You may recall a few months ago that we called for you, dear reader, to come up with the best and brightest infographic ideas, which we’d then get to work on for an all out infographic based on your ideas.

That day has come.

Let me introduce you to contest winner Ned Poulter.   While we had many great ideas in the contest, Ned’s idea really seemed to stand out above the rest.  Here we have the genesis of the idea in Ned’s own words:

“The idea first came to me when I was minoring in American politics at university. I had seen a number of useful infographics on American politics including ‘a visual history of the American presidency‘, ‘the visual history of American political parties‘ and ‘Left vs. Right‘ . These were incredibly helpful for my learning, allowing me to take in and process a large amount of information without having to read reams and reams of books.

During my studies I was fascinated by the American psyche and that, by their very nature, they are political animals. This is represented strongly in their culture from proudly singing their national anthem at major events such as the Superbowl to flying the American flag on their lawns. Another side of the American psyche is there critical and protest based tendencies supported by ‘their rights as American’s’ included the First Amendment of the American Constitution, ‘Freedom of Speech’ is something that a lot of American’s live their lives by. This is shown worldwide through trashy TV shows when people are screaming “I know my rights” when being arrested and historically with mass movements and public unrest, such that were seen with the equality protests fronted by Martin Luther King.

The American psyche is portrayed to a large extent through music, a medium that many people (across the world) have used, and continue to use, to speak out in favour of their country in a patriotic nature or, equally, to protest against it. Examples of this can be seen with songs like Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the USA (Patriotic) and Talking World War III Blues by Bob Dylan. The nature of this infographic is to portray the sheer diversity in music genres that are influenced by the American psyche and to encapsulate the patriotism, and protests, of the American people.”

Well said, Ned. We really liked this concept and are happy to kick off this fine infographic!

(and yes, we do infographics)

Click the image to view full size:

Ned Poulter is an internet marketing specialist and SEO in Manchester, UK.