Puerto Rico- Our 51st State?

[Arwon]

On my travels around the world I always run into way more German tourists than American. Yes, it is anecdotal evidence, but in Germany (and a lot of other western nations) it is encouraged and almost expected for 20 year olds to travel to other countries & cultures.

The reason I bring up German backpackers in particular is because there were SOOOO many Germans in New Zealand and Chile.. There were even more Canadians & Czechs than Americans.

Anyway, it's anecdotal, but a couple Americans I've talked to have agreed with me that Americans prefer to travel .. in the U.S. as opposed to exploring foreign lands. It's a generalization, but on average it seems to be true.

Germans are literally everywhere.

LITERALLY.

 

[Godwynn]

I hear they normally travel in 10,000 man groups to neighboring countries fairly often as well.

 

[_random_]

On my travels around the world I always run into way more German tourists than American. Yes, it is anecdotal evidence, but in Germany (and a lot of other western nations) it is encouraged and almost expected for 20 year olds to travel to other countries & cultures.

The reason I bring up German backpackers in particular is because there were SOOOO many Germans in New Zealand and Chile.. There were even more Canadians & Czechs than Americans.

Anyway, it's anecdotal, but a couple Americans I've talked to have agreed with me that Americans prefer to travel .. in the U.S. as opposed to exploring foreign lands. It's a generalization, but on average it seems to be true.

Well, in all fairness, a lot of the Canadians you met were probably American.

 

[Hygro]

I hear they normally travel in 10,000 man groups to neighboring countries fairly often as well.

They just get really excited to go visit different cultures and seeing their local flair!

 

[Babbler]

On the original topic: I think people here are underestimating the nationalism/patriotism in Peurto Rico. I doubt they would give, say, the PR Olympic committee. I don't know; it might be better if the island was allowed to stand on it own two feet, rather than being a convenient tax haven for US corporations.

On the topic of Spanish in the USA: People are also underestimating the Anglicization and the assimilation of Hispanics. I'll quote Wikipedia here:

Calvin Veltman undertook, for the National Center for Education Statistics and for the Hispanic Policy Development Project, the most complete study of English language adoption by Hispanophone immigrants. Mr Veltman's language shift studies document high bilingualism rates and subsequent adoption of English as the preferred language of Hispanics, particularly by the young and the native-born. The complete set of these studies' demographic projections postulates the near-complete assimilation of a given Hispanophone immigrant cohort within two generations. Although his study based itself upon a large 1976 sample from the Bureau of the Census (which has not been repeated), data from the 1990 Census tend to confirm the great Anglicization of the U.S. Hispanic population.

The idea that Spanish will overtake English in US southwest seems to be promoted by two groups of people: (i) right-wingers who fear it and want to clamp down on emigration and (ii) left-wingers who celebrate it and want to promote and such. And any scenario seeing the "Quebecization" or the "Sudenization" of the Southwest is probably as realistic as the various "Eurarabia" models.

Main obstacle to bilingualism in the US is the school system. Most schools dont bother to introduce spanish until the students are nearly in high school and even then its only a couple years usually, almost never enough to actually teach the language instead just gives a bare bones introduction. Schools need to start young when its really easy for students to soak it in.

I'm not so sure about that. If we're talking about a true immersion program, I think it's probably true, but having a X hours per week foreign language class for elementary students isn't going to cut it. And if it done poorly, and to no practical end, it will probably make the student hate the target language and language learning in general (eg Irish language classes in Ireland).

 

[Winner]

Americans don't really travel like Europeans do. A lot of Americans are content staying in their own country and not exploring at all. My roommate was like that.

I don't mean learning Spanish in order to be able to travel (though it wouldn't hurt for every Anglo-American to actually travel a bit in Latin America). Knowing the language of your closest neighbours is useful even if you never travel - you can read their books and newspapers, watch their TV, etc. This helps you to get an insight into their culture and understand them better.

I've only been in an English speaking country a few times, and never for long. Yet I watch/read news almost exclusively in English (mostly to avoid getting depressed by the crap that's happening in this country ) and so I think I have a pretty good "general knowledge" concerning the Anglo-Saxon world. I can easily follow what's happening in Slovakia because of the lack of the language barrier, and so I do that too. Now I am working on my German, and I hope that soon it will be normal for me to read stuff on German-language pages or to watch German-language TV.

So, my point is, the Americans are sometimes way too insular, and this reinforces their idiotic notions of being the unique, exceptional, "chosen people" handpicked by God to rule the world.

 

[Joecoolyo]

So, my point is, the Americans are sometimes way too insular, and this reinforces their idiotic notions of being the unique, exceptional, "chosen people" handpicked by God to rule the world.

Basing your opinion of Americans entirely on a single stereotype?

How insular of you.

 

[Pangur Bán]

@Joecoolyo, let's be fair, that's a pretty common mainstream view in the US, minus perhaps the "chosen by God" bit. Americans, from Kansas conservatives to Massachusetts (though perhaps not Berkeley) liberals are always congratulating each other how great and democratic they all are. Partially this is insularity, partially size. Alot of the foreigners Americans encounter validate this view of course, people from third-world countries and so on, but if you are in Western Europe it just comes across as delusional insular nationalism (many Europeans, rightly or wrongly, would put the USA up with Iran as a model society).

 

[Godwynn]

Hey guys, remember that thread we made about Puerto Rico? You know, the one where the Puerto Ricans could vote to decide to join the Union? Yeah, that was a great thread. It's also a good idea. I think it's a lot better than the old idea the Europeans had where you just show up on a distant shore, say in Africa, Australia, Asia, North America, or South America and just murder and take what you want, then force that land to be a colony. Establish your political system on completely innocent tribes or just wipe them out completely. You know, fun!

Man, Americans and their nationalism. It's out of control.

 

[Winner]

Basing your opinion of Americans entirely on a single stereotype?

How insular of you.

That's why I said "sometimes". The Americans I've met in person were all well-educated, down-to-earth, and generally quite pleasant in demeanour - in other words as far from the stereotypical "American" as you can get. (Which is the reason I still think there is hope for you guys ).

But you can hardly deny the "exceptionalist" streak is very strong in the American culture. "We know the best. We are the best. If someone else is good, that's fine, so long as we're the best." etc. etc. etc. At least that's the image your media keep projecting outwardly.

Hey guys, remember that thread we made about Puerto Rico? You know, the one where the Puerto Ricans could vote to decide to join the Union? Yeah, that was a great thread. It's also a good idea. I think it's a lot better than the old idea the Europeans had where you just show up on a distant shore, say in Africa, Australia, Asia, North America, or South America and just murder and take what you want, then force that land to be a colony. Establish your political system on completely innocent tribes or just wipe them out completely. You know, fun!

Man, Americans and their nationalism. It's out of control.

Of course, once the Americans won their freedom, they kind of restricted its meaning to include only white English speaking men, and happily continued where the Europeans had stopped.

So...

 

[Traitorfish]

Hey guys, remember that thread we made about Puerto Rico? You know, the one where the Puerto Ricans could vote to decide to join the Union? Yeah, that was a great thread. It's also a good idea. I think it's a lot better than the old idea the Europeans had where you just show up on a distant shore, say in Africa, Australia, Asia, North America, or South America and just murder and take what you want, then force that land to be a colony. Establish your political system on completely innocent tribes or just wipe them out completely. You know, fun!

Man, Americans and their nationalism. It's out of control.

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

Just carrying on the fine old European traditions, eh?