America may be a paradise for introverts, but from what I’ve seen (I’ve lived there for 12 years), america is much less introverted than europe.
Consider the schools, for example – in america, students are encouraged to participate in class, and there are lots of projects involving student presentation. In europe (in my experience), such presentations are much rarer, and students are instead encouraged to stfu.
There may be more in southern europe, though. I don’t know.
I think there’s a failure of reasoning in the original, linked post.
People in places of high population density don’t become more extroverted. That would be unsustainable. They increase the mental walls between themselves and others, in order to be able to get through the day without crippling themselves with human interaction.
Compare the behavior of a pedestrian in a major American city to that African village where people do nothing but greet each other all day.
Europeans stress introversion because they need it in order to survive in their crowded conditions. America is hell for dorks.
I remember once reading that Europeans appreciate “surreal” humor. Think “a dog walks into a bar, shotgun in hand…,” whereas Americans like, for lack of a single word to describe it, “humor that makes fun of somebody.” More direct, more generic. This sounds to me like Europe is for the dorks, even while maintaing that the top dorks in Europe prefer American universities.
I’ve never been in Europe long enough to make a proper comparison (longest visit: 10 days in Copenhagen – my god what a nice place!). Having said that, I’ll take Europe. I don’t care much for having kids, so far like the single life, and since having moved to the bay area much prefer it to the suburbs of the hinterland (central valley CA), though I agree with TGGP that the suburbs are so damned comfortable.
The dork paradise is not a polity at all. If you’re a bachelor dork, the paradise is a decent-paying job you can do 20 hours a week via net. That way you can travel wherever you want, do whatever you want, and think whatever you want. If you like being in one place or want to get married and have kids, that’s a different story.
Scandinavians are stereotypically introverted while southern europeans are less so.
Interesting point about humor, Dain. The English also seem to think Germans have a very different sense of humor.
Eric’s idea of separating work from location/residency is one of the reasons suburbs were created (I live and work in the suburbs, but they are two different suburbs).
[...] 26, 2009 — Isak Dain made an interesting point about American humor in the comments over here. He pointed out that Americans particularly like type of humor where one is making fun of someone, [...]
Dain, I think the word you may be looking for is schadenfreude, although I’ve been told by native German speakers that the term implies a faint sense of shame experienced by the onlooker for enjoying others’ suffering.
Another potentially useful descriptor would be ‘low-concept’. Americans are notorious for liking slapstick and broad comedy more than conceptual humor, and I find that the stereotype often holds.
There are subcultures here that find British / Canadian comedy to be more worthwhile – specifically, geeks or nerds are far more likely to enjoy conceptual absurdity more than pure suffering.
Most humor contains elements of both – and when you consider that absurd juxtapositions of concepts induces a dissonance within the listeners’ minds that is itself unpleasant or motivates them to resolve it, perhaps all humor revolves around pain of one kind or another.
I often associated England with a certain kind of humor, but not Canada. There do seem to be plenty of Canadians in American comedy though.
Jim Holt has a book on jokes and diavlogged with Will Wilkinson on it. He notes that Jewish humor has an aspect of “jaunty superiority” over other ethnic groups, but is also neurotic and self-critical. Steve Sailer says that mid-century Jewish humor on television centered on hostility between characters, whereas English humor was about trying to maintain social decorum. At the same time its often characterized as having a penchant for the absurd.
August 26, 2009 at 1:14 am
America may be a paradise for introverts, but from what I’ve seen (I’ve lived there for 12 years), america is much less introverted than europe.
Consider the schools, for example – in america, students are encouraged to participate in class, and there are lots of projects involving student presentation. In europe (in my experience), such presentations are much rarer, and students are instead encouraged to stfu.
There may be more in southern europe, though. I don’t know.
August 26, 2009 at 6:01 am
Funny how so many of those US introverts are so much louder and obnoxious than the average Europeans. I’m excluding the UK of course.
August 26, 2009 at 11:02 am
I’ll take you on, euro-dude. Meet me in the Atlantic Ocean at dawn.
August 26, 2009 at 11:26 am
I think there’s a failure of reasoning in the original, linked post.
People in places of high population density don’t become more extroverted. That would be unsustainable. They increase the mental walls between themselves and others, in order to be able to get through the day without crippling themselves with human interaction.
Compare the behavior of a pedestrian in a major American city to that African village where people do nothing but greet each other all day.
Europeans stress introversion because they need it in order to survive in their crowded conditions. America is hell for dorks.
August 26, 2009 at 12:57 pm
I remember once reading that Europeans appreciate “surreal” humor. Think “a dog walks into a bar, shotgun in hand…,” whereas Americans like, for lack of a single word to describe it, “humor that makes fun of somebody.” More direct, more generic. This sounds to me like Europe is for the dorks, even while maintaing that the top dorks in Europe prefer American universities.
I’ve never been in Europe long enough to make a proper comparison (longest visit: 10 days in Copenhagen – my god what a nice place!). Having said that, I’ll take Europe. I don’t care much for having kids, so far like the single life, and since having moved to the bay area much prefer it to the suburbs of the hinterland (central valley CA), though I agree with TGGP that the suburbs are so damned comfortable.
August 26, 2009 at 3:38 pm
The dork paradise is not a polity at all. If you’re a bachelor dork, the paradise is a decent-paying job you can do 20 hours a week via net. That way you can travel wherever you want, do whatever you want, and think whatever you want. If you like being in one place or want to get married and have kids, that’s a different story.
August 26, 2009 at 7:55 pm
Scandinavians are stereotypically introverted while southern europeans are less so.
Interesting point about humor, Dain. The English also seem to think Germans have a very different sense of humor.
Eric’s idea of separating work from location/residency is one of the reasons suburbs were created (I live and work in the suburbs, but they are two different suburbs).
August 26, 2009 at 9:48 pm
Here is the link for my comment about Americans vs. Europeans:
http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/uk-news/page.cfm?method=full&objectid=12251019
August 26, 2009 at 11:15 pm
That is interesting about the humor, Dain. It matches quite well with what I’ve experienced.
August 27, 2009 at 12:05 am
[...] 26, 2009 — Isak Dain made an interesting point about American humor in the comments over here. He pointed out that Americans particularly like type of humor where one is making fun of someone, [...]
August 27, 2009 at 1:48 pm
Dain, I think the word you may be looking for is schadenfreude, although I’ve been told by native German speakers that the term implies a faint sense of shame experienced by the onlooker for enjoying others’ suffering.
Another potentially useful descriptor would be ‘low-concept’. Americans are notorious for liking slapstick and broad comedy more than conceptual humor, and I find that the stereotype often holds.
There are subcultures here that find British / Canadian comedy to be more worthwhile – specifically, geeks or nerds are far more likely to enjoy conceptual absurdity more than pure suffering.
Most humor contains elements of both – and when you consider that absurd juxtapositions of concepts induces a dissonance within the listeners’ minds that is itself unpleasant or motivates them to resolve it, perhaps all humor revolves around pain of one kind or another.
August 27, 2009 at 8:30 pm
I often associated England with a certain kind of humor, but not Canada. There do seem to be plenty of Canadians in American comedy though.
Jim Holt has a book on jokes and diavlogged with Will Wilkinson on it. He notes that Jewish humor has an aspect of “jaunty superiority” over other ethnic groups, but is also neurotic and self-critical. Steve Sailer says that mid-century Jewish humor on television centered on hostility between characters, whereas English humor was about trying to maintain social decorum. At the same time its often characterized as having a penchant for the absurd.
August 28, 2009 at 12:34 pm
A lot of “American” humor is actually Canadian, one way or another, frequently adapted for American tastes.
“You Can’t Do That On Television” is a classic example of Canadian comedy that became popular in the US.
August 28, 2009 at 8:39 pm
I never saw that, but it sounds like the name of a Frank Zappa album I heard of.
August 29, 2009 at 10:35 am
You never saw it? It was one of the defining shows of the early Nickelodeon era. Its use of ‘slime’ permanently warped a generation of young people.
August 29, 2009 at 11:06 am
Nickelodeon was a cable channel.