Read a Q&A with Liz Joyner discussing what she thinks it means to be an American. Story on
What does it mean to you to be an American? The Adlai Stevenson quote, “the steady devotion of a lifetime.” It’s really quite incredible how many people do that. Alexis de Tocqueville said when he came to America that Americans are forever in the habit of forming associations. We’ve gotten used to doing things with people who are more like us rather than unlike us, and we need to get back to the habit of seeking out other people. What moment touched and motivatedyou to launch this effort? I really feel like I grew up in a place that I know what it looks like — I know what a healthy, civic life looks like. I know what disagreement looks like when it’s vibrant and real and dynamic, and it really was from watching people who had become my friends who were local leaders, who had those kinds of dynamic conversations going on that inspired me. I reached the point in time that my personal frustration was so high that if I didn’t do something, it wouldn’t have been healthy for me. What gives you hope? I think that getting the upcoming generations of leaders, people who are millennials and younger, gives me a lot of hope. It gives me a lot of hope that when you guys are my age, it’ll just naturally be better. But — there is a ‘but’ there, and the ‘but’ is: We’ve got to find a way to connect what’s naturally so exceptional about your generation to what is exceptional about the hero arc of American democracy. What concerns you? That having fallen into our like-minded silos, as we have, that we’re not going to have the will to climb out. We’re going to have to see the reason to find what we share. What do you hope to accomplish through your efforts? What I hope to accomplish is revive the old idea, repackage it in a way that works for a new environment. I describe the Village Square as being a very new, very old idea. We’ve just got to punch it up a little bit.