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The American Dream: Was It Ever Within Our Grasp?

Photos and Story by Melissa Hernandez De La Cruz

Steven Lara, owner of Caffe Sabroso on Second Street, has yet to accomplish his American dream. From Dominican paintings hanging from the walls in his cafe to the way he brews his coffee, Lara prides himself on his store's authenticity.

The 25-year-old has managed three businesses and has plans to open a second cafe in The Oaks Mall later this year. But to him, the true American dream is leaving behind a legacy through his coffee.

The American dream has been instilled into the veins of the United States, starting with the promises of the Declaration of Independence, according to Steven Noll, 68, University of Florida history professor. The guaranteed freedoms of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness drove the notion of social mobility. Like Andrew Carnegie's rags-toriches story, early success stories were used almost exclusively as a marketing tool for immigrants, inviting them to be a part of the formula. The term was officially coined in the 1930s by James Truslow Adams but has long circled in America before that, Noll said.

"It's just kind of formalized in the 1930s, which is interesting because the 1930s is the time in which the American dream, at some level, was dying because of the Great Depression," he added.

For Noll, the American dream means striving to have a better life, which isn't necessarily tied to material success. With so many interpretations of the American dream, it raises the questions of what the American dream means, the truth behind it and how it's changing.

He said he believes the American dream's foundation is changing because people are realizing for the first time that their kids might not be better off in the future. Questions of affordable housing, education and even the looming threat of climate change challenge the notion that working hard will guarantee an easier passage for the next generation.

"For particular groups in American history, the American dream is something to aspire to but not necessarily something that you can achieve," he said. Corey McZeal, a sociology lecturer at UF, 31, agrees with Noll's idea and adds that it might be less attainable than before. The costs and wages 60 years ago were enough to climb the social ladder, laying the foundation for the next generation. However, McZeal explained that the purchasing power and disposable income have decreased in the last few decades, causing the chances of achieving the American dream to grow dimmer and dimmer.

"If you look at the cost of things like housing, like health care, for instance, the United States is maybe a great place to come for some things, but it's not a great place to come if you have had a medical emergency," he said.

American literature has done a great deal of criticizing the rampant materialism driven by the American dream, such as in F. Scott Fitzgerald's “The Great Gatsby.” McZeal said he agrees with the notion that material things often measure success. The definition of the American dream depends on where someone is from as well, he added. For a war-torn refugee, the American dream can manifest itself as freedom from fear.

Most of the time, however, it is rooted in materialism.

"We prop up individual success, so your neighbors can be evicted, but if you're doing well, then you've been successful," McZeal said.

To Lara, the material things tied with achieving the American dream are like momentary highs that wash away. He said it might look good to the public, but like Cinderella's slipper, the feeling will always slip away eventually.

"If I can help people who don't have the money to help themselves, that to me is the American dream. Some people are selfish, more about 'I'm going to please myself before I please others,' but having family values, I feel like I need to help those who disciplined me and helped me," he said.

Lara, who was born in Providence, Rhode Island, and moved to Gainesville when he was 18, said he

72 The Origins Issue believes in the American dream, but that failure doesn't always fall back on one's shoulders. Barriers prevent people from achieving their dreams, no matter how hard they try. He came across issues when he first opened the cafe because of neighboring competition and attitudes toward him. He said as a newcomer to Gainesville's business scene, he never felt welcomed. tween the wealthy and the poorest is growing, that mythology is still there. Whether that's a good thing or not is another matter," he said.

He also said what really sells the dream is the success of those who surpassed those failures. The few who manage to work hard enough to break the seams of success transform into sound bite stories.

"When it comes to minorities starting businesses, you need to do something really marvelous for people to even go there," he said.

For many minorities and immigrants, the barriers on the path to success never truly disappear. However, the American dream continues to thrive and attract immigrants on a hollow promise of achievement. Noll said even in the context of the border wall and the Muslim ban issued by the Trump administration, immigrants still wanted in, showing the longevity of the American dream myth.

"In spite of the fact that America is the differentiation between rich and poor, and the disparity beMcZeal said rags-to-riches stories are not very common in the U.S. and that social mobility, in general, is low, even for people who were born here. He explained it may seem common when the L.A. Times publicizes an individual experience of how one person went from being homeless to winning the Super Bowl. People don’t get to see the countless others who never even got close to that situation.

"The American dream is not one to bank on. The likelihood of that happening to you is unfortunately not all that great," he said.

The Origins Issue 73