And I've been having some really interesting (well, for me, anyway) discussions with people here from all over the States that have helped me understand why things are the way they are. The US is built on an entirely different set of principles to the UK, and it was created this way by the founding fathers who wrote down all the principles very clearly in a little ready reckoner called the Constitution. In the UK we have an eternity of baggage with nothing written down, making our approach innate, incomprehensible and impossible to penetrate.
Enter Brit-think, Ameri-think by Jane Walmsley - a very thoughtful birthday pressie from a lovely friend of mine. Its only a thin volume, but I'm not a massive reader and I read it on one day (go to the front of the class and get a gold star). I'm hoping that Ms Walmsley is also happy to shoulder the accusation that she too is hugely biased towards her US homeland (the not-so-subtle undertone of 'America is great and Britain is stuck in the dark ages' pervades every chapter, and jolly-well got up my nose on more than one occasion). That irksome subtext aside, it encompassed this idea that many Brits don't understand (I didn't until I came to the US) that we are very different people and it stems back to the overarching principles that shaped our respective societies.
There are certain aspects of British and American society that Walmsley completely mis-defines (her chapter on humour is totally off), but understanding the distinct principles on which each country has built their culture is a very sound concept, and one that is helping me understand why things are the way they are here, and why I'm trying to write down some of the barriers-to-understanding (fuck off - I happen to think that Corporate Speak can be very descriptive in certain circumstances) that I'm coming across, even though they sometimes annoy the ever-living shit out of me.
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