December 11, 2006
Book recommendations
EJ, a regular contributor who is, I know, frustrated by our slowness in revamping the site, was kind enough to send a recommendation:
Karen, you should check the book "WHAT'S UP AMERICA? A Foreigner's Guide to Understanding Americans" by DIANE ASITIMBAY (Culture Link Press). Evelyne
This book is written for students and it's really fascinating. Here are some of the questions it answers:
Why do most Americans leave home at 18?
Why are many Americans on diets but still overweight?
How do we judge if an American is just being friendly or truly being a friend?
Another I just came across, an anthropology textbook, is also worth a look: Distant Mirrors: America as a Foreign Culture (Paperback) by Philip R. DeVita, James D. Armstrong. Once we have a database set up, we can link to many interesting books, and perhaps even have discussion questions for classes or reading groups and bookclubs.
Posted by Karen Christensen at 6:48 PM | Comments (0)
July 27, 2006
What the world thinks about America at WatchingAmerica.com
I really should be reading WatchingAmerica.com every morning, but here it is 5.45pm and I'm finally taking a look. I was intrigued to find a story that shows more subtle attitudes about the United States (not much subtle about most of the news today), in an article from a London paper, "BUZZ HAD TO FIX MOON LANDER WITH BIRO". It highlights how what the world thinks of them is important to Americans: "The US Government had already ordered NASA to cut links with the astronauts if disaster loomed. They did not want the world watching pictures of the Americans spinning off into space."
Posted by Karen Christensen at 5:49 PM | Comments (0)
May 9, 2006
The buzz on global perspectives
I've been so caught up in launching GUANXI: THE CHINA LETTER that I haven't been blogging as I'd like, but I have been following the great discussion about how people in different parts of the world see us (and U.S.). And I've been hearing from people with related projects that so wonderfully mesh with our efforts to explore global perspectives on the United States. The first of them is WatchingAmerica.com, a brilliant and innovative gathering of news from around the world about how the world sees us.
Robin Koerner, a British guy now based in New York, is one of the founders. We had a chat on Sunday that devolved (or evolved) to a discussion of what's good about being an expat. I told him how a friend said I'd moved back to the States (in 1991) because after a decade or more away I now felt really foreign here in America. He thinks there's a lot of freedom in being an expat, and that's true, too.
And Robin told me about PBS's amazing new Borders: American ID site, which references this site as an important resource on the American identity at How They See Us. We'll be getting involved in that, too, and looking for ways to collaborate. LoveUsHateUS readers and contributors will find it another fascinating place to explore.
Posted by Karen Christensen at 5:28 PM | Comments (0)