Guns! Steak! Freedom!
In which my students think about cultural stereotypes, and I relive the Taxi Driver Conversation.
Many of our students will spend at least part of their degree programme in the US, at one of our campus’ partner universities. As part of their preparation, in their second year we run a course that focuses on culture and life in the US. In a recent lesson, I asked them to think about cultural stereotypes.
“What kinds of things do you think Americans enjoy?” I asked as a starter.
Most of the responses were predictable. Guns! Hamburgers! Cars! Steak! Some were more abstract. “Freedom!” shouted one student. “Individualism!” said another.
Others were a little more linguistically challenging. “Rugby!” said one boy. Chinese uses the same word (literally “olive ball”) for both rugby and American football, so that confusion is common. Hopefully they learn the difference before they go to the US and start asking about the college rugby team.
To try and puncture some of the stereotypes, I asked whether they thought all Americans had guns. “Do you think Miranda* has a gun?” I asked, referring to their American writing teacher. “No,” they responded. “Do you think Mike* has a gun?” I went on, pointing across the hall at my American co-worker in the other class. “Yes!” they shouted enthusiastically, and we all laughed. “No,” I told them. “Mike definitely does not have a gun. That’s a stereotype.” Later, a Chinese colleague told me that in Chinese, talking about somebody’s gun can be a rather suggestive double entendre. Now I’m suspicious about their enthusiastic laughter…
We moved on to stereotypes about the UK. “So what do you think people from the UK like?” I asked.
“Fish and chips! Umbrellas! Sunny days!” came the responses. I was a bit puzzled by the last one. I think it comes from their impression of the UK and especially London as a damp and foggy place, based on their reading of Oliver Twist in high school, or possibly on the famous pea-soupers of the 1950s. If you mention London, chances are someone will nod knowingly and say “Ah! London, Fog City.” Trying to explain that it’s not like that anymore seems to have no effect whatsoever.
I shared with them the classic taxi driver conversation that I’ve had more times than I can remember. In my mind, I capitalise it: The Taxi Driver Conversation.
The Taxi Driver Conversation goes something like this. I get in the car, and the driver immediately notices I’m a foreigner, a laowai.
“Where are you from?” he asks. (It’s usually a he, although occasionally I’ve met female taxi drivers, and when I do the conversation is usually different).
I might start by replying “Scotland”, but then have to explain that Scotland is part of the UK. (If I don’t, they usually think it’s somewhere in the former USSR).
“Ah!” he says. “A rich country!”
I try to explain that the UK also has many poor people. I don’t think he believes me.
“Over there, you eat steak every day!”
I try to explain that actually, steak is expensive and we only eat it now and again.
“And you eat bread with every meal!”
I try to explain that although we do eat a lot of bread, we don’t eat it with every meal. And that our bread is different from the soft sweet pale stuff that’s sold in the supermarkets here. Eventually, I give up.
There’s also a version of the Taxi Driver Conversation where he asks about my marital status, family, and how much I earn here. All things considered, I prefer the steak-and-bread version. But over the years, I’ve learned that it’s more interesting (for me) to turn the tables and start asking the driver where he comes from (most are migrants from other provinces), why he became a taxi driver, and how much he earns.
With the students, I don’t have to explain where Scotland is. Of course, they have stereotypes about that too. “That’s where men wear skirts!” they say. A previous generation of students would probably have mentioned Braveheart, but that seems to have dropped out of the public eye here. In a different class, talking about high-context and low-context cultures, one boy said he thought Scotland was a low-context culture, “because of the music.” When I asked him to elaborate, he mimed playing the bagpipes. “The music is very loud and direct,” he said, “so I think it must be low-context!”
Our students also have to face all sorts of stereotypes and assumptions when they go to the US or Europe, and we talked about how to deal with some of these. But my hope is that when they go abroad, they will meet kind people. Friendly people, who will engage with them as individuals, who will welcome them and help them understand the local culture better, and who will listen to their experiences and explanations of Chinese culture. At a time when there are fewer foreigners living in China than any period in recent history, and when it’s become more difficult for Chinese scholars and students to go to the US, I think it’s vital to seize every opportunity there is to communicate across cultures and learn a little more about each other. And I’ll try and remember that next time I’m in a Taxi Driver Conversation.
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