Intercultural differences ! (1)    Harriet Welty Rochefort and webmaster Philippe Rochefort doing what the French love to do most - earnestly discussing life with a French friend, over a cup of coffee on the terrace of a bistro.

A few stereotypes of how the French and Americans often see each other....

 The Americans see the French as ...

Read about the image of France in the US press.

The French see the Americans as ...

  • arrogant and sure they are always right and good, moralizing and overly religious
  • people who do not know other nations and whose press never addresses international issues : read more about it, see a few examples, try our French Quiz and read a funny letter about it
  • people who do not take criticism (see some of them...)
  • de grands enfants (ie, people who are naive and have no, or a too short, history)
  • people who have free access to guns and who use them to shoot each other when things go wrong
  • people who are arch-capitalists and only think about money
  • Clik for the image of America for the French in history, the popular image of America and what the French do not understand about America
  • etc...

 Of course these are broad generalizations and once Americans and French really start talking to each other and explaining their societies to each other, the stereotyped vision changes. There's more room for "grey" in what is generally seen in black and white. See the mutual stereotypes of the 25 European countries

A psychoanalytical view....

 Pascal Baudry is a Frenchman who lives in California where he runs an organization, WDHB, that holds seminars on international management. His cyberbook gives fascinating explanations of intercultural differences between the French and the Americans :

  • For him, the key factor is in infancy : the fact that Americans are weaned early and toilet trained late when the French are weaned much later and toilet trained much earlier (Pascal Baudry is a psychoanalyst, was trained as an engineer and also got and MBA degree)

 

  • Later, education develops major differences : schools help American kids become independent and autonomous (their mother says : "have fun ") whereas French kids learn the principle of authority (the mother says : "be good "). Read more details in French Toast.
  • According to Baudry, the major cultural differences come from infancy and education :

 Americans

 French
  •  are highly explicit
  • are highly implicit
  •  optimist and positive : value present and future ; good at action
  • pessimist and negative : value past ; good at analysis and criticism
  •  binary : "it is true or false"
  • contextual : "it depends"
  •  like what is simple
  • like what is complex
  •  do not lie (it is bad)
  • lying is no big deal
  •  want to be loved
  •  want to be independent
  •  social identity is based on the individual
  • based on being a member of a group
  •  law and contracts must be respected ; everything is in the contract once it is signed
  • try not to get caught ; signing a contract is just the beginning
  •  a contract is not linked to the relationship
  •  the contract is strongly associated with the relationship
  •  process oriented : everything must be clear and documented ; reacts as planned
  •  like grey zones and nuances ; very creative ; very quick to react and sometimes more inventive
  •  try to get a win-win deal
  •  if the other one wins, it means that I'll lose
  •  DOING : you are judged on what you do
  •  BEING : you are judged on what you are
  An example : with the same word ("to do" and "faire"), you get two very different meanings :
    •  positive : a "doer" is someone who gets things done
    •  negative : a "faiseur" is someone who is arrogant and obnoxious
  •  value quality of work
  • value quality of life
  •  etc....
  •  etc....

 DID YOU KNOW THAT. For Baudry as for many observers, there are fewer differences between the French and the Japanese than with the French and Americans ; in both France and Japan, the relation with the authority principle, the individual and the group, the importance of not being blunt, etc.. are very similar and both countries have a long feudal history. Baudry links it to the fact that they have the same toilet-training and weaning traditions.
Anti-French America...

Contemptuous : about the evidence of Iraqi threat (as brilliantly demonstrated by Colin Powell!) "...so convincing that only an imbecile, or maybe a Frenchman, could conclude differently... " (NYT Feb.5, 2003). He was refering to massive destruction weapons (which are still to be found). Read my comment about it and read a letter from a Harvard student.  
Some revealing perceptions about France (from a Poll published in Figaro Magazine, July 2004) :
  • Only one American out of five ranks correctly France in terms of economic power (among the 5 major economic powers) : the American image does not correspond to the economic reality and is a conventional traditional view ; 25% rank France beyond 10th ! See more detail.
  • Many Americans ignore that many industrial French companies are world leaders in their field and keep associationg France with wine and perfume. See more about it.
  • As seen by Americans, France is a very different country from the one we know her (read Guillemette Faure about it)
  • More to come....
 

 

France and the French, as seen by the U.S. press : zero, except for clichés : read more about it

 

Visit miquelon.org, the authoritative site on French-bashing, with appalling quotes and links to racist and hate sites. See a few examples and more about French-bashing.

Hate the French ? See a list of a few anti-French books...

And how about French-bashing ?

  • A very typical form of French-bashing is what I would call "collateral bashing" : you take one very negative thing on one side, and something about the French on the other. The reader or the viewer will make an involontary association and that's it. For instance, you put in the same article "...Jack the Ripper killed nine women....(and further along) .... Jacques Chirac declares that it is time to subsidize cheese..." : the reader may conclude that Jack the Ripper was subsidized by France. Read my column about it and see a few documents to substantiate it.
  • About French-bashing, visit an excellent site on French-bashing, read a "letter" I received and read Paris Diary (after a trip to the USA). French americanophiles are very hurt by French-bashing : read a letter about it.

    This is the cover page of the New York Post (Feb 14, 2003) about "the Weasel Axis" and Iraq evidence... (still to be found!)

     
  • Racist ? : Knox (see above) says : "No other national or ethnic group appears to get the same continually negative treatment in print media reserved for France and the French, with the possible exception of Arabs or Palestinians, and even there, the treatment is not so much cultural as political, linked to a specific context or event." He also says "If one were to substitute, for example, "Mexican" or "Japanese" or "Indian" for "French", what would reader reaction be ?". Try to do it the next time you read an article about the French in the NYT! Read my editorial about American racism...
  • The French are irritating... In 2002 the British European Commissioner Chris Patten, the German Minister of Foreign Affairs Joshka Fischer and his French colleague Hubert Védrine expressed the same (negative) opinion about the policy of the US government. Only the latter was heavily criticized by the US Press and the US government. One year later, Russia, Germany and Frence opposed the (absurd) invasion of Iraq. Condoleeza Rice, then adviser to president Georgez W.Bush said : "Forgive Russia, forget Germany, punish France". Says Colombani: " ...the President (of the USA) is the headmaster and the Europeans are the students. Whenever there's noise in the class, without even turning around, the professor designates the French student as the author of the disturbance "
  • Read Jefferson about the benevolent French people...
  • More to come

 THE ANTI-FRENCH QUOTE OF THE YEAR was provided by President George W.Bush himself when he said "You know the trouble with the French, they don't even have a word for "entrepreneur" (!!!)" (Sunday Times, July 21, 2002).

Stereotypes : what other countries think of France and the French

 (source : Francoscopie 1999)

  • the Japanese : sophisticated, conservative, elegant, art de vivre, noisy, brutal and dirty, cheerful and patient (see a letter from Japan)
  • the Americans : creative, not open, cold and wary (and anti-American)
  • the Dutch : culture, respectful of human rights, welcoming and open
  • the Danes and the British : disorganized and aggressive
  • the Poles and the Swedes : inveterate talkers, exuberant, impatient, distant and inhospitable
  • the Swiss : unsafe, crime
  • the Germans : they say "happy as God in France"
  • the Belgians : messy, inefficient, self-satisfied
  • the Brazilians : the French do not like children
  • all of the above : arrogant. My God!!
  • Read Frischer and a quote by a writer from Quebec ; Nadeau, who is Canadian, wrote "France is a mouse with the skin of an elephant ; America is an elephant with the skin of a mouse" !

And the French about themselves :

  • "The French constitute the most brilliant and the most dangerous nation in Europe and the best qualified in turn to become an object of admiration, hatred, pity or terror but never indifference" (Alexis de Tocqueville)
  • "General de Gaulle is right to believe he truly incarnates the French, he is wrong to believe it is flattering" (Jean François Revel)
  • Read about France as seen by Charles de Gaulle in the History section.
  • More later...

It is funny to observe that many of the stereotypes about the French (arrogant, frivolous, quarrelsome, etc...) were the stereotypes about the Gauls by Roman or Greek authors : read a few quotes about it !

From the American Press :

  • In The Washingtonian (who reads that?) dated July 1997, a certain David Brooks, described as "liking to vacation in France" (I'd hate to meet him) writes :"Other nations have accepted their diminished stature. They meekly accept the spread of American popular culture, American political might and the increasing dominance of the English language. But not France ! The French are too great a nation to let their sense of glory be brought low by something as trivial as reality" and also :"You despise them (the French) a lot of the time, but you can't help admiring them, too. Especially because they always lose".
  • "... Crushing taxation may be one reason that an estimated 5 million Europeans tried to become permanent U.S. residents last year. Or perhaps they are simply tired of drinking lukewarm beverages with Lilliputian ice cubes, driving Altoids box-sized cars, or smelling too many Frenchmen who clearly could use a shot of the ozone destroying effluents formerly found in spray-on deodorants...." (The Washington Times, House Editorial, July 22, 2001)
  • "...the USA and France do have different interests. And on those interests, the USA will continue to act as a unilateral superpower. It will because it can. The stark fact is that America is a lot more important and visible to France than France is to America." (The International Herald Tribune, February 8, 2002)
  • More to come...

The British gutter press provides an endless flow of anti-French views. Examples of the traditional French-English love-hate relationship:

  • "I do not dislike the French for the vulgar antipathy between neighbouring nations, but for their insolent and unfounded airs of superiority" (Horace Walpole 1787) from the "I Hate the French Official Handbook"
  • "Oh please, spare us all from France.... What a worthless bunch of bullies and braggarts the French are" (Julie Burchill, Sunday Times July 7, 1995)
  • More to come...

 USEFUL TIPS.... The world famous comic strip books "Asterix and Obelix" (more than 310 million sold) give an excellent idea of how the French see themselves : the whole world is against them but they do not care ! In a small village, totally surrounded, with the whole world against them and particularly the powerful Romans (meaning the Americans...?), they have fun eating, singing and drinking, and the Romans are afraid of them. They survive thanks to the magic potion elaborated by their druid and which gives them a formidable strength and because they are more astute that the external world which keeps bugging them when all they want is to enjoy their life and eat wild boar in their lengthy banquets... Read these books (in English) : they are a lot of fun and you might learn something about the French ! See a cartoon of Asterix and Obelix and read what Roman authors wrote about the Gauls : you could write it about the French! Near Charles-de-Gaulle airport, the "Parc Asterix" is a theme park devoted to these characters : it is smaller and less spectacular than Euro Disney but not bad at all. It is interesting to observe that this quintessentially French character was created by René Goscinny (of Polish origin) and Albert Uderzo (of Italian origin), illustrating the melting-pot of the French society.

French Artists no one knows outside France !

 Language is very important for the French and, in many cases, it does not translate easily because the themes are so deeply rooted in French culture that they would not touch a non-French listener or reader. For example :

  • The most largely read French author of the 20th century was San-Antonio : under this pseudonym, Frédéric Dard wrote around 200 books, each of them selling an average 400,000 copies. They illustrate the Rabelaisian side of the French perfectly (from François Rabelais 1494-1553) : sex, scatology and puns ; they are clearly impossible to translate but very funny indeed.
  • One of the most cherished singers of the 1950s-1980s is Georges Brassens who, accompanied only by his guitar and a bass, sang wonderfully poetic (and often off color) songs ; everything is in the words, sometimes from the most famous French poets (Victor Hugo, François Villon, Lamartine, Jacques Prévert, etc).

 

  • The most successful (in France) French films did not have a brilliant career (or had no career at all) in the USA : the film that attracted the largest audience (>20 million) is "La Grande Vadrouille" (1966), starring Bourvil and Louis de Funès and "Les Visiteurs" (1992), with Jean Reno and Christian Clavier, also a big success in France was a total flop in the US.
  • Other very famous (in France) French artist include Johnny Hallyday (rock singer), Isabelle Adjani (movie star), Coluche (comedian), Maurice Pialat (film maker), etc...
  • More about French singers
  • More to come

The American artists the French like the best ...

Of course the French know and like most major American artists but, not to mention Jerry Lewis, the French love some American artists who do not seem to be as widely appreciated in the U.S.A..

  • A typical example is Woody Allen, who is probably one of the most popular film-makers in France and Michael Moore and Clint Eastwood are also very well regarded.
  • Some American artists living in Paris - singer Dee Dee Bridgewater, orchestra conductor William Christie, pianist Jay Gottlieb, dancer Carolyn Carlson, comedian Django Edwards, actor John Malkowich (in Provence), writers Douglas Kennedy and Nancy Huston (Canadian, in Berry), etc...-are also very popular
  • In the past, the French loved Nina Simone, Mort Shumann, Man Ray, Josephine Baker (before WWII), Eddie Constantine (in the 1950s), Sidney Bechet and Kenny Clarke among many Afro-American jazzmen, Richard Wright, James Baldwin and Chester Himes, among many Afro-American writers, etc ... who lived in Paris in the 1950s
  • See the choice of American artists by a very respected left-wing magazine
  • More to come ...

See a list of American artists and writers having resided in France and American writers more popular in France than in the USA ; for the most popular French personalities, click here

 

More on intercultural differences

 Click here for :

To more intercultural

To intercultural management

To table of contents

Back to home page

For more on intercultural differences, order Harriet Welty Rochefort's books :

  • "French Toast, An American in Paris Celebrates The Maddening Mysteries of the French", St.Martin's Press, New York, 1999
  • "French Fried, The Culinary Capers of An American in Paris", St.Martin's Press, New York, 2001

More on Harriet's books (excerpts, upcoming events, testimonials, etc..)

Together or separately, Philippe and Harriet speak about Intercultural Differences : click here for information.

 site still under construction
To email us

 If you like this site, please bookmark it or create a link!

To top of the page