Satire/sarcasm doesn't always work cross-culturally
Satire/sarcasm doesn't always work cross-culturally
No joke here. I just think stuff like this is interesting.
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Americans are also known for being really direct (YMMV; southerners are a lot more indirect, where West Coasters would much rather that you just tell them to get fucked than pretend that you like them). OTOH, from my experience hosting students from East Asia, they tend to be at the opposite end of directness. It took us half the school year to get the kid from Hong Kong to open up, start talking and joking without being prompted and be comfortable telling us mildly uncomfortable things (like if he was unhappy about something). We've had two Japanese students as well, and it's always been a constant struggle to get them to tell us if there's a problem; they prefer to reach out to a program supervisor instead of telling us directly, and one of them was so bad about indirectness that it felt like he was constantly lying to us. It turns out that differences in directness cause a lot more issues than I would have guessed.
Utah is extraordinarily passive aggressive. Home in New York, I was considered tactful with my words. Here in Utah, I'm considered rude.
People raised here, especially Mormons, will lie to your face with no remorse in order to avoid saying any "harsh" words or causing "contention."
I've pretty stopped being tactful and have embraced vulgar honesty. Not to hurt others - I really do care about my roommates and most of my coworkers on my shift - but to make my thoughts so motherfuckingly clear that even a god-damned inbred Mormon pioneer worshipping dumbass can understand.
I've heard this called a "West Coast Attitude", though AFAICT, it seems like the Northeast also has a reputation for not mincing words. Anyway, yeah, I'm a big fan of the West Coast Attitude; you always feel pretty good that you know where you stand with someone. There's people out here in Cali that fall in love with the south after a little visit and gush about how nice everyone is. I make it a point to tell them that, as someone who lived a good decade or so in the south, I know that 4 times out of five, that niceness is a facade papering over a whole lot of shit they talked about you the second the door hit your ass. In all fairness, there really are some super great people there that genuinely are as nice as they seem, but I found it hard to tell them apart without getting to know them first.
Northeast is direct, but just won’t say anything until less it’s a big problem. Except NY/NJ assholes.
Midwesterners want to talk all the time to everyone, but mostly niceties.
Southerners are talkative and sound nice too, but can be super backhanded about it.
Westerners are more talkative than New Englanders, and blunt like them at the same time.
— Midwesterner who moved to New England 40 years ago, and has family from NC and CA.
I have a similar experience being from the North and moving to Texas some time ago. At work in the North, I was well spoken, direct, honest, friendly, and kind. In Texas, I spoke my mind too much and wasn't nice, but was considered a dependable hard worker. The only people that didn't file HR complaints? Other Northerners.
Culture shock in your own country is a hell of a thing.
I call it being “subtle as a sledgehammer.” Makes it a little harder to make long lasting friends, but the ones I have greatly appreciate it.
Americans are also known for being really direct
Maybe in America. They are also known for saying "this is the best XYZ I've ever had in my entire life!!!" for every XYZ they ever have in their entire lives.
We are the most hyperbolic people ever of all time, I'm absolutely positive
From an American, this means the thing meets expectations, or possibly even exceeds them.
"Not too bad" means I almost died.
"Pretty good" means it wasn't the worst possible result, but not great.
E: You'll know it's actually the best ever if we stop talking.
Again, Your Mileage May Vary. People in the south can be frustratingly indirect because they believe it's polite. Broad strokes, however, Americans do tend to be more on the direct side of things; I reckon we're a little behind Germany (as the exemplar of extreme directness), but much closer to them in directness than we are to, say, England.
Dutch people are the undisputed champions of telling you shit to your face.
There are two things that I cannot stand, one is people who are intolerant of other cultures, and the other is the Dutch.
Probably more than a little behind Germany. I remember coming across an article about communication pitfalls in the business world that stem from Americans being indirect and using a lot of stock phrases for courtesy.
I remember well-known examples like "how are you" not expressing an interest in how the other person is doing. Or more obscure stuff like "we should meet for coffee soon" expressing not an intention to meet in the near future but a generally positive disposition towards the other person. Or them giving a positive response when someone suggests something they don't want and relying on nonverbal cues to convey their disapproval.
Perhaps it's proximity but as a German I find British indirectness (which often revolves around obvious understatement or sarcasm) to be easier to parse than American indirectness (which revolves around stock phrases). Americans can be a bit Darmok if you're not familiar with a phrase. Thankfully online communication doesn't feature them as much.
Those are all good points. I want to emphasize that this is relative to East Asia. The West as a whole tends to be more direct in its communication style, and you're going to find differences inside of that. Speaking from our experience, we've had the fewest communication problems (in terms of directness being a problem) with German and Dutch kids. We're also not having any issues with the Italian kid. Kind of in the middle is the Russian kid we hosted, who struggled a bit with understanding the how casual Americans are (the affectionate teasing that we do, joking around at any old time, hanging out for the purpose of hanging out, etc. but he eventually got it down like an old pro). At the far end are the east Asian kids. It's pretty consistently an issue to get them to open up, advocate for themselves, tell us if something's wrong, etc. They get there eventually, usually, but it's always the biggest journey for them. I can respect that it isn't easy. I'm sure I'd have a much worse go of trying to adapt to their cultures, based on how hard of a time just dealing with the indirectness of the southeast US.
I just wanted to add, but didn't know where to squeeze it in, that they apparently don't do lame-ass dad jokes in Russia. It was a brand new experience for him, and he mastered it by the time he left. I'm really proud of him, and I hope he's doing okay.
I’m American, studying in Germany with about half my cohort being East Asian students. To me, it seems like we’re square in the middle and I’ll give you an example:
We were asked how we would address it, if we saw our dear roommate finally wearing the sweater they’d spent months knitting and it looked bad. In broad strokes, the Asian students would not address it, the Germans would say they didn’t like the sweater, and the (north and south, not just US) American students would find something they honestly liked to complement and not address anything else.
Some Germans would also find something positive to say about the sweater (“I don’t like the color, but it’s a beautiful knit” or something similar), but they only mentioned that after the American students said their approach, so I’m not sure if that was just social pressure from all the non Germans being shocked at their answer.
These are all totally valid, by the way, it’s just better to be prepared for it. A few days before this class, I showed my old (German) roommate some of my wedding pictures and he told me he didn’t like my lipstick. I still have no idea what the point in that is, but I probably would have taken it better if it had happened after the class discussion.
Edit: I’ve since thought more about this, and given that the others found the American position dishonest (it is intentionally telling only the flattering/socially easier part of your opinion), I can see how each of them would consider theirs the middle position: the Asian students would think that instead of insulting or flattering their roommate, they’d just say nothing; German students would think that instead of saying nothing or exaggerating their positive feelings, they’d just say the truth.
I guess it’s more of a wheel than a line based spectrum
Bless your heart.
Good grief. There are times I miss the south, but I had a hard time with that indirect stuff. It was being neurodivergent on hard mode.
Man, it ain't easy with neurotypical
I reckon we're a little behind Germany (as the exemplar of extreme directness)
??
Germans are, in my experience, often presented as speaking the most directly. That is, they tend to say exactly what they mean and are less afraid of saying something that might be considered rude or uncomfortable by less direct cultures.
I can't confirm that.
I think this entire "the Americans" and "the Germans" and "the Japanese" thing in this post is probably super productive and leads us somewhere useful!
It's really broad strokes and focused on a snapshot of one element of the contemporary culture of those places. I think there's nothing wrong with acknowledging these differences, no more than acknowledging that different cultures celebrate holidays differently.
My American-immigrant-in-Germany self snorted when I read that Americans were direct. It’s a spectrum, for sure.
I live in a very direct culture, but that does not mean we're being impolite towards each other. I work with a lot of immigrants from cultures which do not separate these two concepts, however, and when you tell them to be more direct, or if they are not getting anywhere by merely hinting at what they need, they quickly switch to:
- frowning
- shouting, or talking very loud
- using very short sentences, as if they were ordering people around
- being borderline insulting
And that is not acceptable in any society. I was absolutely miffed by this many times until I understood that they don't actually know communication which is both direct AND polite because they didn't grow up with it.
I put together a quick illustration to show what I mean:
So, the people I'm talking about go from top left to bottom right, maybe brushing on bottom left, because that's the only direction they know.
Lol
-- a German