A very interesting discussion of one of the major reasons (IMHO) that we are seeing so much dysfunction today. When you isolate and label people as a this or a that, you immediately box them, expect specific loayalties and behavhior, and that is rarely true of the wild American. I do disagree that this is a recent invention, it has been a tool of societies for as long as there has been writing. Any time you set a preference for a group over another, it is a practice of identity politics, so ancient Egypt over Hebrews, Romans over "barbarians" Muslims over Christians (in all the many forms that has taken), English over "continentals" (French, German, Spanish, all at different times). It is recent that it has become such a fractured art, where they have invented a million things you can be, to allow for ever smaller groups to be pulled in and manipulated, that seems to be the truth at hand.