WHY AMERICANS DON'T KNOW GEOGRAPHY

Why Americans don't know geography—it's not because Americans are stupid. It's not because they don't have maps. (Although the maps might need some updating.) In this video, I'll get to the bottom of why Americans don't know world geography.

Do you have something you just don't understand about Americans? Let me know in the comments below.

#americans #geography #dreamprague

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Ahoj! I'm Jen, native Californian, living in Prague, Czech Republic for the past 9 years with my husband and our rescue dog Tobik. One fateful night, we drank a bottle of wine, threw a dart at the map, and bought one-way tickets to move our entire lives to the center of Europe! Every day we learn something new, about Czech people, Czech culture, Czech history, Czech language and how to battle the Czech bureaucracy. Dream Prague started as a place to share what we learned with other foreigners living here.

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[caleuxx]

I am about 185cm tall. Back in about the year 2000, I was in a road trip through the west of the USA, and while walking down a typical street with shops, etc. (typical for more rural towns), a tall woman stopped me to ask, where I had bought my long jeans. I responded that in the Czech Republic. She then asked if that was a store like the Banana Republic.

[henri]

in movies it is said "let's save the world" and the world is "United States of america" ​​or when they say "superbowl is the biggest sporting event of all" when only in the USA it is the most popular

[MiladaKaiser]

My children were taking ESL
English as a Second Language In USA. My daughter was 13 and she said to her teacher, that she comes from Czech Republic.
- Where is that, ask the teacher.
- Just next to Germany.
- Oh, my son lives in Germany now, I know where it is, said the teacher.
Than she was looking all over the Turkey, trying to find Germany.
I asked my daughter what she did? Did she help her?
She said no, first I thought she was joking and than I was too embarrassed.

[Grk]

I spent 10 years living in the US. I really don’t blame Americans for not knowing countries and capitals of Europe the same way I don’t blame any European for not knowing the capital of California or Montana.
But I found the lack of curiosity even from educated individuals very weird indeed. I once planned a trip with three American friends to Greece my home country. Just before the trip I wondered at one of my friends, with degrees from USC and UCLA (so quite educated), if she could point on the map where we were going to. Not only could she not point to Greece, even roughly, but she couldn’t point to other significant countries, some of which she had visited! I just found it very weird. How do you book a trip without curiously checking for the location of your destination on the planet??

[RoninTF]

Was in a small town in Kentucky, having breakfast. The lady there was quiete nice. She asked us where we are from, my friend (a Welshman) told from Wales, UK....She said: For a foreigner you speak a pretty good english :-P

[irena]

Dunno why so many non-Americans below are so fixated on "you can't name all the US states, either" - well, last time I checked, those weren't independent countries. Size does not matter here, they about as relevant as the Swiss cantons (no offence to the Swiss) or our own regions.

[janslavik]

What really amazes me is when an American can't find a country they've been to on the map. Like I understand that you can't pinpoint Senegal, but if you've been to Spain for 2 weeks at least know where it is 😆

[marekvasku]

Virginia often leans in the discussion here, I don't know exactly why. But did you know that the first and very high quality map of Virginia and Maryland was created by the Czech Augustin Heřman in 1670? And has this map been used in the US for 200 years? In return, he received large plots of land in Maryland, which he named "Bohemia Manor". The map was said to be of such high quality that seventy years after its printing in 1673, it was considered the most accurate map of the area. Or he is also the author of one of the first depictions of New Amsterdam (New York) from 1650.

[amberthecinderacee]

As an American who loves to study my geography, I need to say I always get really annoyed when people say 'oh you're an American, you probably can't name any countries'. It's honestly just an annoying stereotype. However, I do appreciate, and agree with, what you are saying. I wish we learned the geography of the world in school! I, for one, would enjoy school much more that way!

[DanDjurdjevicplus]

What’s sad is that “Geography” is not the mere study of political borders on maps. Not even close. Not having a basic idea of where you are on a map - or where other places are - is just basic, basic general knowledge: stuff I knew in primary school.

[vs]

Před lety jsem viděl nějaký pořad, ve kterém Američané neuměli najít různé země na slepé mapě světa (někteří teda nedokázali najít ani USA). To mě přimělo se zamyslet, jak jsem na tom se znalostmi zeměpisu já sám. A zjistil jsem, že jsem na tom sice o dost lépe, ale najít nějakou malou zemi třeba v Africe nebo v Oceánii, případně identifikovat na mapě všechny státy USA bych taky neuměl. Tak jsem tomu věnoval úsilí a teď už jsem schopen označit všech 196 nezávislých zemí, většinu závislých území, státy USA, kanadské provincie, spolkové země Německa, Rakouska, autonomní komunity ve Španělsku, regiony v Itálii, polská vojvodství. Když se někde mluví či píše o nějaké zemi, teď už aspoň přesně vím, kde to je a nepletu si Haiti a Dominikánskou republiku, Guyanu a Surinam, Burkinu Fasso a Guineu-Bissau, Tuvalu a Tonga, Kampánii a Kalábrii, Durynsko a Hessensko, Kansas a Nebrasku či Vermont a New Hampshire. Ale je fakt, že jinak je mi to ve skutečnosti vcelku k ničemu.

[sion]

I'm a Colombian who moved to the U.S. around 4th to 5th grade and was in the NYC education system until the very beginning of high school (I had about a month of 9th grade) before moving elsewhere and I got to say we were taught pretty well on all accounts, I was in a bilingual English-Spanish class and while geography in itself wasn't its own class it was a pretty well studied subject in, I guess, social studies as she mentions (can't remember it's been a long time since elementary).

Although, it might have something to do with the fact that there were students from elsewhere in the Americas, as NYC offers English-Spanish bilingual curriculum because of them or rather because Puerto-Ricans won a lawsuit way back when that led NYC to create such a curriculum as the suit demand of it and Hispanic-Americans can take advantage of it. However, when I moved to New England I did notice a big difference as language courses were poor, because most schools in the U.S. end up teaching another language very late in one's schooling and not even that well most of the time.

Anyways, if Europeans can at least say the capital of the United States of America is Washington, D.C. and that English is the main language of the place (not official language), I think that's more than good enough. But extra points for knowing that NYC isn't the capital of the States of New York. People outside one's country don't need to know the subdivisions of other countries, official name and capital of all UN members plus the main or official language of the countries should be the very minimum everywhere! Because any country teaches their people about their own country including subdivisions of it and their administrative settlements (town or city).

[Jacobulous]

as an American, I can confirm I have never once learned about geography in school. They just don't teach it!

[CzMilkaNet]

I think it's not about being able to locate all the countries of the world, know the capitals, etc., but know what continent the state is located on, where approximately (that the -stan states lie "together"), what is the standard of living or political history of the area. It is typically necessary to suspect that there have been some wars in Africa, to be aware of North / South Korea, etc. You will learn a lot about this naturally by reading and watching the news.
In Tibet, we met a couple of Americans, I would say when someone travels like this, they have at least some general knowledge. So, of course, they never heard about the Czech Republic, according to them, Czechoslovakia was part of the Soviet Union, they were surprised that we didn't speak Russian...
And comparing the knowledge of states in Europe or Africa to the knowledge of states in the United States is, in my view, irrelevant when the political order is completely different.

[spirocz]

Smutné je, když jsem viděl zde na YouTube video, kde někteří Američané na slepé mapě nenalezli ani vlastní zemi ve které žijí. To už je podle mě na zamyšlenou.

[elanereknu]

I was just talking to this girl from Texas the other day and when I said Im from Czech Rep. she asked me "Is that in England? Are you Bri-ish?" Im not even kidding! Took me like 4 minutes to explain its in Europe and she stiiilll didnt get it...

[DavidJones-ocup]

Loved this video. As an American who has lived in the Czech Republic for twenty years, I get this question quite often myself. I really like your explanation about the US having such diversity as a country, many people don’t feel the need to travel elsewhere. I say something similar when I try to explain this with trying not to sound like I’m bragging, because I’m not. It’s a difficult subject to navigate, but you did a great job.👍

[incognitusmaximus]

I have lived in Czechoslovakia, ČSSR, ČSFR, Czech Republic and Czechia, without having to set a foot abroad😁

[paradigmbuster]

As an American I have been always interested in reading maps so when someone mentions a name of a country in most cases i know where it is in the world.

[wookie]

It is somehow weird, how the U.S. seems to be on one side a country which values individual responsibility and initiative and on the other blames the school system for not teaching them basic knowledge, they could find on wikipedia.