Dans lequel j'apprends que tous les français croit que les Americans portent les armes de feu.....OR In which I learn that the French think all Americans own guns....Yeah.

Okay, I had kind of a bad day yesterday (Friday). I observed 7 classes, which was pretty exhausting, since I gave presentations about myself and Colorado in four of the classes, which involved me trying to explain things in very simple English and then trying to field all sorts of questions. I worked waaaaay more than 12 hours last week (the required time for assistants), but when I mentioned it to the head English teacher he said, "Oh well, you're just observing, it's not that hard..." Yeah. Right.
Towards the end of the week, I was really feeling like a zoo animal, there to be gawped at, particularly in one teacher's classes, where kids would ask really bizarre or personal questions.
Then during the last class of the day, I presented myself to a really large group of older kids, about 30 of them, and answered their questions and everything. It came up that the night before on the national French news there had been an expose on American politics, focusing on an interview with a Neo-Nazi right-winger who claimed he wanted to assasinate Barack Obama. I tried in vain to explain that this is really a minority opinion and a very radical view, not one shared by the majority of Americans. I thought it a bit odd when one kid asked me if I had a gun, and when I said that I didn't, and tried to exlpain that not that many people in America do, the teacher said "Well, when I was in South Carolina, everyone had guns!" "Yes," I tried to backpaddle, "but it's a little different in the South, you know, people go hunting, and..." but I could see that no one belived me. Then when they started their lesson, I realized they were studying Michael Moore's film, Bowling for Columbine. Aha.
Now, I have seen Bowling for Columbine, and I thought it was really good and thought-provoking in a lot of ways. But these kids were watching it not as social commentary or as Michael Moore's opinion, but as if this was American History. They were studying the cartoon part of the film that critiques and pokes fun at the United State's fears and subsequent massacres, i.e., fear of being persecuted led to the Pilgrims arrival in America, fear of Native Americans led to massacres, fear of black people led to the Ku Klux Klan, etc. etc.
Here's the link, if you want to see what I'm talking about:
Bowling for Columbine cartoon
Now, this is about parallel to watching South Park in order to learn about American family dynamics...it might be an interesting supplement, but if this is all you see, you are going to wind up with an incredibly distorted view of American culture!
The students in this class took turns reading the transcript of the cartoon sequence aloud, and they all did a worksheet to see if they understood what the cartoon had said. I sat there, totally shocked, while they were reading, "Don't kill me big black man!", etc. etc.  in monotone voices...
At no point in the class was there any discussion of how this was a caricature, exaggeration, etc.
I began to feel truly uncomfortable, like the students were looking at me askance...I felt misrepresented, judged, and condemned, and I had no opportunity to say that this is not how "everyone" in the US really thinks or behaves. I was nearly in tears by the end of the class, and afterwards I tried asking the teacher if they had talked about exaggeration, satire, etc. and she said "Yeah, yeah, the kids totally understand!" But I was unconvinced. I later tried to explain to another English professor how awful it had been for me, and she responded by saying "Oh, I thought every American had a gun, too!"
Great. Good. Cool. Okay.
This is the first experience I have had this time around with anti-americanism, and while I sort of expected it in the first few days, I guess I was lulled into a false sense of comfort by the nice townspeople and teachers....now I am wondering if people are nice to me because they think I have a gun! Okay, not really, but I feel kind of disillusioned and super sensitive. It's harder here than I had thought, because I am the first American most of these kids have ever met, and they have LOTS of misconceptions, but because they are so familiar with American music and tv shows, they aren't openminded to hearing things that are contrary to their expectations/perceptions. I guess it's far more dramatic and exciting to believe that all Americans are drug-addicted, promiscuous, and violent...and I feel sort of powerless to change their perceptions, like the proverbial kid with his finger in the dyke. It's also hard to feel like I am the representative of an entire culture, or rather, many cultures. I don't think many French kids get that America can really be compared to Europe, rather than compared to France, Spain etc. They don't understand how vast it is, or how many different beliefs, lifestyles, dialects, etc. it contains. Sigh. I'm not sure if this post really makes sense, I'm probably still too close to the situation to explain it properly.
On the bright side, the marché this morning was nice and I bought some really tasty cheese. Tonight is the Latin American soiree, where we will have chile con carne! Hooray for Mexican food!
Missing you all like crazy!
Linds