Stereotypes in regions of Europe

[MidasKnight]

I've often wondered how different regions of Europe were viewed within Europe itself.

For instance, here in America, California is generally viewed by Californians to be high class, refined. The rest of the country generally views Californians as pretentious and materialistic.

Both views are pretty accurate.

The South (Mississippi, Georgia, etc) is generally viewed as slow, unrefined ... generally redneck.

Granted, these are stereotypes ...

What up in Europe? Is London the center of the universe there? Is it Paris? Is Finland Europe's version of the American South?

If you're a Londoner, do you view Newcastle as the redneck area? If so, what does that make Scotland? Hillbillies?

Discuss.

[laurie]

If so, what does that make Scotland? Hillbillies?

You may have hit a bullseye there, MK. A clear majority of Appalachian "hillbillies" are of Scottish descent.

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

I've often wondered how different regions of Europe were viewed within Europe itself.
...
Discuss.

It's impossible to discuss. Views, reputations and prejudices are as numerous as the population itself. They can be limited to a single person or be shared by a family / school / suburb / town / province / political party / language group / country, the list is endless.

One of the best parodies to broadly describe the silly stereotypes in Europe is the movie "Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines, Or How I Flew from London to Paris in 25 Hours 11 Minutes."

Are stereotypes in American TV shows accurate?
Do Yanks always drink beer straight from the bottle?
Do Krauts always drink beer from 1 liter tankards?
Do Frog Eaters smoke like Turks?
Is Limey cuisine horrible?
Are Spics lazy?
Are Scots stingy?
Are ship's engineers always Scottish?
Can't Chinese pronounce the R?
Are Belgian dentists fiscal frauds?
Are Flemings gullible retards?

My personal view of people in other towns / regions / countries / continents is also my favourite rebuttal: "They're people, just like us."

[voralfred]

Well, I don't remember hearing the one about fiscal frauds, though I did see the movie "Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines, Or How I Flew from London to Paris in 25 Hours 11 Minutes."

I wonder if there is a prejudice about Turks smoking like Frog Eaters, too... ?
Anyway, one prejudice that a lot of Frog Eaters do have about their northern neighbors is pretty much bottled in, as it were, in the following joke. Of course the following disclaimer applies:
All characters appearing in this joke are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

One foggy night, a mathematical physicist Frog Eater is heading north from Paris and a Belgian dentist is driving south from Antwerp. While crossing a narrow bridge, they hit each other head-on, mangling both cars.  The man from Antwerp manages to climb out of his car and survey the damage.  He looks at his twisted car and says, "Man, I'm lucky to be alive!" Likewise, the Frog Eater gets out of his car uninjured, he too feeling fortunate to have survived. The Belgian guy walks over to him and says, "Hey, man, I think this is a sign that we should put away our petty differences and live as friends instead of being rivals." The Parisian thinks for a moment and says, "You know, you're absolutely right! We should be friends. In fact, I'm going to see if something else survived the wreck." He pops open his trunk and removes a full, undamaged bottle of Jack Daniel's. He says to the man from Antwerp, "I think this is another sign we should toast to our newfound friendship." The latter agrees and grabs the bottle. After sucking down half of the bottle, he hands it back to the Frog Eater and says, "Your turn!" The other one calmly twists the cap back on the bottle, throws the bottle over the bridge into the river and says, "Nah, I think I'll just wait for the cops to show up".

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

Well, I don't remember hearing the one about fiscal frauds ...

"The Belgian Dentist" is a stereotypical term in the financial world. Just google for "the+belgian+dentist" and you'll see what I mean. (I include the quotes in the search term, otherwise you get annoying advertising)

I wonder if there is a prejudice about Turks smoking like Frog Eaters, too... ?

"Hij rookt als een Turk" (He smokes like a Turk) or "Hij rookt als een schoorsteen" (He smokes like a chimney) are Flemish expressions denoting a heavy smoker. But I have no idea whether the Turkish smoke a lot. Maybe it's derived from the nargileh (waterpipe) producing more smoke?

In cartoons and parodies I've often seen Frenchmen depicted as wearing a dark beret and with a Gauloise dangling from the lips (never the women though).

Spoiler: show

(Wasn't BB lovely?)

... "Nah, I think I'll just wait for the cops to show up".

LOL
The Dutch tell the exact same joke, except that a Dutchman replaces the Parisian, and the polyglot Antwerpian doesn't need to speak a foreign language. Yes, we Belgians are caught between several rocks and a wet place.
We, Europe's battleground, have been invaded and/or ruled by the Romans, the Franks, the French, the Spanish, the French again, the Austrians, the French once more, the Dutch and finally the Germans (twice), with occasional interstitial sprinklings of looting Vikings and visiting armies. Of course this was fertile ground to grow multiple mutual stereotypes.
Fortunately we've had positive influences too. We've inherited Roman civilisation, some Spanish temper, a lot of Burgundian refinement, the Code Napoléon, the German Gründlichkeit, the Austrian Gemütlichkeit, the Dutch ... the Dutch ..., the English stiff upper lip, Coca Cola® and the Pirelli Pin-ups.

[MidasKnight]

This question originally came from a conversation I had with our Japanese exchange student.

I am always fascinated by other cultures (should have never become an engineer ... oh wait, engineering pays the bills) so I asked her what she learned about America or Americans in her first week here that she wasn't taught in Japan.

Her answer: Americans have big hearts. The Japanese do not.

Due to her limited grasp of English, I interpreted this as "Americans are more friendly. The Japanese are more stoic."

Remember, stereotypes are convenient and mostly accurate, but their downfall is that they are very often not accurate.

I realized I know a lot about the differing stereotypes in different regions of the United States, but barely knew about Europe and was curious, not to prepetuate stereotypes, but just to understand the basic cultures.

All I really have is that Germans are stoic and meticulous ... and Finns are good racecar drivers.

What else?

[gpackin]

Do Yanks always drink beer straight from the bottle?

Unfortunately a large majority do. However, I aim to change that one friend at a time. If someone drinks beer at my house I insist that they use the proper glass for the style of beer they are drinking. This causes my friends to call me a beer snob and make fun of me, but I just ask them "do you drink wine straight from the bottle?" This usually helps them get the point.

[MidasKnight]

What's wrong with drinking wine from the bottle?

I usually take it out of the bag first ...

[MidasKnight]

Do Yanks always drink beer straight from the bottle?

Unfortunately a large majority do. However, I aim to change that one friend at a time. If someone drinks beer at my house I insist that they use the proper glass for the style of beer they are drinking. This causes my friends to call me a beer snob and make fun of me, but I just ask them "do you drink wine straight from the bottle?" This usually helps them get the point.

I believe this is largely based on the quality of beer ... mostly.

Americans are coming around, but still a large amount of us drink really bad beer. Why pour really bad beer into a glass? I tend to avoid purchasing any beer that can be bought in 30-packs, but maybe that's just me.

There is a strong trend now in the United States towards appreciating quality beer. I, for one, am very happy to see this. Traditionally, in the United States, beer was cheap, watered down crap. I didn't realize until I was in my twenties that the reason I didn't like beer was because I never had any good beer.

Come on people, give me more stereotypes!!!

Which countries have higher crime? Which countries are more snobbish? Which countries dislike outsiders? Which countries are friendly to outsiders? Which countries (besides France) particularly dislike the United States and is England really our best friend over there?

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

What's wrong with drinking wine from the bottle?

I want to be able to stick my nose in the glass and smell the wine's aroma.

Spoiler: show

That's why I hate wine glasses with a rim diameter less than 7 cm.
(BTW. I'm not the guy in the picture.)

[MidasKnight]

I was joking.

I am an avid wine drinker and yes, smallish wine glasses are dumb!

[voralfred]

(....)
Are Belgian dentists fiscal frauds?
(...)
My personal view of people in other towns / regions / countries / continents is also my favourite rebuttal: "They're people, just like us."

I personally cannot swear about that but if you want to know the stereotypes that the average Belgian dentist has about custom collectors, just click here.

[umsolopagas]

Can't Chinese pronounce the R?


My personal view of people in other towns / regions / countries / continents is also my favourite rebuttal: "They're people, just like us."

The demographics of my country is quite diverse and all ethnic groups are largely classified by their lingual differences. All the diverse vernaculars have their own peculiarities which are usually distinguishable when speaking a common language (English being our official language).

People from my tribe have problems with the "th" sound which usually comes out as "d", some ethnicities have difficulty pronouncing the L sound, others have issues with "sh" (usually comes out as a more strident "ssss"),

Romanisation did not take into account the Chinese and all similarly afflicted communities but we can all laugh at them and ourselves, although Hollywood and those TV shows have stretched Chinese accent way past the limit.

[KeE]

Here's an artist who has mapped- yep, real cartography- stereotypes all over the world. Recognised quite a lot of them...
http://alphadesigner.com/art-store/coll ... ereotypes/

[MidasKnight]

Thanks!