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Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
24,544 posts, read 56,060,466 times
Reputation: 11862
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jtur88
"Educated" and "ignorant" are not necessarily antonyms.
I was guided through the Amazon by a man who did not know what country he lived in until he was 16 years old and had never been to school. My ignorance was humiliating.
I drove my car across the trackless Jordanian desert whose features shift daily, accompanied by two truckers who navigated by the stars. My ignorance was mortifying.
I've known people who have never been to school, but can speak four languages fluently and play several musical instruments and heal the sick and wounded and take a car engine apart and put it back together and build a house. My ignorance was embarrassing.
No, not at all. Book learnin' ain't the only kind of learnin'.
"Educated" and "ignorant" are not necessarily antonyms.
I was guided through the Amazon by a man who did not know what country he lived in until he was 16 years old and had never been to school. My ignorance was humiliating.
I drove my car across the trackless Jordanian desert whose features shift daily, accompanied by two truckers who navigated by the stars. My ignorance was mortifying.
I've known people who have never been to school, but can speak four languages fluently and play several musical instruments and heal the sick and wounded and take a car engine apart and put it back together and build a house. My ignorance was embarrassing.
"Educated" and "ignorant" are not necessarily antonyms.
I was guided through the Amazon by a man who did not know what country he lived in until he was 16 years old and had never been to school. My ignorance was humiliating.
I drove my car across the trackless Jordanian desert whose features shift daily, accompanied by two truckers who navigated by the stars. My ignorance was mortifying.
I've known people who have never been to school, but can speak four languages fluently and play several musical instruments and heal the sick and wounded and take a car engine apart and put it back together and build a house. My ignorance was embarrassing.
I can't rep you right now, but that was a fabulous post.
I don't think being exposed to all sort of international news (I'd even argue that we're over-exposed to that in the Western world, which hasn't enlightened us at all), going to great schools, reading many books or travelling a lot make us more aware in general, anywhere and anytime. We may have better small talk skills in most cases, however.
Thank you, Reverend Doctor Paisley. Now Colonel William McMason (retired) will lecture us on the perils of the Irish race.
So acknowledging a positive contribution of political and social philosophy that originated in England makes me Ian Paisley, one of the UK's biggest pratts? You, sir, are a master of hyperbole.
You sound as sensitive and bullyish as a plastic paddy from Woodlawn (which is a fantastic neighborhood, by the way).
There may be some truth to this. I'm a longtime native of the Washington, D.C. area. We have the Washington Post, which is supposed to be one of the top newspapers in the nation. Plus, it's such a political city and has foreign embassies from just about every country in the world. So, there's potentially a lot of exposure in that way to countries outside the U.S., which probably isn't the norm in most other places in the U.S.
On the other hand, people living in, say, some small midwestern U.S. city could probably care less what's going on in the east or west coasts of the U.S., let alone in foreign countries that are oceans away.
I've noticed how the Washington Post's headlines usually involve international or national news. Just travel 30 miles away to Baltimore and see our local news coverage here. The front page stories always involve either the Ravens, the Orioles, or local Maryland events like the state government, etc. The Baltimore Sun has very little international news, the only time in the past year I remember a foreign news story being the headline was the Japanese earthquake. Kim Jong Il's death was on the front page but not the lead story. Though honestly I wish the Washington Post WOULD carry more state news from Maryland and Virginia since so many in the DC suburbs have no idea what the important state issues are and yet are very influential in statewide elections, more so in Maryland than in Virginia.
I was just looking at a question on Yahoo! Answers, asking why native English speakers are so bad at spelling their own language? The asker wanted to know why Brits, Americans, Canadians and Australians misspelled alot of words yet many non-native English speakers spell perfectly..
Are the Anglo-Saxons really this ignorant, or is it because English is so common? I mean, Scandinavians, the Dutch etc need to learn English when travelling or working/studying abroad because it is the international language of business..
Simply look at the misspellings, incorrect word usage, grammatical errors and lack of syntax exhibited by CD posters.
In the late 80s/90s, schools taught students that spelling any which way was ok. I believe that this was a big mistake. It's easier to teach something correctly when it is new information, but difficult to correct later.
Quote:
Originally Posted by the troubadour
Discovered a long time ago many Europeans could explain English grammar better than native speakers.
They are taught at school. Something rather lacking at some of the schools I attended at any rate.
I still diagram sentences in my head.
I'm older and received quite a good education at a time when there were significant standards. We were also taught critical thinking skills.
Sadly, this is seriously lacking in the NCLB world of teaching to tests. It's a sad statement on "education" in the US.
Quote:
Originally Posted by pigeonhole
what I atually appreciate in the Anglo saxon character are 2 traits that are sorely lacking in the French culture :
- casualness (the French are everything save casual)
- the art of understatement (French people are often drama queens):
Really?
Maybe in Paris (same with any major or capital city), but in the small villages and towns (where I spend most of my travel time), it's quite casual.
Interesting perspective; but not one I share.
Last edited by chielgirl; 01-05-2012 at 05:08 AM..
i guess the way i look at it, we're all from backwaters. People from New York City think the world ends in New Jersey. I met people born-and-raised in Austria who had never visited Vienna.
Those of us in all places, who pay attention to what the hell is going on in the world, are a minority.
A lot of stereotypes exist, and several young Scandinavian students I met -- for all their "worldiness" -- still had the most idiotic ideas about American (college) culture ever.
Some Norwegian friends of my family had us busting up by relating ridiculous ideas their countrymen had about Americans. The amount of propaganda these people believe is insane. Their media is as rife with biased information as any other place.
Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
24,544 posts, read 56,060,466 times
Reputation: 11862
Quote:
Originally Posted by orangeapple
Some Norwegian friends of my family had us busting up by relating ridiculous ideas their countrymen had about Americans. The amount of propaganda these people believe is insane. Their media is as rife with biased information as any other place.
Just going by the people I've met I've yet to meet the super ignorant Americans that I keep hearing about. I've met many ignorant Australians, Brits, Europeans and Asians though.
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