Interesting posts on what French students in the U.S. experience.

When I was a young girl, 18 years old, I was an exchange student, and I’ve returned to France many times since then.

Í guess that I’m weird, because I don’t see so many differences between cultures as I do between individual people/families.

- Comment se pendre
- Le jour du 11 septembre 2002
- Pots d’echappement d’avions
- Is Canada in the USA?

MDR.

*When I say ‘American’, *

*do you think ‘fat and stupid’?*

By Tamara Laszlo

I am a young French professional who lives in London. As a student, I lived in Spain and in the United States for a year each. These two successive experiences had a long-lasting impact on me – I realized how much influence national cultures had on the way people thought and viewed the world.

In this article I would like to write about one particular issue that affects me – how strong stereotypes about Americans and America are compared to other nations’. My problem with this is that when my fellow countrymen – the French – criticize the Americans in a stereotypical way, I feel offended because I know those are caricatures, not the complex truth.

I will try to present you with an account of the stereotypes I had before going to the US for the first time, what I found there, and then explore some differences in French and American values. I will finish with a comparison of perceptions of Spaniards and Americans in France, and how much stronger the American stereotypes are,

*Expectations*

Before going to the United States for the first time – I was 15 years old, and I left with six other French students and a teacher, and we all stayed with host families – I had a very vague idea of Americans, and the main thing I thought I would find there were beaches and smiling people with beautiful bodies (I was going to Florida). I was attracted to the country – the open landscapes, the fact that everything looked bigger and brighter.

*My American experience*

When I arrived, I was immediately blown away: everything was bigger! I particularly loved the roads – so straight and so wide! At first, it was difficult to understand the language. I had an excuse: French schools and universities insist on teaching almost exclusively British English and British culture and history. American English is viewed as a ‘distorted’, ‘run-down’ version of the ‘purer’, and essentially ‘more civilized’ British English (most French people will tell you that the Americans have no culture whatsoever).

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I also discovered *new ways of living and different values*: at my new home, I was showed all the rooms when I arrived (this contrasts with the French culture where many rooms are considered private, so either they show you extremely quickly, or they don’t show you certain rooms at all), and I was allowed to help myself whenever I was hungry (in the American culture, I found that personal needs and choices are less group-dependent). In France you constantly attend to hosts and eat with them. They are rarely allowed to go through the closets, because it would be an invasion of privacy.
Basically, they are guests, not members of the family.

I also noticed that religion is much more important in the US. The second day after my arrival, I joined my host family to go to church. I met some of the other French students there, who had come with their host families. I think none of us was a Protestant, but we all wanted to go in order to discover an important part of our host families’ lives. We joined the youngsters’ group, with very loud Christian rock music and a stage, where we participated in a game along with everyone else. However, after an hour of extremely loud music, not understanding much of what was being said, and with jet lag weighing in, we all had big headaches. We decided to go on the porch outside for a bit of fresh air. After five minutes, the mother of my host family arrived, visibly upset, and scolded us: she said we were extremely disrespectful. She didn’t give us a chance to explain anything. We were all taken home in silent cars, because the families wouldn’t speak to us. Fortunately, the rest of the stay was fine, but that incident left quite an impression on me.

Looking back on it, I think the families were shocked by the answers we gave to their question – they had asked us about our religious orientation before going to church. We were all either atheists or non-practicing Catholics.
And then I think they were influenced by the French stereotypes (’immoral’
and ‘godless’). Every time I told an American that I didn’t believe in God (that time and other times later in my life), they looked at me with a blank stare, as if they did not understand what I was saying. And then they acted like they wanted to avoid the subject altogether, as if this was too much to cope with. I think that many Americans think that not believing in god equals having no moral sense. This is a fundamental difference between the French and the American cultures – religion doesn’t play such an obvious role in France, and atheists are considered ‘normal’ people.

Euh le texte etant un peu trop long et par peur d’embouser cette thread, j’ai mis un lien ici:

http://politiquesusa.blogspot.com/2007/07/americans-as-viewed-by-french.html

http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_lien

Tiens ce matin, j’ai vu une personne dans la rue avec un panneau a la main: “ovary cancer, please help me”.

Voila le systeme sante aux USA. Bravo.

Thank you Alain. Oh that people here could understand and support this level of compassion… sigh..