美国人地理真那么差劲吗? [美国媒体]

Are Americans really poor at geography?

美国人地理真那么差劲吗





Thomas L. Johnson
Unschooled in geography might be a better way of putting it.
Almost all of schooling that American students currently receive is focused on four things, reading, writing, science, and mathematics. Each student and each school is assessed on the basis of national testing programs that focus on these fields. In the meantime, areas like the arts, geography, civics, economics and history are occasionally or rarely tested.
For me, as a college instructor in international business, I realized early on that most of the incoming students I taught —even those from excellent suburban schools — arrived both economically and geographically illiterate. In addition to the usual problems (confusing Austria and Australia, Slovenia and Slovakia), most students were unaware of much of South and Central America as well as Asia.
Part of the problem stems from the fact that they have spent their lives in a large country that didn’t really offer that many chances to travel to other cultures. It is not unusual to discover Minnesotans, for instance, who have never stepped across the border into either Canada or Mexico, our neighboring countries. In fact, many more Americans measure their sophistication by counting how many of the 50 states they have visited than anything outside the USA.
Were the USA not a global military power, a significant percentage of Americans would have no international experience at all.

不如说是地理方面没受过教育。
几乎所有美国学生目前接受的教育都集中在四件事上:阅读、写作、科学和数学。每个学生和每一所学校的教学重点都是基于国家测试项目。与此同时，偶尔或者很少测试艺术、地理、公民教育、经济学和历史等学科。
对我来说，作为一名教授国际商务的大学讲师，我很早就意识到，我所教的大部分新生——甚至来自优秀的郊区学校——对经济学和地理都是一无所知。除了常见的问题(混淆奥地利、澳大利亚、斯洛文尼亚和斯洛伐克)，大多数学生都不知道美国的南部和中部以及亚洲。

问题的部分原因在于，他们在一个没有真正提供很多机会去其他文化旅游的大国生活。例如，你会发现，在明尼苏达州人中从未跨过边境进入我们的邻国加拿大或者墨西哥的情况并不罕见。事实上，更多的美国人通过计算他们去过50个州中的多少个而非计算去过美国以外的国家数量来衡量他们的老练程度。
如果美国不是一个全球军事强国，那么很大一部分美国人根本就不会有一点国际经验。

Akash Srivastav
Yeah, American youth (18 to 24 years old) are generally geographically illiterate . In a survey, it was found that half could not find New York State on a map of the United States.
48 percent couldn't locate Mississippi on a map of the United States, even though Hurricane Katrina had put this in spotlight in 2005.Many young Americans also lack basic map-reading skills.
If you are unable to believe on this, please visit Young Americans Geographically Illiterate, Survey Suggests
(if they are unable to locate their own cities on map of USA, what can be think about locating Asian countries or cities on map of world by them)

是的，美国的年轻人(18到24岁)一般都是地理盲。一项调查发现一半的人在美国地图上找不到纽约州。
48%的人在美国地图上找不到密西西比州，尽管2005年卡特里娜飓风使这个地方成为人们关注的焦点。许多年轻的美国人也缺乏基本的看地图的能力。

如果你不能相信这一点，那就去访问下美国的地理盲们。事实胜于雄辩。
(如果他们无法在美国地图上找到自己的城市，想想要是让他们将亚洲国家或城市定位在地图上会如何)

David Friedman
There are 330 million of us, give or take.
For any question of the type “Are Americans [quality]?” the only correct answer is “some are and some are not.”
Personally, geography seems trivially easy. But then I grew up in a family that valued education. I grew up reading encyclopedias and looking at globes of the world. But many Americans don't grow up in such families. But that's true of almost all, if not all, countries: most people in most countries don't evince much interest in education or intellectual inquiry.

我们有3.3亿人，大概这么多吧。
对于任何类型的问题，“美国人(真的——)吗?”唯一正确的答案是“有些是，有些不是。”

就我个人而言，地理学似乎很简单。但那是因为我成长在一个重视教育的家庭。我从小就阅读百科全书，看地球仪。但是很多美国人不是在这样的家庭中长大的。但几乎所有国家(如果不是全部的话)都是这样:大多数国家的大多数人都不太关心教育或智力调查。

Catherine Beale
I am terrible.
There’s a map that floats around of the world that New Yorkers think exists outside Manhattan.
North of the Bronx is Westchester and then a vast unknown unchartered territory we refer to as “upstate”. Above it is Canada, Maine, possibly other states.
To the left is New Jersey, then the rest of the country, and at the end is California. Then comes Hawaii. Then a vague idea of China, Japan, Viet Nam.
To the South is the coast, and it ends with Florida, and you can skip down to Puerto Rico and somewhere floating near Miami is Cuba.
I am still not good with maps. I never really thought this was important. If I lived in Brazil, I would feel the same way.
I do know all the state capitals. We memorized those in 4th grade. Pierre is the capital of South Dakota. I think most Americans do not know that.
I was in Bonaire once with my daughter to SCUBA dive. This is near Aruba and Curacao. But I’m not sure where those are.
Unless I have to drive there, I leave these matters up to someone else. I am fine with that.

我地理相当差劲。
这里有个纽约人认为的存在于曼哈顿之外的世界地图。
在布朗克斯区的北部是韦斯特切斯特，然后是一个未知的无人领地，我们称之为“北部”。上面是加拿大，缅因州，可能还有其他州。

左边是新泽西，然后是整个国家，最后是加利福尼亚。然后是夏威夷。然后模糊的知道有中国，日本，越南。
南边是海岸，它的尽头是佛罗里达，你可以跳到波多黎各，在迈阿密附近的某个地方是古巴。
我还是不擅长地图。我从没想过这很重要。如果我住在巴西，我会有同样的感觉。

我知道所有的州首府。我们记住了四年级的所有学生。皮埃尔是南达科他州的首府。我想大多数美国人都不知道这一点。
有一次我和我的女儿在博内尔潜水。这是在Aruba和Curacao附近。但我不确定它们在哪里。
除非我必须开车去那里，否则我把这些事情留给别人去做。这样就够了。

Jessica Zastoupil
Well, personally, I'm not poor at geography, except maybe the geography of most of Africa, which, for some reason I could never get right, and the former Soviet states which were part of the USSR when I went to school so they didn't even exist. But I digress... 
I had many, many geography classes over my years in school. So did my daughter who just graduated last year. However, the quality of education is not the same all over the US. The state sets the rules and not all states teach the same things (pretty crazy, right?). 
Not to mention, not everyone really cares about geography being the USA is humongous and a lot of people never get out of their county, much less their state, so they tend to feel that they will never use the information.

就我个人而言，我地理并不差，除了非洲大部分地区的地理位置，由于某些原因，我从来没有记住过，还有前苏联国家解体后的一些国家，当我上学的时候，他们根本就不存在。额我跑题了…

我上学那些年要上很多地理课。我女儿去年刚毕业。然而，美国的教育质量却变了。国家制定规则，但是并非所有州都教同样的东西(相当疯狂，对吧?)
更不用说，并不是每个人都真正关心地理。因为美国是一个巨大的国家，很多人从来没有出过县，更不用说他们的州了，所以他们倾向于认为他们永远不会使用这些信息。

Felicia Gardner
Yes though the ones you see on this site know it, the majority can not even recognize the state within their own country.

是的，虽然你在这个网站上看到的那些人都知道，但是大多数人甚至不能识别出他们县城所在的州。

Sushil Kumar Sompur
Yes, and you can take my word for it. I attest to the fact that a majority of Americans are very very very ….. bad at geography.
Take care and have a lovely day !!!

是的，你可以相信我的话。我证明一个事实,大多数的美国人是非常非常……不擅长地理。
保重，祝你有个愉快的一天!!!

Anonymous
Originally Answered: Are Americans really bad at geography?
We cant really group all Americans into one basket. That would be pretty bad generalization. There are many geography scholars who are American.
Some might be weak in geography and some just might be ignorant.

最初的问题是:美国人在地理上真的很差吗?
我们不能把所有的美国人都放一块说。这种概括很糟糕。有许多美国人是地理学者。
有些人地理可能很不好，有些人可能只是无知的。

Josh Hill
Put it this way: a receptionist at work once asked me, in all earnestness, whether Israel was in South America.
I’m not sure how kids can get through school without geography lessons but that seems to be the norm these days, and as others point out, the US is such a large country that many Americans never travel abroad — I have to fly almost as far to visit LA as I do to visit London.

这样说吧:工作的地方有一位接待员曾经诚恳地问我，以色列是否在南美洲。
我不知道孩子们上学时怎么能不上地理课，但这似乎很正常,当然就像其他人指出的,因为美国是这样一个幅员辽阔的国家,许多美国人几乎从未出国旅行,我打飞的去洛杉矶和去伦敦一样远。

Idy Udoma-Udofa
Yes they are
I’m currently in Chicago on a holiday
The USA is a very big place with a small population and its very very spread out, you can drive for miles before you find simple places like barbers shop, etc
so i think it has more to do with the size of the USA itself , theres almost nothing you wont find here, which is one of the reasons why Americans wont travel.

是的他们地理很差
我现在在芝加哥度假。
美国是一个非常大的地方，人口稀少，分布很广，你可以驱车数英里，然后才能找到理发店等地方。
所以我认为这与美国本身幅员辽阔有很大关系，在这里你几乎找不到任何东西，这也是为什么美国人不爱来这旅行的原因之一。

Ward Chartier
1.Once worked at a company that was simultaneously setting up factories in Shanghai, Penang Malaysia, and Mexico. I was headed for Penang. In a meeting some not so bright spark looked at me and the guy heading to Shanghai and said, “Oh! You’ll be close to each other!” If 2000 miles was close, then that would be true.
2.When it came time for me to get my W-2, some loon in HR sent it to Penang, China.
3.Upon repatriating to California I was in the market for new carpeting. Visited two stores. At both, the people with who I was dealing attended elementary school in the 1960s, as I did, and certainly had geography in their curriculum. Before repatriating I had been living in Shanghai, and mentioned as much to the sales associates. Both asked me if I spoke Japanese assuming Shanghai was in Japan. Face palm. Both asked, “Are you sure Shanghai isn’t in Japan?”
4.While I was working in Ireland for 2 years, my sister sent Christmas cards. One year the card went to Haiti before getting to me. The next year the card first went to Italy.

1。曾在一家在上海、槟城和墨西哥都设立了工厂的公司工作。我当时要去槟城。在一次会议上，一个人比较热情的看着我，然后那个人去了上海，人们跟我俩:“哦!你们会彼此亲近的!”如果你觉得2000英里的距离很近，那就有可能。
2。当我得到W-2的时候，一些人力资源部的笨蛋把它寄到了中国的槟榔屿。

3。回到加州后，我在市场上买了新的地毯。去了两家店。在这两家店里，我所接触的人都是上世纪60年代上的小学，当然，他们的课程中也有地理知识。在回国之前，我一直住在上海，我跟两家店的销售助理都聊到了这些。他们都问我是否会说日语，他们以为上海在日本。我捂脸。他们都问:“你确定上海不是在日本吗?”
4。当初我在爱尔兰工作了2年，我姐姐给我寄了些圣诞卡。有一年，这张卡片在到我这之前被送到了海地。第二年，圣诞卡先去了意大