International History and Tradition
In most countries, Mother's Day is a recent observance derived from the holiday as it has evolved in the United States. When it was adopted by other countries and cultures, it was given different meanings, associated with different events (religious, historical or legendary), and celebrated on a different date or dates.
Some countries already had existing celebrations honoring motherhood, and their celebrations have adopted several external characteristics from the American holiday, such as giving carnations and other presents to one's mother.
The extent of the celebrations varies greatly. In some countries, it is potentially offensive to one's mother not to mark Mother's Day. In others, it is a little-known festival celebrated mainly by immigrants, or covered by the media as a taste of foreign culture.
Read more about this topic: Mother's Day
Famous quotes containing the words history and/or tradition:
“To care for the quarrels of the past, to identify oneself passionately with a cause that became, politically speaking, a losing cause with the birth of the modern world, is to experience a kind of straining against reality, a rebellious nonconformity that, again, is rare in America, where children are instructed in the virtues of the system they live under, as though history had achieved a happy ending in American civics.”
—Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)
“The tradition I cherish is the ideal this country was built upon, the concept of religious pluralism, of a plethora of opinions, of tolerance and not the jihad. Religious war, pooh. The war is between those who trust us to think and those who believe we must merely be led.”
—Anna Quindlen (b. 1952)