31–40 of 62 posts
Reminds me of when my wife conveyed enthusiasm about her tech job to some family and friends of family back in France, how interesting the work was, creative, etc, only to have them snicker and declare, "look at you, so American now, you can't stop smiling." And yes, the connotation was something like vanity and superficiality.
That being said, and this is anecdotal, but I've had experiences from all over the country - I've lived in the Northeast, spent extensive time and have family in the South, etc; a lot of the time people are smiling genuinely or being cheerful with purpose. Most of the time it's not a facade, naivety, or sign of stupidity, as some would like to think.
Is it really hard to consider the possibility that Americans just have a more positive attitude? And why is that a bad thing?
There's a point to be made by (sometimes snarky) non-Americans about the stereotypical "dumb, always smiling" American - there are times when it is insincere or a bit unnecessary and I think that this is unique to America. I also find this stereotype to vary by location - it's more apparent when venturing down South, for example, but less so in a place like NYC. That being said, and this is anecdotal, but I've had ex…
There's a point to be made by (sometimes snarky) non-Americans about the stereotypical "dumb, always smiling" American - there are times when it is insincere or a bit unnecessary and I think that this is unique to America. I also find this stereotype to vary by location - it's more apparent when venturing down South, for example, but less so in a place like NYC. That being said, and this is anecdotal, but I've had ex…
I saw a lot of this with tourists posing for pictures at the 9/11 memorial in NYC. Cringe. There are times when it is absolutely inappropriate to smile.
I was referring to more "day to day" attitudes than situational though.
I actually thought the smiling people in the images seemed less intelligent and less honest than the neutral looking people.
For me there's a big difference between someone flashing their teeth in a big grin, and a photo that freezes the moment in time. The longer I look at such a motionless smile, the sillier it seems. FWIW, I'm from Germany (way to the right on the graph) and probably somewhat of an outlier, since people kept asking me whether I was sad when I just made a neutral face. I ended up training myself to always curl my lips sl…
"Germany"
To me a much simpler explanation is that people in Russia are incredibly sad and life there is very sad and hard. However almost no one there realizes it until they get out for a prolonged period of time. Me and my wife were born and spent most of our life in Russia, we were pretty well of and yet since moving to US we realized how sad it actually was. The collective consciousness of Russia is still heavily polluted…
They'll downvote this because it is generalizing bullshit in almost every point made.
Sensationalist oversimplification. For Russians, a smile serves a different function than for Americans. It's not used for communicating with others and does not serve as a social marker of openness or good mood. The social expectation is that a smile must always be prompted by something, whether it's someone's joke, or a humorous occurrence, or even own embarrassment. People don't smile in posed group photos for the…
> the social expectation is that a smile must always be prompted by something Well, that's exactly the point that's interesting to analyze. I.e. why there is such social expectation.
Do you consider laughing at people at random to be socially acceptable? Why would smiling be fine but laughing not be?
Now the question becomes, _why_ do some cultures have the social expectation that an impromptu smile is acceptable?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the social expectation is that a smile must always be prompted by something Well, that's exactly the point that's interesting to analyze. I.e. why there is such social expectation.
> why there is such social expectation. Do you consider laughing at people at random to be socially acceptable? Why would smiling be fine but laughing not be? Now the question becomes, _why_ do some cultures have the social expectation that an impromptu smile is acceptable?
So I don't see here anything out of the ordinary. It's quite an expected effect on human emotions.