Why Do Some Think America has No Culture?

[xylophone]

Dont get excited hispanics in the US from our generation dont speak spanish unless they arrived fairly recently they speak a disgusting monstrosity that devolved from the worst from english spanish and computer lingo.

Ya, I know a couple first/second generation families that don't even teach their kids spanish.

- - - Updated - - -

I mean it in the most genuine and honest way possible, it would be great if more people spoke more than one language. If there is anything I envy from Canada and Europe is that people are able to speak many languages and it is praised rather than shunned upon by them.



Yeah that is so shameful, but I have a dream ;_;

I'd be happier if America could get their STEM shit together. TBH you can get by more easily in the U.S. knowing only english than knowing one language in Europe.

[Vizardlorde]

I mean it in the most genuine and honest way possible, it would be great if more people spoke more than one language. If there is anything I envy from Canada and Europe is that people are able to speak many languages and it is praised rather than shunned upon by them.



Yeah that is so shameful, but I have a dream ;_;

Well according to my Canadian born cousin the Quebecois dislike other canadians and would rather be independent if they could.

[xylophone]

Well according to my Canadian born cousin the Quebecois dislike other canadians and would rather be independent if they could.

Ya, my Vancouver relatives tell me west coast and east coast canadians hate each other.

[GreatOak]

Ya, my Vancouver relatives tell me west coast and east coast canadians hate each other.

Most people outside of Qubec can't speak French either.

10 million Canadians speak French (almost 1/3 of the population)
And 37 million Americans speak Spanish (a little over 10% of the population. America has a higher percentage of English speakers than Canada though by nearly 5%, which would suggest that Spanish speakers know more English than French speakers do in Canada.
From Pew: A record 37.6 million persons ages 5 years and older speak Spanish at home, according to an analysis of the 2011 American Community Survey by the Pew Research Center.

Spanish is, by far, the most spoken non-English language in the U.S. The next most spoken non-English languages are Chinese (with 2.8 million speakers), Hindi, Urdu or other Indic languages (2.2 million), French or French Creole (2.1 million), and Tagalog (1.7 million).


http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank...non-hispanics/
http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-re...1003_1-eng.cfm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...ing_population

[xylophone]

Most people outside of Qubec can't speak French either.

10 million Canadians speak French (almost 1/3 of the population)
And 37 million Americans speak Spanish (a little over 10% of the population. America has a higher percentage of English speakers than Canada though by nearly 10%, which would suggest that Spanish speakers know more English than French speakers do in Canada.
From Pew: A record 37.6 million persons ages 5 years and older speak Spanish at home, according to an analysis of the 2011 American Community Survey by the Pew Research Center.

Spanish is, by far, the most spoken non-English language in the U.S. The next most spoken non-English languages are Chinese (with 2.8 million speakers), Hindi, Urdu or other Indic languages (2.2 million), French or French Creole (2.1 million), and Tagalog (1.7 million).


http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank...non-hispanics/
http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-re...1003_1-eng.cfm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...ing_population

Fun fact: San Diego has the second largest Somali, Filipino and Chaldean populations in the U.S.

[Yvaelle]

I usually do that, but I'm confused about other things. Like: Oh crap, I'm outside?

:-/

I'm cultured! I swear it!

Yvaelle: You missed a third definition of culture, which is the process of micro-organisms growing. Some might say that best describes US culture (not bashing, I'm from the US).

I was considering how to work it in, but every way I came up with turned into a bash - I had a paragraph that rambled off-topic into something about over-use of antibiotics and all those horrible smelling cleaning products department stores use to sanitize things -it didn't make much sense. But it's true! Bacteria are very cultured!



- - - Updated - - -

The reason the Western U.S. looks like squares and rectangles is because of the PLSS used to allocate land during the conquest of The West. Older cities like Boston have a more "organic" look to them due to no real centralized city government so people just set up shop wherever was convenient. Kinda funny IMO how people point out our stubbornness to convert to something logical like the metric system and in the same thread cite our orderly city layouts as some indication of our lack of sophistication.

That's a good point

I suspect that the lack of city structure is more an indication of 'culture' because it requires a higher degree of local knowledge to memorize - having a grid street system is just far too easy on people from out of town! The Z and S distinction are different, because Z is viewed as more a variable to the English - it is a backup letter should you want to indicate the strangeness of something: same with X and Y.

Z's are not to be used in polite conversation! Far better that we use three or four letters to make the same sound via some S's and C's - than to allow a degenerate Z into a prim English word

[belfpala]

Just a question how did you got form knowing better to making peace?

I have no idea, I was just going with a general feeling like, "let's be peaceful" or something. My overall point being that people anywhere really do have common things to talk about; I suggested music in my example.