My ex-husband was from St. Louis, MO, and he used to find it astounding that so many of the black people around here were Francophones. He'd say, "Yo, bro'," and they'd reply, "Qu'est-ce que vous avez dit?" The fact that he found this so odd (and funny) was a sign of how ingrained the American experience was for him. Over and over he was running into ways the American experience of life was not the same as the Canadian experience. (Like the time he was so sure that all the stores would be open on Boxing Day....)
Yes, I find American culture quite different in a lot of ways, particularly its inclusion of black and Hispanic culture, which really doesn't translate to our Canadian experience - or the language used to describe it - even for those who are black or Hispanic Canadians.
I think American TV can and does speak to Canadians - why else would we be enthralled by Smallvile or Buffy or Stargate-SG1? But I think also we're at a remove from so many things that Americans (and therefore American TV shows) take for granted as 'reality', and that gives us a cognitive dissonance that is sometimes confusing, sometimes just amusing.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2003-09-09 06:23 pm (UTC)Yes, I find American culture quite different in a lot of ways, particularly its inclusion of black and Hispanic culture, which really doesn't translate to our Canadian experience - or the language used to describe it - even for those who are black or Hispanic Canadians.
I think American TV can and does speak to Canadians - why else would we be enthralled by Smallvile or Buffy or Stargate-SG1? But I think also we're at a remove from so many things that Americans (and therefore American TV shows) take for granted as 'reality', and that gives us a cognitive dissonance that is sometimes confusing, sometimes just amusing.