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Stop Generalizing About Europe

jonasbentzen.com

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Re: Stop Generalizing About Europe

#21

Post by jonascopenhagen »

Vivtek wrote: post #12
jonascopenhagen wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Varsavsky has lived and built businesses in Madrid since 1995 Which is exactly why I'm puzzled by some of his completely wrong statements about Europe.

Have you ever been to Madrid? They're about as far away from the epicenter of Europe as you can get and still be in the Union - and not at all Central European. A lot of the points he made are very, very Spanish. But as I just posted upthread, as a contrast between the "general look and feel" of Europe vs. the US, I thought his post was bang on. Of course, I'm also an American in Europe - married to a Hungarian for 2…

I think it would be a shame if American entrepreneurs were to be deterred from starting businesses in Europe solely because they've heard this and that general statement about Europe that isn't correct.

Martin Varsavsky goes into specifics regarding legislation, etc., and, as others have pointed out, many of those details are simply not correct when applied to all/most of Europe the way he does.

Re: Stop Generalizing About Europe

#22

Post by personlurking »

cllns wrote: post #2

I was curious so here are some population figures (from wikipedia) Eurozone: 332,839,084 EU: 503,492,041 Europe: 739,165,030 So 45% of Europeans (66% of EU citizens) are in the Eurozone.

Here's a great lil' venn diagram of all the European bodies

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Supranati...

Re: Stop Generalizing About Europe

#23

Post by jordinl »

fahadkhan wrote: post #7

I think you are pedantic about other people's semantics and not your own. E.G. when you say American, do you mean US citizens or people from the two continents of America? I think you mean the former. Just like they most likely mean Western Europe.

So when Americans say American do they mean US Citizen or someone from North/South America? ...

Re: Stop Generalizing About Europe

#24

Post by mbell »

neumann_alfred wrote: post #13
mbell wrote: post #5

I could make an almost identical argument about the usage of terms like "Americans". The states and even cities themselves are all very different.

And you'd be right. But you'd also have admit that Americans tend to do that to themselves. "The American Way" and whatnot; less bright people even saying "Unamerican" as if that was a thing. Those aren't labels others gave you, Americans proudly confess them. And then there is this ever-present flag and/or red-white-blue. From far away those similiarities seem to kinda outweigh the differences, it's just real hard t…

Honestly this post is a perfect example.

You've classified "Americans" as one group when your really talking about "American Nationalists". It sounds like your attributing nationalist propaganda you see on Fox News to all Americans. This is also a great example of state/city variation. Living in Boston for 7 years I can probably count the number of times I've heard someone talking about "The American Way" or using the term "Unamerican" on one hand. One week long trip to Texas and you hear it a dozen times or more.

Re: Stop Generalizing About Europe

#25

Post by Xylakant »

outside1234 wrote: post #19
Xylakant wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, indeed they are. But they all share a common language. It's a bit like Germany, Switzerland and Austria or even the german states themselves. We all share a common language so it we've seen the same movies, read the same media, etc. Certainly it's on a larger scale than the german states, but it's on a smaller scale than europe. If I travel 200 km to the east I'm in Poland. My GF comes from a village close to th…

"But they all share a common language" Ha! You haven't been to Watsonville, California or just about anywhere along the border with Mexico, have you?

Try to follow the conversation between somebody living in my village and the next one 5 km further down the road. Or a bavarian and someone from Hamburg. They wouldn't understand each others dialects. You know what I mean. Even the folks down on the mexican border get fox news and understand plain old english.

Things tend to be pretty ok in western europe where most can agree on english, but don't forget that a large part of europe was behind the iron curtain and didn't get to learn english until 1989. The majority of people in the east doesn't speak any english at all.

Re: Stop Generalizing About Europe

#26

Post by Dove »

outside1234 wrote: post #19
Xylakant wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, indeed they are. But they all share a common language. It's a bit like Germany, Switzerland and Austria or even the german states themselves. We all share a common language so it we've seen the same movies, read the same media, etc. Certainly it's on a larger scale than the german states, but it's on a smaller scale than europe. If I travel 200 km to the east I'm in Poland. My GF comes from a village close to th…

"But they all share a common language" Ha! You haven't been to Watsonville, California or just about anywhere along the border with Mexico, have you?

I haven't been to the particular locations you name, but my experience with multilingualism in the US is that it's more like "Spanish spoken here" than "Does anyone speak English?"

Re: Stop Generalizing About Europe

#27

Post by ColinWright »

personlurking wrote: post #22
cllns wrote: post #2

I was curious so here are some population figures (from wikipedia) Eurozone: 332,839,084 EU: 503,492,041 Europe: 739,165,030 So 45% of Europeans (66% of EU citizens) are in the Eurozone.

Here's a great lil' venn diagram of all the European bodies http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Supranati...

One of my bugbears, but to be completely accurate this is an Euler Diagram, not a Venn Diagram. Technically, a Venn Diagram has to have all possible intersections represented.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euler_diagram

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venn_diagram

http://blog.stevemould.com/venn-vs-euler-diagrams/

Re: Stop Generalizing About Europe

#28

Post by elomarns »

As a brazilian, I completely understand this feeling. A lot of people think Buenos Aires is Brazil's capital, when it's actually Argentina's capital. And small parts of our culture are taken as national main interest, as carnival.

But it's ok to me. In the end, there's no much to do besides correcting people. It's not worth to be upset with this behaviour. People will always generalize and will always state things about places they don't even know with total confidence.

Re: Stop Generalizing About Europe

#29

Post by peteridah »

I am an African currently living in Europe. When you think that my home country ( just 1 out of 54 in Africa ) is made up of over 500 tribes which were really separate and distinct nations pre-colonializiation by the British, you come to realize that any generalization made of a continent is rarely (if ever) a representation of the observed set.
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