Cultural Misunderstandings: The French-American Experience (Paperback)

~ (Author), Carol Volk (Translator)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Volk's translation evokes the flavor of Carroll's French in an entertaining, informative book. The author is a U.S. citizen of French origin, an anthropologist and teacher at Oberlin College, who lived on a Micronesian island and wrote Nokoru Stories , about social customs there. Her inter-cultural experiences form the text of this illustrative, often witty book about why the French and the Americanseven when fluent in both languagescan confound each other with what seems uncivil behavior. Carroll explains cultural misunderstandings on such diverse areas as party manners, child-rearing, privacy, using the telephone and, most important, friendship. The examples are eye-opening and all-encompassing, a vital source for learning how to establish amity not only between the U.S. and France but among all the world's nations.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Description

Raymonde Carroll presents an intriguing and thoughtful analysis of the many ways French and Americans—and indeed any members of different cultures—can misinterpret each other, even when ostensibly speaking the same language. Cultural misunderstandings, Carroll points out, can arise even where we least expect them—in our closest relationships. The revealing vignettes that Carroll relates, and her perceptive comments, bring to light some fundamental differences in French and American presuppositions about love, friendship, and raising children, as well as such everyday activities as using the telephone or asking for information.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 162 pages
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press (June 15, 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0226094987
• ISBN-13: 978-0226094984
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #85,963 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

38 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good start for understanding cultural misunderstandings, February 18, 2000

By	Marie C Noel Martien (Baltimore) - See all my reviews

As a French citizen living in the States for now 10 years and dealing on a daily basis with intercultural communication, I found this book quite interesting.It is a good starting book for the one who studies intercultural communication as part of one's job. Even though some of the chapters are quite general and limited to some social environment, it will help the reader in going further in the subject. For me, it confirmed my decision to attend an intercultural management seminar. One of the most interesting remark from the author was how cultural analysis is probably more painful than psychoanalysis. I am in total agreement with this remark. Besides reading this book with lots of attention, I must say I enjoyed myself in reading about my own behavioral patterns as well as the ones from my American friends.

A book to read.

35 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Impartial & well presented views on both cultures, July 17, 2002

By A Customer

This book presents impartially both French & American perspectives on some major topics in daily life (conversation, parent-child relationship, information exchange, blame, ...) through some simple daily cultural misunderstanding scenes. It shade some light on how both sides look at the same issue, and accordingly how they act, and how different they are! All is presented without some fancy theories, but in an elegantly concise and knowledgable way of an ethnologist.
I read the french version directly so I cannot comment on the quality of the translation. I doubt, however, that there would be important points lost in the translation as the author writes clearly and does not play with linguistic nuances.
I am not American nor French, but I have spent part of my life in both countries. This book brings back to mind the old experiences (both positive & negative) and provide some light on the questions I have on both cultures that I have finally come to love.

27 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Cultural analysis as a technique to defuse misunderstandings, October 22, 1999

By A Customer

As an American who has lived in France for the last six years, I have a reciprocal experience to that described by Ms. Carroll. Over the last decade-plus, some details have changed (such as the use of the telephone), or her anecdotes reflect a limited milieu (as those about couples). Nonetheless, her well-taken point is that one needs to take a step back from situations in which cultural misunderstandings can occur. One needs to ask oneself, does this situation warrant a cultural analysis to be understood? That sounds academic, but it is very useful for avoiding hurt feelings.

Ms. Carroll gives many real-life examples which helps to render her analyses more concrete. Some of these are better chosen than others. However, I especially appreciated her argument that when a person from Culture Y says that "People from Culture X are like this", this sort of generalization is most revealing about the unrecognized presuppositions prevalent in Culture Y, and says nothing at all about Culture X. In my experience, this is true, both coming from me about France and from my French friends about the US.

Above all, this book could be enjoyed by expatriates (or ex-expatriates) of any flavor. It would be perhaps more fun for those who have lived in either the US or France for some time. I read it in French, so I can not comment on the quality of the translation, but trust that the author was able to supervise it since she has lived for so long in the US.