Cultural Misunderstanding: The French-American Experience.No wonder I was confused! I had an American father and a French mother. As a child I thought their differences merely reflected their particular roles and personalities. I never imagined there was a cultural gulf that allows French and Americans (a) to say and do the "same thing" but mean different things and (b) to say and do different things but mean more or less the same thing. Anthropologist Carroll Car·roll , James 1854-1907. British-born American physician noted for his research on yellow fever. In 1900 he deliberately infected himself with the disease for experimental purposes. dedicates her book to "all interculturals" and devotes one delicious chapter each to examples and explanations of eight areas of everyday French-American cultural misunderstanding. I found myself repeatedly wincing wince intr.v. winced, winc·ing, winc·es To shrink or start involuntarily, as in pain or distress; flinch. n. A shrinking or startled movement or gesture. as I realized how far astray a·stray adv. 1. Away from the correct path or direction. See Synonyms at amiss. 2. Away from the right or good, as in thought or behavior; straying to or into wrong or evil ways. my presumptions about ordinary behaviors had led me on occasion in matters relating in turn to: Home, Conversation, Parents and Children, the Couple, Friendship, the Telephone, "Minor Accidents," and Obtaining Information. Ouch, and ouch again. Nothing since army basic training as a raw recruit Noun 1. raw recruit - an inexperienced and untrained recruit military recruit, recruit - a recently enlisted soldier has raised such hell with my unconscious unconscious, in psychology, that aspect of mental life that is separate from immediate consciousness and is not subject to recall at will. Sigmund Freud regarded the unconscious as a submerged but vast portion of the mind. assumptions. I wish I'd read a book like this when I was growing up. EDWARD MACNEAL |
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