(no subject)
After reading the first 43 pages of Kohl’s Survival
Kit for Overseas Living, I thought that it was ok.
Some of the author’s perspectives seemed skewed to me.
Right away on the third paragraph of chapter 1 it
reads: “If left to luck, your chances of having a
really satisfying experience living abroad would be
about one in seven”. I feel that travel experience is
not close to being “left to luck”. Travel enjoyment
is based on ones decision making and the results of
their actions.
Kohl later mentions the views that others have on
Americans. I find most of them to be true, as
degrading as some may be. He makes a good point
mentioning how Hollywood sadly has a great affect on
how people foreign to the US view our culture. On
page 11, after listing many stereotypes of Americans
on previous pages, Kohl makes a good point about what
one should do when a foreigner (to US culture) is
saying about what a “typical American” is or might do.
The listener needs to hear out their stereotypes
intently, then speak back to them explaining why one
might think this; how perhaps it makes sense that one
could feel this way about an American. Then they need
to correct the person(s) who are misinterpreting
American culture or society with an explanation.
On page 19, there is a diagram of Lewis Morgan’s
“Pyramid or Human Development”. It has nine different
stages of a culture’s “development”. At the top is
“Higher Civilization” and at the bottom in “Lower
Savagery”. As the diagram goes down from the top the
stages’ boxes grow larger, indicating that the highest
cultures in the sense of development are very few and
this “Savagery” is a large part of the world. A
European made this, and Europe accounts for a small
portion of the world’s surface. That was just an
observation of mine during the reading.
Staying on the development issue, I enjoyed reading
Kohl’s part of the book when he mentions
industrialization versus development. It is a very
poor comparison because a “third world country” could
be so spiritually developed and have developed an
eco-friendly bond with Nature that it would be
ridiculous to relate the two concepts of development
and industrialization.
I feel that this book’s definition of culture as
“total way of life of any group of people” is good for
what the book discusses and how it compares different
cultures. Kohl also mentions family and how extended
family is more commonly lost in close relations
because of USA’s personnel’s often-individualistic
approach to life. Family is more than an important
part of many cultures outside of the USA. I disagree
when it is mentioned that most middle-class Americans
are optimistic and out-going, looking for friendship;
but maybe that is just from my personal experiences.
Lastly, The last two pages in the chapter I enjoyed.
Kohl has cleverly provided a list of proverbs and what
the values they seem to be teaching. It is a good
relation to American society and culture.