XXVII Международный конкурс научно-исследовательских и творческих работ учащихся
Старт в науке
Сравнительный анализ Британского и Американского национального характера и стиля жизни на основе романа Джоанны Троллоп «Девочка с Юга»
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INTRODUCTION
Since such a phenomenon as international communication is widely spread in modern life, the subject of this paper is, no doubt, of great importance nowadays. To speak the foreign language correctly one should not only know grammar of it but also its culture and national peculiarities.
As the English language the international one, the problem who speak it should know the culture of the countries where it is used at large. And especially the difference between the British and American national character. It is a common mistake to think that they are much the same. Every nation has its own culture, national, character and specific mode of life.
So the aim of this investigation work is to make a thorough analysis of the peculiarities of the national character of these two countries and to find out the coincidence and difference of them by means of Joanna’s Trollope novel “Girl from the South”.
Objective As The English language is the international one the problem who speak it should know the culture of the countries where it is used at large.
Hypothesis – British and American national character differs.
Theoretical Significance is that every language reflects the mentality of the nation and cultural-historical traditions of it. In recent years scientists also turn to the sphere of religion which influences greatly the formation of the national character and the interaction of the nation with the other countries and cultures.
Practical Significance for the interaction of the cultures it is very important to carry out careful and thorough investigation of the specification of national cultures and languages. The result of the investigation process can be winning respect for traditions and also cultural-religious, historical and spiritual inheritance of other nations and countries reflected in the language.
CHAPTER 1
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What is national character
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We know that such phenomenon as a national character exists. But you can ask: what is the national character?
From the point of view of the scientific studies it is very complicated. Scientists have not come to terms concerning the fact of national characters’ existence yet.
With all that, there are international values in the world. All people love, like and hate, are born and die, go through the definite stages of their development, and thus have common laws of existence.
Moreover, there are different groups in every society – social and aged – on the one hand having their own peculiarities, on the other hand – getting them closer to the similar groups in other countries.
Hence, in every culture there are general features that distinguish them from other nations. These peculiarities unite all members of the society. It is believed that we learn our culture only through knowledge of other cultures. That is why it is necessary to compare and analyze their basic values and beliefs.
Let’s take Americans, for example, the main American value is freedom. They consider themselves as the best in the world.
Another distinctive difference is in the attitude to change and future. Americans are generally less concerned about history and traditions than the British. "History doesn't matter," many of them will say. "It's the future that counts." They look ahead. People from many other cultures, as well as Britain, have a pronounced reverence for the past. In those cultures the future is considered to be in the hands of fate, God, or at least the few powerful people or families dominating society.
British consider their society as decent, tolerant and modern one. They are uncomfortable with terms such as liberation, capitalist, bourgeois. They prefer practical common sense to pure logic. So we can say that British is a cool-headed society.
But there is one common thing for the two nations, is the attitude towards time. For Americans and British, time is a resource, like water or coal, which can be used well or poorly. "Time is money." Thus, Americans and British admire a well-organized person, one who has a written list of things to do and a schedule for doing them. The ideal person is punctual and considerate of other people's time.
Thus, having looked and analyzed different literature we come to the conclusion that every nation has its own understanding of family, the relations in it and the attitude to children’s upbringing, career, traditions, strangers, and even food. They have their own system of values which have been formed with the development of the nation.
1.2 Views on family
Family as the main unit of society, brings people together, regulates the upbringing of a new generation.
To understand the national character of these two countries, their coincidence and difference it is very important to investigate their attitude towards family relations and children’s upbringing. The attitude to family differs greatly in Great Britain and the USA.
Stiffness and the famous British pragmatism take place in a family life. Married to the fore financial matters: life in the UK is rather expensive. A common problem is late children in the family. British couples used to have children, but only when firmly getting on their feet.
Another feature inherent in the English family is adherence to tradition.
The English family is such a family where the woman is the head. It consists of one generation and has slight connection with the other generations. The members of the family live in different regions of the country and their meetings are very short, uncommunicative and rare. They are not accustomed to show their feelings in public. This is their way of life and understanding of family.
In the U.S.A. the family is considered one of the top national values underlying the American way of life, so for example, most Americans are trying to keep a good reputation citizen and family man, subjecting this purpose, all his life's behavior. Credo of American family life - the family should be just happy.
An American family consists of two or even more generations. Unlike Great Britain families are very important to Americans.
1.3 Children’s upbringing
There exists the large difference between the American and British children’s upbringing.
One of the main principles of British upbringing can be explained by one phrase “We came to this world not for having fun”. This very fact is the starting point of children’s upbringing in Great Britain. The children in British families are brought up strictly.
Englishmen traditionally avoid excessive familiarity, avoid displays of intimacy.
The British like to say Churchill saying: If a single tree survives, it grows stronger. In London, you can often hear that but the Americans tend to think in terms of the family and the state, the more usual coordinates for an Englishman serve the individual and society. That is the main difference in children’s upbringing between British and American Society.
In the representation of Americans, and many other people, the family is like a harbor, where a man goes on his own and to which he returns in the storms of life. The English do not count on the support of close relatives in case of difficulties, but on the other hand, do not feel a sense of duty or responsibility. American children are usually surrounded by parents’ care, not deprived of attention, and family nature trips, picnics, excursions and country weekends are the tradition of the vast majority of American families. There is even the notion of «family day» - this is usually one of the weekend devoted entirely to the family. In addition, parents take their children with them everywhere: to the park, on a visit to a restaurant, to a party, to travel - and that is accepted by society absolutely normally. American parents routinely ask their children: “What do you want to be when you grow up?” This is one place in the world where the answer to the question matters. Kids are expected to dream, and then work at the dream.
In contrast with the British children the ones in the USA have more freedom.
1.4 Differences in food
These two countries have different attitude towards food and the way they prepare it.
For example, British food is boiled and bland while American country cooking uses more frying and fats hence tastier; American food is seasoned and, therefore, has taste. Though the British food is healthier and simpler than the American one.
Obviously, the American food culture permeated "fast food chains", which consists of high-calorie, fat and, above all, not fortified food. Many Europeans believe that American food consists of fast food, and the people are overweight and unhealthy.
Let’s take a typical English breakfast, for example, today it consists of eggs, bacon or sausage, mushrooms and baked beans, toast with jam and a cup of tea or juice. It is rather healthy breakfast.
If you compare American breakfast with European, once it becomes clear that, for Americans, it is the most harmful food for a whole day. Unlike the Central European Breakfast in America is considered mandatory. There are two choices of breakfast: the sweet and hearty breakfast.
The other example is the attitude to meat, so in Britain they are also fussier about where their food comes from, hence the popularity of organic and local farm produce, you can even find out the name of the farm upon which the pig was reared if you want to! Animal welfare is important and even non-organic meat is likely to come from outdoor-reared and free-range animals.
In the U.S. all meat is anonymous, factory-farmed, genetically-modified and stuffed with synthetic growth hormones to maximize yield and the animals fed on genetically-modified soya. From the above, it can be concluded that the British more care of their health, appearance and well-being than the Americans.
1.5 National holidays
At all times, in different nations, holiday was a special event, it stands out among the rest of the weekdays and it was of particular importance in the family, society and country. For many years in culture, numerous festive celebrations, and there were many ways to celebrate a particular date. Despite the fact that all the holidays somewhat diverse, many of them have something in common.
The largest number of festivals are international ones.
In the UK, there are officially only 38 Holidays: 5 of them official state holidays: New Year's Day, Catholic Good Friday, May Day in the United Kingdom, the Day of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, Christmas, 12 of them - festivals, anniversaries, etc., which are of great importance for the country, but not a holiday in the truest sense of the word, 21 - holidays celebrated throughout the country, but not official holidays. You can also mark religious festivals, there are only 7 - is a Catholic Good Friday, Catholic Easter , Day of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, Halloween - Halloween (Halloween, All Hallows Evening or Beggars Night ), All Saints 'Day, Guy Fawkes Day and Christmas Day.
There are 54 holiday in the U.S.A.: 7 - the official state holidays: New Year's Day, Martin Luther King Day, President's Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day and National Hunting and Fishing Day; 13 - festivals, anniversaries, etc., which are of great importance for the country, but not a holiday in the truest sense words, 34 - holidays celebrated throughout the country, but they are not official ones. You can also mark religious festivals, there are only 6 of them. As for personal holidays, it is natural birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, and many others that are celebrated with family and friends, or the holidays on a specific group of people.
We will consider only the main common and the most popular holidays of the two countries. They are: New Year's Day - January 1, Christmas - December 25, St. Valentine's Day - February 14, St. Patrick's Day - March 17, April Fool's Day - April 1, Halloween - 31 October, Easter - Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox, Independence Day - June 4, Queen's birthday - the second Saturday of June.
CHAPTER 2
After we have looked through and studied all theoretical components components of the national character we will try to see how they are reflected in Literature. The book under analysis is “Girl from the South” by Joanna Trollope.
The action takes place mainly in Charleston, South Carolina, the USA and also in London, Great Britain.
There are two main characters in the book: Gillon, who is an American Southern girl and Henry, a photographer from London.
There are several problems tacked by the author in this book. But the main problem is different mentalities, mode of life and approaches to some general facts of life of different nations. The author tried to show with maximum authenticity the ways of life of two nations, which are very similar at first sight, but which are greatly different at a closer look.
Through out the whole book we can see the incongruity, which is shown through the various facts of life: language, family, children’s upbringing, attitude to work and career, to house-keeping, customs, friendship, health etc.
A reader can realize that the world, in which we all are living, is so vivid and diverse that two nations closely connected with each other by their ancestors differ much in their culture but in all sides of life.
So when the passengers of the Mayflower stepped on the ground of North America there came the beginning of a new nation unknown before – the Americans.
The idea of the book is the ways people of different nationalities try to solve the problem of misunderstanding.
One of the most important values in our life is family and family relationships. In the book we can see the families of two nations: the Englishmen and the Americans. The reader can observe the relations among the members of a big charlestonian family consisting of three generations and the relations and the relations among people who only want to build up a family.
To begin with we should point out that for both nations family is a very important thing. But there are different views on family and children’s upbringing in the USA and Great Britain. We can see it clearly through out the whole book. As the theme of this investigation paper is comparative analysis of two mentalities it is supposed to be very useful to compare these points of view of two cultures. The incongruity is clearly seen in the situations, scenes, conversations of people belonging to different nations represented in the book.
As the book is composed so that the chapters in which the action takes place in the USA are interwoven with the chapters in which the action takes place in Great Britain the reader is supposed to compare two cultures and two countries. And there is no doubt that he compares the attitude towards the most important values of the life such as family.
2.1 Comparative Analysis of the American and British Families
The attitude to family differs greatly in Great Britain and the USA. In the USA family takes a very high position in the system of values of an ordinary American. Especially the Southerners who always were an example of true, real, sound family. There are big families consisting of two or even three generations.
It is not by chance that the second chapter, where the reader meets Gillon’s family, begins with the description of Sarah Alton Cutworth – Gillon’s grandmother, - the description of her parents and their parents. Respect for traditions, close ties with the place, connection with the earlier generation are very strong in the South. There were no divorced couples during four generations of Gillon’s family. There is no need to describe the childhood of all the Americans – it can be understood through the Grandmothers childhood. She was surrounded by love and affection of the members of her family. The author shows it with the help of the metaphor “her father’ princess”- the one who is beautiful, lovely, cute and requires respect in all possible ways.
Showing that Sarah’s childhood was rather good the author describes the house through the eyes of little Sarah. She adores the house and describes every little thing, which is of interest to her, inside it. There we can find high-ceiling rooms, eighteenth-century furniture, shower heads the size of dinner plates, the example of simile and exaggeration shows the world with the eyes of a child.
The emotions of grandmother can be compared with those of her granddaughter.
“The tiles were cool under Gillon’s feet, as they had always reliably been during all those long hot summers of Gillon’s childhood. Bare feet and marble floors, Grandmama always said, that’s a true Charleston childhood.”
These two sentences show warm feelings of the Americans to their childhood.
It is the other way round in Great Britain. Family is not considered a highest value of a person’s life. This leads to the misunderstanding between the spouses and then to a great amount of divorced couples, in its turn. It seems, at first sight, that there is nothing interesting in the theme of family of an Englishman, because in a short passage the reader gets to know about the destinies of three English families and not happy ones. Only the fact that the description of Gillon’s family takes a whole chapter and the description of the English families takes only a passage speaks for itself.
So from this passage the reader gets to know that Tilly’s parents divorced when she was eleven. Henry’s parents divorced when his younger sister was born. And though William’s parents avoided being divoreced there was no love, affection and even mere understanding between them.
As a result Henry does not love his parents much. His father never thought of him as a person, a child but as some useful thing of boasting, the prize of his achievement. To show henry’s feelings about his father the author used a very expressive metaphor: “…even Henry’s father – not someone he cared to think about much – he had five year-old Henry as a trophy of achievement”. Thus his father treated his children not as little, small, young but still personalities, but as his property. The way he abandoned his wife with two children is striking and even shocking and shows his real personality.
But Henry’s mother is not an extremely person either. She nursed to a feeling of resentment all her family and forgot completely about her children. The author shows it with the help of the metaphorical simile: “…leaving Henry’s mother to cherish her resentment as tenderly as a rose garden”.
She shifts all her negative emotions onto her children and no wonder that they do not want to share anything with her no matter whether it is a house or a problem. The problem of feeling oneself not a person but a machine is displayed in Paula’s fears of the marriage. To show them the author uses such metaphors as: ”wife symbol”, “a baby machine”, which show her permanent feeling of humiliation.
The author shows there a specific feature of the Englishmen – more affection to the gardening than to their own children.
The reader can observe the differences between British and American families with the help of the dialogue between Henry and Gillon, where we can clearly see the importance of a family for Gillon and Henry’s absolute indifference to it.
2.2 Martha as a New Type of an American Woman
One of the most crucial problems of nowadays life is the problem of working women in the family. The problem is not that they are working in general but it is that they get sucked into their professions. They mainly think of how to make their careers but not how to bring up a child.
It does not only concern children but also husbands, who get angry about lack of attention. The dialogue between Boone and Martha is very interesting in this respect. They argue about Martha’s permanent being busy so that she almost forgot about her family.
Boone, Gillon’s father, is always wondering what are the reasons of Martha’s indifference to family affairs. He is very angry and hurt. His feelings are clear – he is supposed to be a husband and the head of the family but there is no real family to rule as well as he has no support from it.
Martha is not a kind of a typical Southern woman who is crazy about housekeeping. The author strengthens that with the help of the anaphora – repetition of “you know”. She emphasizes the fact that she had never concealed her devotion to work.
“You know,” Martha said, her voice less neutral, “You know I couldn’t identify with the kind of southern feminine my mother exemplifies. You know I believed – still believe – that that’s either weak or crazy. You know I identified with my father and my grandfather, that I deliberately chose this – “She stopped abruptly and looked down at the table”
But Boone blames her that her work is more important for her than her family, which does not justify her behavior, the children should not be the victims of her character.
“I will if that’s how things seem to me. If they seem wrong, I’ll call’em wrong. It seems to me wrong that it’s easier for you to love work, to love all these patients, who, after all, pay you for your time and expertise, than to love your family.”
His monologue is full of rhetoric questions, which gather in his head and, which he could not answer.
The antithesis “linen napkins, half-olive forks” is Martha’s understanding of boredom of housekeeping and “love, caring, honoring traditions” is Boone’s understanding of happy family. The different views may be not only among the different nations but between the members of one family.
With the help of the talks between Martha and Boone the reader gets to know Martha’s reasons of her complete devotion to the work. She is not a simple career-maker but her job is a kind of shelter for her, the place where she can hide from the fears and emotions of a real family life.
2.3 Comparing the American and British Children
There is a point of considering the different ways of children’s upbringing and their behavior in the USA and Great Britain. American children are more mobile, naughty, lively because of the freedom given to them. The British children in comparison are more serious, calm and even indifferent. It is of course due to the different ways of upbringing.
“Gillon could see the children as she walked towards the prier, see all their excited, chattering little heads bobbing and bouncing under the great white roofs, between the lines of the white columns. Their teachers had somebody piled them in, like puppies in a basket and the great chains that held the seats to the roofs above them were groaning faintly as the seats creaked to and fro and the little kids scrambled and pushed and shouted.”
The author shows with the help of the emphatically colored words “bobbing and bouncing” the activity of the little children and that it is very hard for them to sit still in one place even for a minute. The usage of a simile there “like puppies in a basket” gives the reader the image of children’s immediacy.
And there is a description of children as follows. “The little kids were being prised off the seats and herded towards the park and the fountains. If they’d been little London kids, Gillon thought, they’d have been in a double line, hands behind their backs to stop them touching one another, probably in dark wool blazers, certainly in collapsing socks and scuffed black shoes.”
Henry begins to compare the attitude to family in Great Britain and the USA. And he comes to the conclusion that the American way of family life is better in general and especially for him. He likes the unity of the American family, that all of the members of the family support each other and there would always been a shoulder to cry on. There is a conversation between him and Cooper – Gillon’s brother: “You’re all intertwined with one another, you’re all involved, you don’t do anything that everyone doesn’t know about.”
Henry explains the reasons of his liking the American way of family life. “You get looked after, here,” Henry said. “You get looked after in families and schools and colleges”.
It is very interesting to compare the attitude to the children in Great Britain and the United States of America. At first sight one can see some difference in the views on children but still they are mostly alike. The Britons as well as the Americans think before having a baby. Both of the nations are aware that a child takes all women’s love and care.
The reader can compare the points of view on children of the British older generation and the younger one. Older generation still thinks about children as the property while younger generation becomes aware of the responsibility they carry having children.
2.4 Food
In every country it is supposed to have its peculiar cuisine. Unfortunately, we cannot say much about English and American cuisines. Britons are very fond of quick in preparation and rich in taste dishes. They should be served either with a glass of wine and beer. Wine is the favorite drink in Great Britain.
There are many different fast food cafes in the United States. The food there is far from being healthy. And as the Americans are very mobile and have a rapid speed of life they eat in such cafes. Nowadays there is a problem of fattening. American people think about their health and try to eat healthy food, mostly vegetables.
The South being mostly an agricultural region has lots of vegetables and they were the main food. Still Southerners eat healthy food regardless of the occasion.
“Ashley picked up strips of red pepper and began to lay them in a great lattice over the cubed chicken.
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So what’s new? Gillon looked at the big salad platter. It seemed to have every vegetable on it known to man, including broccoli.”
Englishmen do not like to spend much time in the kitchen preparing a meal. It is more convenient for them to serve some ready-made food from the nearest shop. Even when Tilly comes to her mother after a long time of parting she served food that the American would consider to be poor. There is another point of difference of these two nations on hospitality. Margot does not prepare anything special even for her own daughter.
“There is anywhere, - Margot said. – Is there? One thing just leads to another. You find yourself somewhere you never meant or wished to be with no very good idea of how you got there. – She put a plate of cheese and nuts down beside Tilly. – Better eat.”
At the same time the American family welcomes Henry, a completely unknown person, with a delicious dinner.
MY INVESTIGATION
Which nationality is closer to the Russians? Citizens of Mezhdurechensk were asked.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion we can state that though the phenomenon of the national character exists in people’s mentality, from the point of view of scientific studies it is very complicated. Scientists have not come to terms concerning the fact of national characters’ existence yet. Even those who accept them have not yet given an appropriate term and definition to this phenomenon, have not worked out universal approaches to its studying.
With all that, there are international values in the world. All people love like and hate, are born and die, go through the definite stages of their development, and thus have common laws of existence.
Moreover, there are different groups in every society – social and aged – on the one hand having their own peculiarities, on the other hand – getting them closer to the similar groups in other countries.
Hence, in every culture there are general features that distinguish them from other nations. These peculiarities unite all members of the society.
Thus having looked and analyzed the book we come to the conclusion that every nation has its own understanding of family, the relations in it and the attitude to children’s upbringing, career, traditions, strangers, and even food. They have their own systems of values which have been formed with the development of the nation.
With the help of the investigation book the reader can get acquainted to two kinds of national character – British and American. Both of them are surveyed thoroughly. In conclusion we can state that any nation has definite features, traditions and customs contained in it. But nevertheless all people are human beings with their own psychology and feelings. Thus every person can be a representative of any nationality or national character as well.
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