United States America
The climate.
Due to shifts in latitude and a variety of geographical features, such as mountains and deserts, the climate in the United States varies. On the mainland, the U.S. climate is typically mild. Until one reaches the West Coast, the climate becomes warmer as one moves further south and drier as one moves farther west.

Much of the U.S. lies west of 100°W. S. has a climate that ranges from cold semi-arid in the interior upper western states (Idaho to the Dakotas) to warm to hot desert and semi-arid in the southwest of the U.S.
The Northern Plains, Midwest, Great Lakes, and New England are among the northern regions with humid continental climates east of 100°W. From the Southern Plains and lower Midwest east to the Middle Atlantic states (Virginia to southern Connecticut), the climate changes to a humid temperate climate.

From the Virginia/Maryland capes (north of the greater Norfolk, Virginia area), westward to roughly northern Oklahoma (north of the greater Oklahoma City area), a humid subtropical climate is present along and south of a primarily east-west line. Central Florida is located in a humid subtropical climate zone that stretches along the Atlantic coast. The majority of California's coastline has a Mediterranean climate, while southern Florida, the warmest place on the US mainland, has a tropical climate. Hawaiian Islands and the U.S. Tropical weather is common in territories.

The Wasatch Range, Sierra Nevada, Cascade Range, and the Rocky Mountains are alpine ranges because of their higher elevations. Oceanic climate can be found along Oregon's and Washington's coasts. The state of Alaska, which is located in the northwest corner of North America, has a subarctic climate that is largely predominate, with subpolar oceanic climates present in the southeast (Alaska Panhandle), southwest peninsula, and Aleutian Islands, and a polar climate present in the north.

The migration of subtropical highs north-south, the seasonal change in the solar angle, and the seasonal change in the position of the polar jet stream are the main factors influencing weather in the contiguous United States.

The subtropical high pressure systems move northward and closer to the US mainland during the summer in the Northern Hemisphere. In the Atlantic Ocean, the Bermuda High generates a south-southwest flow of tropical air masses over the southeastern, south-central, and central United States, resulting in warm to hot temperatures, high humidity, and frequent intense (but typically brief) showers and/or thunderstorms as the heat builds in the afternoon. The northwesterly airflow that produces the cool, dry, and stable weather that is typical along the West Coast in summer in the Northern Hemisphere is caused by high pressure in the Pacific Ocean that builds toward the California coast.

Winter in the Northern Hemisphere causes the subtropical highs to move south. The polar jet stream descends further south into the United States, bringing with it a conflict zone between warm, moist air masses from the Gulf of Mexico and cold, dry air masses from Canada. As a result, stormy weather with rain, ice, and snow is more common, and temperatures are much more unpredictable, with quick rises and falls in temperature not unusual. Several southern U.S. S. However, due to the polar jet stream's infrequent impact that is felt that far south (Florida, the Gulf Coast, the Desert Southwest, and southern California), these regions frequently experience more consistent weather.

When compared to the summer/warmer months, when the belt of lows and storms typically moves into southern Canada, weather systems, including high-pressure systems (anticyclones), low-pressure systems (cyclones), and fronts (boundaries between air masses of differing temperature, humidity, and most commonly, both), move faster and are more intense during the winter/colder months.

Many storms that enter the United States originate in the Gulf of Alaska. These "North Pacific lows" touch down in the U.S.
traveling through the Pacific Northwest, the northern Rocky Mountains, the northern Great Plains, the upper Midwest, the Great Lakes, and the states of New England before continuing eastward. "Panhandle hook" storms move from the central Rockies into the Oklahoma/Texas panhandle regions, then northeast toward the Great Lakes, across the central states from late fall to early spring. They produce unusually large temperature contrasts and frequently transport a lot of Gulf moisture northward, which can occasionally cause cold conditions and possibly heavy snow or ice to the north and west of the storm track as well as warm conditions, heavy rain, and potentially severe thunderstorms to the south and east of the storm track, often simultaneously.

"Alberta clipper" storms, which typically develop from Montana eastward across the northern states in the winter, track east and bring light to moderate snowfalls from Montana and the Dakotas across the upper Midwest and Great Lakes states to New England, frequently trailed by windy and severe Arctic outbreaks. "Gulf lows" can form in or near the Gulf of Mexico and move eastward or northeastward across the Southern states, or nearby Gulf or South Atlantic waters, when Canadian cold air masses drop unusually far southward during the winter. They can bring snow or ice across the South, mostly in interior or northern areas, but they also occasionally bring rain.

The majority of precipitation during the cold season (typically from November to March) coincides with organized low-pressure systems and related fronts. Storms are much more localized in the summer, and many areas east of 100°W and south of 40°N frequently experience brief thunderstorms.

In the warm season, storm systems that affect a wide area are less common, and weather conditions are more solar sun controlled, with the highest likelihood of thunderstorm and severe weather activity occurring during peak heating hours, typically between 3 PM and 9 PM local time. Particularly from May to August, mesoscale convective system (MCS) thunderstorm complexes, which are frequently overnight and typically linked to frontal activity, can produce significant to flooding amounts of rainfall from the Dakotas/Nebraska eastward through Iowa/Minnesota to the Great Lakes states.

Tropical cyclones (hurricanes, tropical storms, and tropical depressions) occasionally approach or cross the Gulf and Atlantic states from late summer into the fall (mostly from August to October), bringing high winds, torrential rain, and storm surges (often topped with battering waves) to the Gulf and Atlantic lowlands and coastal regions.

Culture.
The United States Census Bureau regularly publishes data on the top languages used at home, based on annual data from the American Community Survey. Additionally, it reports on the English language proficiency of those whose native tongue is not English. A year ago, the US.
The Census Bureau published data on the number of speakers of more than 350 languages, according to an ACS survey conducted from 2009 to 2013, but it does not routinely compile and publish data for that many languages.
The ACS is not a full census but an annual sample-based survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau. The language statistics are based on responses to a three-part question asked about all members of a target U.S. household who are at least five years old. The first part asks if they "speak a language other than English at home." If so, the head of the household or main respondent is asked to report which language each member speaks in the home, and how well each individual speaks English. It does not ask how well individuals speak any other language of the household. Thus, some respondents might have only a limited speaking ability of that language. In addition, it is difficult to make historical comparisons of the numbers of speakers because language questions used by the U.S. Census changed numerous times before 1980.

The ACS does not tabulate the number of people who report the use of American Sign Language at home, so such data must come from other sources. While modern estimates indicate that American Sign Language was signed by as many as 500,000 Americans in 1972 (the last official survey of sign language), estimates as recently as 2011 were closer to 100,000. Various cultural factors, such as the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act, have resulted in far greater educational opportunities for hearing-impaired children, which could double or triple the number of current users of American Sign Language.

Percentage of people 5 years and over who speak Spanish at home: 2008.
English is the most common language spoken in the United States with approximately 239 million speakers. Spanish is spoken by approximately 35 million people. The United States has the world's fifth largest Spanish-speaking population, outnumbered only by Mexico, Colombia, Spain, and Argentina; other estimates[which?] put the United States at over 50 million, second only to Mexico. Throughout the Southwestern United States and Puerto Rico, long-established Spanish-speaking communities coexist with large numbers of more recent Hispanophone immigrants. Although many new Latin American immigrants are less than fluent in English, nearly all second-generation Hispanic Americans speak English fluently, while only about half still speak Spanish.

According to the 2000 U.S. Census, people of German ancestry made up the largest single ethnic group in the United States, but German language ranked fifth. Italian, Polish, and French are still widely spoken among populations descending from immigrants from those countries in the early 20th century, but the use of these languages is dwindling as the older generations die. Russian is also spoken by immigrant populations.

Tagalog and Vietnamese have over one million speakers each in the United States, almost entirely within recent immigrant populations. Both languages, along with the varieties of Chinese (mostly Cantonese, Taishanese, and Standard Mandarin), Japanese, and Korean, are now used in elections in Alaska, California, Hawaii, Illinois, New York, Texas, and Washington.

Native American languages are spoken in smaller pockets of the country, but these populations are decreasing, and the languages are almost never widely used outside of reservations. Besides English, Spanish, French, German, Navajo and other Native American languages, all other languages are usually learned from immigrant ancestors that came after the time of independence or learned through some form of education.

American Sign Language is the most common sign language in the United States although there are unrelated sign languages which have been developed in the States and territories—mostly in the Pacific. No concrete numbers exist for signers but something upwards of 250,000 is common.
Landmarks.
There were 2,462 National Historic Landmarks (NHL) that the US government had officially recognized as of 2007. Numerous landmarks can be found in every major US city. For instance, the Landmarks Preservation Commission has designated 23,000 landmarks in New York City. These landmarks include a variety of unique structures, interiors, historic areas, and scenic locations that contribute to defining the culture and character of New York City.

Sports.
Sports in the United States, in brief.
In the US, a sizeable portion of tourist spending goes toward sporting events and the venues that host them. The size of the US sports industry has been estimated to be between $213 billion and $410 billion. Sports tourism accounted for 25% of American tourism receipts in 1997, putting a market value of about $350 billion per year on it. International spectators frequently attend numerous US sporting events. Out of the total 28,000 runners, 12,000 of them in the 1997 New York City Marathon were from outside the US.