immigrants in outer boroughs like

Queens and Brooklyn.

Ethnic enclaves have offered transitional spaces for newly arrived families, and

maintain traditions, associations and monuments of the past for future generations. Legal

and medical services, media (

newspapers

and videos), foodstuffs and restaurants, and

religious centers all provide continuing linkages in

community

(within definitions o

Entries A-Z 395