The United States is situated almost entirely in the Western Hemisphere: the contiguous United States stretches from the Pacific Ocean on the west to the Atlantic Ocean on the east, with the Gulf of Mexico to the southeast; it is bordered by Canada on the north and Mexico on the south. Alaska is the largest state in area; separated from the contiguous United States by Canada, it touches the Pacific on the south and the Arctic Ocean on the north. Hawaii occupies an archipelago in the central Pacific, southwest of North America. After Russia and Canada, the United States is the world's third or fourth largest nation by total area, ranking just above or below China. The ranking varies depending on how two territories disputed by China and India are counted and how the total size of the United States is calculated: the CIA World Factbook gives 3,794,083 sq mi (9,826,630 km2),[1] the United Nations Statistics Division gives 3,717,813 sq mi (9,629,091 km2),[16] and the Encyclopedia Britannica gives 3,676,486 sq mi (9,522,055 km2).[17] Including only land area, the United States is third in size behind Russia and China, just ahead of Canada.[18] The United States also possesses several insular territories scattered around the West Indies (e.g., the commonwealth of Puerto Rico) and the Pacific (e.g., Guam).
The Teton Range, part of the Rocky Mountains
The coastal plain of the Atlantic seaboard gives way further inland to deciduous forests and the rolling hills of the Piedmont. The Appalachian Mountains divide the eastern seaboard from the Great Lakes and the grasslands of the Midwest. The Mississippi–Missouri River, the world's fourth longest river system, runs mainly north–south through the heart of the country. The flat, fertile prairie of the Great Plains stretches to the west, interrupted by a highland region in the southeast. The Rocky Mountains, at the western edge of the Great Plains, extend north to south across the country, reaching altitudes higher than 14,000 feet (4,300 m) in Colorado. Farther west are the rocky Great Basin and deserts such as the Mojave. The Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountain ranges run close to the Pacific coast. At 20,320 feet (6,194 m), Alaska's Mount McKinley is the country's tallest peak. Active volcanoes are common throughout Alaska's Alexander and Aleutian Islands, and Hawaii consists of volcanic islands. The supervolcano underlying Yellowstone National Park in the Rockies is the continent's largest volcanic feature.[19]
The bald eagle has been the national bird of the United States since 1782
The United States, with its large size and geographic variety, includes most climate types. To the east of the 100th meridian, the climate ranges from humid continental in the north to humid subtropical in the south. The southern tip of Florida is tropical, as is Hawaii. The Great Plains west of the 100th meridian are semi-arid. Much of the Western mountains are alpine. The climate is arid in the Great Basin, desert in the Southwest, Mediterranean in coastal California, and oceanic in coastal Oregon and Washington and southern Alaska. Most of Alaska is subarctic or polar. Extreme weather is not uncommon—the states bordering the Gulf of Mexico are prone to hurricanes, and most of the world's tornadoes occur within the country, mainly in the Midwest's Tornado Alley.[20]
The U.S. ecology is very diverse: about 17,000 species of vascular plants occur in the contiguous United States and Alaska, and over 1,800 species of flowering plants are found in Hawaii, few of which occur on the mainland.[21] The United States is home to more than 400 mammal, 750 bird, and 500 reptile and amphibian species.[22] About 91,000 insect species have been described.[23] The Endangered Species Act of 1973 protects threatened and endangered species and their habitats, which are monitored by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. There are fifty-eight national parks and hundreds of other federally managed parks, forests, and wilderness areas.[24] Altogether, the government regulates 28.8% of the country's land area.[25] Most of this is protected, though some is leased for oil and gas drilling,[26] mining, or cattle ranching.
The United States is a multicultural nation, home to a wide variety of ethnic groups, traditions, and values.[7][175] There is no "American" ethnicity; aside from the now small Native American and Native Hawaiian populations, nearly all Americans or their ancestors immigrated within the past five centuries.[176] The culture held in common by most Americans is referred to as mainstream American culture, a Western culture largely derived from the traditions of Western European migrants, beginning with the early English and Dutch settlers. German, Irish, and Scottish cultures have also been very influential.[7] Certain cultural attributes of Mandé and Wolof slaves from West Africa were adopted by the American mainstream; based more on the traditions of Central African Bantu slaves, a distinct African American culture developed that would also deeply affect the mainstream.[177] Westward expansion integrated the Creoles and Cajuns of Louisiana and the Hispanos of the Southwest and brought close contact with the culture of Mexico. Large-scale immigration in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries from Southern and Eastern Europe introduced many new cultural elements. More recent immigration from Asia and especially Latin America has had broad impact. The resulting cultural mix may be described as a homogeneous melting pot, or as a pluralistic salad bowl in which immigrants and their descendants retain distinctive cultural characteristics.[7]
While the mainstream culture holds that the United States is a classless society,[178] scholars identify significant differences between the country's social classes, affecting socialization, language, and values.[179] The American middle and professional class has initiated many contemporary social trends such as modern feminism, environmentalism, and multiculturalism.[180] Americans' self-images, social viewpoints, and cultural expectations are associated with their occupations to an unusually close degree.[181] While Americans tend greatly to value socioeconomic achievement, being ordinary or average is generally seen as a positive attribute.[182] Though the American Dream, or the perception that Americans enjoy high social mobility, plays a key role in attracting immigrants, some analysts find that the United States has less social mobility than Western Europe and Canada.[183]
Women now mostly work outside the home and receive a majority of bachelor's degrees.[184] In 2005, 28% of households were married childless couples, the most common arrangement.[185] Same-sex marriage is contentious—several states permit civil unions in lieu of marriage. Between 2003 and 2008, the supreme courts of Massachusetts, California, and Connecticut ruled those states' bans on same-sex marriage unconstitutional. The California ruling was superseded by a state constitutional amendment, approved by voters in November 2008, that defines marriage as between a man and woman; the legality of the amendment is currently being contested in court. Between 2004 and 2008, voters in 13 other states approved similar constitutional bans on same-sex marriage.