VIII Международный конкурс научно-исследовательских и творческих работ учащихся
Старт в науке
English stereotypes: true or false?
Автор работы награжден дипломом победителя III степени
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INTRODUCTION
We live in a modern society. Every country and nationality has its own history, customs and traditions. Consequently, there are many stereotypes about each country. For example,the most common picture depicting a typical Englishman is a man wearing a bowler hat, reading the Times newspaper and drinking tea and a typical Russian man plays balalaika in the middle of Red square wearing a winter hat, but is it true?
The aim of the project is to create the image of a typical Englishman.
To achieve the aim we have the following objectives:
To learn about English stereotypes;
To make a survey how the Russians and the British see a typical Englishman;
To analyze the results of the research;
To describe a typical Englishman from Russian and English points of view.
The topic of the project is actual because stereotypes help people to understand the mentality of the country and its inhabitants. Stereotypes are needed so that people can distinguish one country from other countries.
The novelty of the project includes an understanding that borders of our modern world are so wide and transparent that two different nations: the British and the Russians have similar opinion about the image of a typical Englishman. There is an interesting fact, that stereotypes help to determine the belonging of a person to any culture by a stereotype, even locals determine each other by the same stereotypes.
The project consists of two chapters, survey and analysis of its results.
CHAPTER 1.
LEARNING ENGLISH STEREOTYPES
1.1 The most popular British stereotypes
Our world is so different; people from different countries have different behavior and characteristics.That is why, before talking about different stereotypes we should understand the meaning of this word.
Stereotype – is a simple idea of a particular group or category of people about some cultural and behavioral maters. Stereotypes can change over time.
People live according to stereotypes because it is so much simplier. Thanks to stereotypes people quickly make decisions in situations when there is not enough information. People got used to stereotypes because it is easy to identify the person by any criteria. Moreover, it is more convenient to determine the belonging of a person to any culture by a stereotype.
Britain is often portrayed as the land of tea, black cabs and red buses. In most cases, Englishman appears to us as a gentleman, always good-looking, with beard, mustache and dark hair.
The most popular stereotypes about Great Britain according to the research made by Douglas Imri are:
Is their love of tea. "There's so much tea. All the time," they say. "Happy? Sad? Thirsty? Warm? Celebrating? Make a brew! According to the British ideas about the culture of tea drinking, the table, regardless of the time of day, is always served with different kinds of tea.
The British are professionals at queuing. It means waiting in line. This is a little strange, but the British like this pastime.
Englishman is fond of golf,walking, going to football matches.
All the British are very polite. They are very closed at emotions that is why they seem to be very polite.
The British always talk about the weather. They are fond of discussing it, also it is the best way to maintain a communication.
The British drink a lot of alcohol especially beer. Last year it has become a big problem in Great Brtitain.
Every Englishman eat porridge in the morning. Porridge is considered to be a part of a traditional British breakfast.
1.2. The image of an Englishman in Russia
We have learnt about main British stereotypes. However, it is very interesting to know, how Russian people imagine the most polite nation in the world. We found a research made among Russian students – 112 interviewees. They were asked the following questions:
1. Who is a an Englishman? The British (62,5 %), gentleman (40 %), sir (15 %), aristocrat (15 %), foreigner (15 %), tea lover (7,5 %).
2. What do you associate with an Englishman? Tea (70 %), double-decker (40 %), The Queen (30 %), porridge (25 %), Big Ben (15 %), red telephone box (12,5 %), Celt (12,5 %), monarchy (10 %), parliament (10 %), football (7,5 %) .
3. What character does an Englishman have? Polite (70 %), punctual (70 %), neat (32,5 %), funny (27 %), careful (20 %), smart (15 %), friendly (9 %).
4. What does a real Englishman always do? Drinks tea (72,5 %), makes jokes (30 %), eats porridge (22,5 %), works (17,5 %), reads a newspaper (17,5 %), has a ride on a bus (15 %), smokes (15 %), watches football (7,5 %), walks (6 %), studies at Oxford or Cambridge (2,5 %).
Stereotypes come to us from radio, TV and Internet, in other words - media,
they became very popular in our life. Pictures, videos are the most useful sources for stereotypes. This is the best way to create opinion about every country just having a look at the Internet.
Also, stereotypes come to us from school. When we read texts about Great Britain or listen to some recordings about this country and its people. With time, we make a full imagination about the British culture in whole. We have certain opinion, but is it right? To find the answer we conducted a survey.
CHAPTER 2.
INVESTIGATION OF BRITISH STEREOTYPES
2.1 The survey and analysis of British stereotypes
After learning about stereotypes and having an example how to conduct a survey. We interviewed 80 people, to get an equal point of view we talked with 40 Russians, 40 British people.
To conduct a survey we used 3 social networks: Facebook.com, Instagram.com and VK.com.
Three questions were asked:
How does a typical Englishman look like (appearance, character)?
What does he prefer (hobby, interests)?
What does he usually do (free time)? Both British and Russian people were asked the same questions.
Both groups of interviewees were asked the same questions.
People gave different answers, the Russians were more restrained that British ones. The British gave more detailed comments about a typical Englishman.
Firstly, we will analyze the answers given by Russian audience; we summed them and analyzed the most popular.
A typical English man is conservative and responsible – 10 answers.
He always drinks tea – 15 answers.
He is fond of watching sports – 8 answers.
He is always elegant, wears a tweed costume and a hat – 3 answers.
He has got a good sense of humor – 8 answers.
He eats fast food – 3 answers.
Interviewees describe a typical Englishman as a tall, blonde gentleman, wearing a tweed suit, with umbrella and newspaper, always good-looking. He is conservative, keen on golf, traditional 5 o’ clock tea, football and leisure walking. He always drinks tea, reads a good book and eats fast food.
We made an assumption that the image of an Englishman in Russia is created by films, literature, TV, and Internet, in other words – media. The key to success to grab any attentions is to use a well-known stereotype.
British people gave the following answers.
He is blue-eyed and well-groomed – 6 answers.
He drinks tea or beer, eats fish or steak and ships, likes Indian curry – 17 answers.
He plays cricket or watches football – 7 answers.
He prefers a countryside walk – 11 answers.
He often wears a T-shirt and jeans or a good suit – 7 answers.
A typical Englishman is blue-eyed, well-groomed, tall, wearing a T-shirt and jeans or a suit. He drinks tea or beer, eats fish, steak and chips or Indian curry. His free time he spends with the family, also plays cricket, watches football and has a countryside walk.
The survey gave us a complete understanding how British and Russian people imagine a typical Englishman. Both have practically the same image. But the half of russian answers describes him in a more classic manner, partly based on some. It classical literature, films, school education.
This is a real image of an Englishman, but old one. In addition to this, we can see an interesting fact – another half of the answers are very close to the modern image of a real Englishman. Interviewees who communicated with the British gave the same answers as locals from England.
The survey shows that the half of stereotypes is false. We didn’t prove them, for instance the British eat porridge for breakfast or they are too conservative. Modern British people are very sensitive, they can’t show their emotions but this is true. They really drink tea and beer; they really love sports and talk about weather. Modern stereotypes are based on real habits of local people and can be proved or broken only after a real communication.
CONCLUSION
False and true stereotypes have the right for existence. Moreover, the truthfulness of a stereotype can be checked only personally. Neither rumors, nor books, movies won’t tell the truth.
So, in the research were we created the image of a typical Englishman made among Russian people the British there are many traditional stereotypes, prejudices, biased opinions.
Our ideas develop how stereotypes penetrate into the culture and traditions of the country, by learning English.
The survey helped us to understand British mentality and build friendly terms with real Englishman. The research showed us how borders of different countries became wider and people understand each other better.
Stereotypes help people to differ cultures which still have their specific features. And if the culture can be destroyed, stereotypes can’t.
BIBLOGRAPHY
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