http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022641355Oh my.
TimberValley (154 posts) Tue Apr 9, 2013, 12:39 PM
How to make Americans more geographically literate?
We may have all heard those stories about how Americans can't name any more than a few countries on a map or have absurdly little knowledge about the world, its geography, its nations, etc.
Any way to improve on this? Or is this simply because of "America-is-the-center-of-the-world" attitude?
I say, uh, no.
The problem isn't the "America is the center of the world" attitude.
On Skins's island, for example, there's a lot of primitives who have the "Massachusetts [or New England] is the center of the world" attitude.
And there's other primitives who have the "California [or the west coast] is the center of the world" attitude. (Although one needs to note an even sorrier example; for the oblate spheroid cousin, San Diego is the center of the world.)
1-Old-Man (1,343 posts) Tue Apr 9, 2013, 12:42 PM
1. Teaching them how to read would be a good first step
bowens43 (14,129 posts) Tue Apr 9, 2013, 12:43 PM
2. yes, drop bombs on the countries you want them to know.....
1-Old-Man (1,343 posts) Tue Apr 9, 2013, 12:50 PM
6. I'm not so sure, seems to me we've bombed the shit out of lots of places people can't find on a map.
For instance, ask the man on the street to point out the Balkans on a Globe and see what that gets you. Hell, for that matter see how many folks can find Korea or Viet Nam, North or South, on a globe - both of which we bombed to smithereens within the last six decades.
But I dam sure agree with your sentiment. Back when we still had a draft at least most folks knew where Viet Nam was, but now with so very few people having any stake in the game (or kin in the meat-grinder if you prefer to think of it that way) its not too surprising that so few of us has any sense of the world in which we live.
sarisataka (1,814 posts) Tue Apr 9, 2013, 12:50 PM
5. I don't think it is
"America-is-the-center-of-the-world" attitude since most Americans have about equal knowledge of world and US geography. If you rotate the map ninety degrees they couldn't tell the difference between North and South Dakota even with Mount Rushmore on the map.
Oh Hell.
Over the years, the primitives have shown that they think North Dakota and South Dakota are very much alike, in the same way North Carolina and South Carolina are--which is about the same line of thinking that encourages one to believe that North America and South America are very much alike.
Stupid primitives. Primitives don't know shit.
KT2000 (9,608 posts) Tue Apr 9, 2013, 12:53 PM
7. An atlas and a globe should be in every home.
Costco sells the globes at the end of summer - for back to school.
The world could really use a low cost paperback atlas. Mine is held together with rubber bands (a few countries are off) because the ones I have found are too nice and expensive. It only needs to be a handy reference, not a coffee table show off book.
<<<has several atlases here, but the one most frequently used is an enormous coffee-table-sized tome, the
Hammond World Atlas from 1936.
Brigid (10,233 posts) Tue Apr 9, 2013, 01:23 PM
13. In my paralegal class last week . . .
Our instructor had us fill out a map of the states. The results were . . . Not good.
This reminds me of when the University of Nebraska left the Big 12 Conference and joined the Big 10 Conference a couple of years ago. Being the new kid on the block, we didn't have a whole lot to say about things, and had to take what we were given.
The effete eastern establishment elites, when looking at a map to find Nebraska, and to assign us somewhere, decided our main "rival" would be.....Iowa. ****ing Iowa. Iowa, of all people. "Oh, they're right next door to each other, and so they're alike; they're two peas in a pod."
Yeah, right.
Nebraska resembles Iowa as much as Qatar resembles North Korea.
