How They See Us: Meditations on America

by James Atlas

Book Overview

A superpower without parallel since the British Empire, the United States is a source of incessant fascination to the rest of the world. Absurdly rich, alarmingly volatile, the nation inspires both... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1934633100
• ISBN13: 9781934633106
• Release Date: December 2009
• Publisher: Atlas Books
• Length: 274 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.1" x 7.2"

Customer Reviews

Compelling - at times!

As Robert Burns said (paraphrased): "Oh what gie the Giftee gie us to see ourselves as others see us." Not every essay in here is compelling, but the ones on the images we "sell" the world are actually a bit frightening. Makes me wonder if we might focus more on what Dhali Lama says his religion is: kindness!

The rest of the world

This book fills a needed vacuum in that many Americans do not think about or realize how the rest of the world sees us. There is much anger and frustration in here, mainly concerning the Bush policies and invasion of Iraq after 9/11. So often the thoughts expressed are of the sympathy and solidarity the world felt after seeing the havoc that 9/11 wrought and then the fury that followed the Iraq invasion and the government's policies that have been followed. James Atlas' introduction seems to emphasize that anger and frustration and that anger is just not focused on Bush's policies, but the stealing of land from Mexico and placing men such as Pinchot in power. It would be better to skip this introduction and read the essays themselves to form your own judgment. The one thing I wish that would have been done is to include the biography of the essayists with their writing , it helps in interpreting what they have to say. If you have lived in foreign countries and made friends with the citizens there, you probably have had your moments when you realize they see America differently than you have perceived they might have, even if it is only a statement such as "Americans always have to say how everything is bigger and better there, it's really a put down of us." So many little statements hit home in reading these essays: a visitor's astonishment at the size of sub sandwiches, the innocence of Americans, and their "over-the-topness", the feeling that one can have that while living in Europe one feels like an American ambassador and when in America you spend your time explaining the rest of the world to your friends. To sum up; many of the writers do not like what America has become, but they are still fascinated by it. It is impossible to escape from America no matter where you are in the world; but it is indeed a danger for Americans to be so oblivious to the world surrounding them. America does that too often; compare our national/world news reporting and that of the BBC and realize how much of global news does not even cross the threshold of an American's mind. Reading this book might remedy and change your thinking. It's thought provoking whether you agree with the opinions or not, and that is worth at least a try.

People Won't Like This Book in Poughkeepsie...

... or in Peoria, Pocatello, or Pasadena, and especially not in Port Arthur, Texas! For one reason, the "Us" in those US cities won't welcome the assumption that "we" are a homogeneous mass. Possibly only a Harvard-educated New Yorker like editor James Atlas could deflect the objection that any "Us" is a figment of urban imagination. Many of the twenty-one essayists invited to contibute to this collection, from twenty-one different countries, object to the other side of the equation; "They" quite rightly sneer at being clumped together merely because they are NOT "Us". That's the first perception they nearly all insist upon, i.e. that people of the USofA too often cleave the world into "us" and "them" on the assumption that there's really a salient bifurcating line and that `never the twain' shall be recognized as the `many'. Let's be forthright here: 99.995% of Americans will never lay eyes on this book, and you can be sure that if they did, they'd dismiss it smugly since it doesn't in any way confirm how Americans see themselves or what they EXPECT non-Americans to think of them. Iranian author Zarah Ghahramani says it succinctly: "What upsets me -- more than upsets me, what is abhorrent to me -- is the ungovernable need of many Americans to think well of themselves in every circumstance. It's a prejudice that causes great harm." If these 21 writers are representative of "Them", it's fair to say that most of the people of the world perceive Americans as naively self-righteous and arrogant. Many of them do the courteous rhetorical trick of distinguishing between America -- that is, the government, the leaders, the ruling class -- and Americans, the people. Read carefully, however, and that distinction tends to fade. One of the sharpest critics of the American mindset is the Cuban Ricardo Alarcon de Quesada, who writes: "A great Latin American poet who was awarded the Nobel prize once described American foreign policy with two words: arrogance and ignorance." On the whole, these essayists seem to regard American arrogance with disdain more than resentment, as a trait of historical childishness. It's the American ignorance that infuriates them -- not so much `ignorance' as a mere lack of knowledge but rather `ignorance' as the choice to ignore, to not care about not knowing. Donald Rumsfeld's notorious blatherspeak about "unknown unknowns" makes several appearances in the collection. Several writers rage that Americans show so little desire to know about "them" simply because they also avoid any critical knowledge of themselves. Who are these twenty-one essayists? Well, as you might assume, they are not people fingered in the market places. They're all members of the elites of their countries, all well educated, well traveled, etc. Here's the list: Luis Fernando Verissimo, Brazil Leilah Nadir, Canada Alberto Fuguet, Chile Da Chen, China Ricardo Alarcon de Quesada, Cuba Andrei Makine, France Werner Sonne, Germany Gyorgy Dragoman, Hungary Sunny S