I thought it was interesting that many of the french students associated France with democracy, while none of the American responses listed democracy in association with France.  Why do you think that is?

I found it very interesting that the american students responded very positively when talking about France while the french students kept their comments mostly neutral. Also, I always think of France as a country with a lot of romantic people but not a lot of people mentioned that. Why do you think that happened?

Everyone loved to mention food---I wondered whether doing this in class during lunch hour (11h & 12h) for us and possibly right before dinner for them (17h, 18h) had any affect. I did notice that American students generally had a positive view of France, while French students tended to be a bit conservative with their views about their own country. If I were to guess they were exercising "savoir-vivre."

They mentioned Paris and Tour Eiffel a lot, but there are many other places in France. Why not places like Bordeaux, Nice, Chamonix-Mont-Blanc, Lyons, Cannes, Annecy, etc.?

A great deal of attention is given to tourist hot-spots, why? Why not other large cities, why specifically Paris? Does it represent the ideals of France, is it because of history? or is it becaus it's the capital? Is there any special significance of using Paris and other tourist hot-spots to describe france?

Nous avons souvent écrit les mots "Paris" et "Tour Eiffel" pour décrire la France. Personnellement, je pense que c'est parce qu'il s'agit des symboles sous lesquels la France apparaît aux yeux du monde (il suffit de regarder la télévision étrangère). Notre groupe étant constitué de beaucoup d'élèves venant de l'étranger, cela nous a donc paru naturel de répondre ainsi.

Je trouve cela amusant que vous considériez la France comme un pays où on mange bien. Je pense que les français eux-même pensent la même chose. Par contre si on parle de ce sujet pour les Etats Unis, nous les français imaginons imédiatement les fast food...

Vous pensez aussi à Paris et au romantisme. Paris est une ville connue et très touristique de part ses monuments et lieux historiques. On (les français) ne se rend pas vraiment compte parfois des choses magnifiques qui nous entourent. Ce n'est qu'en s'imaginant à la place d'un touriste qu'on ose lever la tête pour contempler la beauté de notre pays qu'est la France !

Soit dit en passant, je confirme que les français sont romantiques. 

Yoana, penses tu que les français sont alors trop modestes ou alors, la plupart des gens les décrivent autrement?

Pooja, connais tu d'autres villes en France à part Paris?

Benjamin, I know of a few large ones and then some random small ones: Chamonix, Le Havre, Lyon, Nice, Marseille, Toulouse, Bordeaux... These are all places in France which I would like to visit at some point, not just Paris. Which is why I was wondering why specifically Paris.

I guess at times, Americans tend to associate everything to New York City and Chicago - but that's usually only to try and give people who don't know much of the US a sense of what they're talking about. So is it just that it's easier to refer to Paris to foreigners or is there another deeper reason like the culture or the arts?

I just thought it curious.

One short comment: My boyfriend is French and he is not really romantic. Maybe I'm just dating the wrong one? haha.

So Benjamin, were you talking about all French people or only yourself?

I found that a lot of my friends think French are romantic because your language sounds so awesome. So even if you're talking about chicken poo, you sound like you are reciting poetry.

BTW, I know this wasn't the topic of our conversation, but I'm curious. What books do you guys like to read? Do you like poetry? What are some French writers you would recommend and what are your opinions on some of the international writers? For example, I like Charles Baudelaire, Jacques Prévert and Jules Verne.

Hahaha I liked the 4-6 weeks of vacation. I know in August a lot of people take some time off. Is that normal throughout the country?

I like how you think French people have better food. I do really like the food there but do you think there are broader implications to that? I feel like i see a lot of associations of food and wine. But if you pay more attention to wine do you feel it detracts from personal achievement and efficiency in work? What have you observed in your own lives? I'm not convinced the two are equivalent but I do see some validity in it.

Hahaha I liked the 4-6 weeks of vacation. I know in August a lot of people take some time off. Is that normal throughout the country?

I like how you think French people have better food. I do really like the food there but do you think there are broader implications to that? I feel like i see a lot of associations of food and wine. But if you pay more attention to wine do you feel it detracts from personal achievement and efficiency in work? What have you observed in your own lives? I'm not convinced the two are equivalent but I do see some validity in it.

I agree with Noujoud's comment that americans tend to represent France with the popular cities and landmarks like Paris and the Eiffel Tower. I think that democracy wasn't mentioned on the americans side because, at least in my case, we don't have much knowledge about France's government. 

Hi everyone,

I certainly won't think of 'republic' or 'democracy' when someone mentions France. Sorry, that is just impossible. France is one of my favorite countries (even though I haven't visited yet) and I connect it with much better things than any kind of politics, which shoud mean that the country probably still leaves a very good impression, even though sometimes weird things happen with its politicians and so on.

@Benjamin: I don't know a lot of French people, so I can't say myself if they are modest or not, also I haven't talked to my friends about that so I can't tell you their opinion. But if you guys have a lot of things to be proud of, you shouldn't be modest to point at them. I guess, the reason why your responses differ from ours was not modesty, but the fact that you consider France differently because it is your country and you can see both the good and the bad sites of it, as well as problems that are bothering you.

Jovana, tu as dû trouver l'exception qui confirme la règle. Je trouve ça hilarant que tu dises que c'est notre voix qui nous rend si romantique... C'est peut être notre accent quand on essaie de parler anglais? J'avoue que moi même j'aime bien entendre une anglaise ou une espagnole parler français ! :) Bref....

Sinon, oui, je suis un grand romantique qui lit de la poésie tous les soirs comme Charles Baudelaire et Savinien de Cyrano de Bergerac ! HEHE !

Non, je rigole, on est pas forcément romantique parce qu'on lit de la poésie mais parce qu'on est sentimental, fragile, tendre et affectueux, qu'on sait comment faire plaisir à une femme en rendant les choses magiques ! (C'est beau ce que je dis )

Yoana, je suis bien d'accord avec toi. C'est juste un mot que l'on ne définit pas tout à fait de la même façon.

I think it is definitely possible for a resident of a country to have some similar views to foreigner's observations.  It depends on how accurate one's information is.  It still seems odd that this can be the case, however, because I (and I assume many others) would assume that our own opinions would be extremely innaccurate and include only stereotypes.

@Jovana, j'adore la lecture, et je pourrais te recommander beaucoup d'auteurs, mais pas des auteurs de poésies. Par exemple: Alexandre Dumas, Voltaire, Victor Hugo. Pour ce qui est de mon opinion concernant les auteurs étrangers, je dirais que comme les auteurs français, il y en a des bons et des mauvais, mais c'est une question de gout. L'auteur que je préfère c'est Agatha Christie qui est anglaise tout simplement parce que j'aime les polars.

J'ai été beacoup amusé, tout comme Amy apparemment, que quelqu'un parle des semaines de congés payé que nous avons ( 5 semaines par an), pourquoi est ce marquant pour vous?

Hi all,

I should say that doesn't sound very modest:"sentimental, fragile, tendre et affectueux, qu'on sait comment faire plaisir à une femme en rendant les choses magiques !" :D Just saying...However, if it is true it's prefectly fine to say it.

Benjamin, even if only 50% of the people in France are the type of people you described, that is already a huge percentage. I don't thik I know a lot of people that match this perfect description you made.

@Romain, I love Agatha Christie. My favorite one: "Death on the Nile". And I love Hercule Poirot and his little moustache. From Victor Hugo I read only "Les misérables". If you ever come to NY, you need to see Broadway musical "Les misérables". It's quite beautiful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Jo4FvpN3_g

Since we mentioned wine, I was wondering do you guys do wine tastings at home? Is that part of your culture? When I went to visit my friend's family who are French, they had this competition where everyone would bring a bottle of wine, peal the labels, drink it, and then they would all guess what wine it is, where does it come from, what vineyard, what family produced it, types of grapes, and so on. Also, here in US I saw that people spit wine on wine tastings so they wouldn't get drunk. That's just ridiculous to me but is that what people in France do also? Spit the good wine? Hm...

Speaking of wine and alcohol, the allowed age for drinking in US is 21, while in France and the rest of the Europe is 18. What are the reasons behind these differences? What are your opinions? (I'm asking both French and Americans)

@Benjamin:"sentimental, fragile, tendre et affectueux, qu'on sait comment faire plaisir à une femme en rendant les choses magiques !" : impossible :)

Re: Drinking Age: I think we're just more restrictive because of the country's puritan roots, and also it appears to me that many Americans just consume alcoholic beverages for the sport of it, not enjoy/actually taste it. (... and not just wines either. There are way better beers out there than Budweiser.)

@ Romain Picard. Haha. I think it's quite a luxury to think about taking 5 weeks of vacation here. It seems very ... hmmmm... well it just doesn't usually happen I suppose. That's why people are surprised that it is so normal in France.

Concernant l'âge légal pour la consommation d'alcool, en Suisse il me semble même qu'on peut vendre certains types d'alcool, comme la bière ou le vin au jeunes de 16 ans! ^^

Avant en France, la majorité civile était aussi de 21 ans comme aux Etats Unis maintenant. J'imagine donc que l'âge légal pour boire de l'alcool était aussi de 21 ans à l'époque... Quelqu'un sait d'ailleurs pourquoi cet âge a-t'il été baissé (enseirb ou mit)?

D'ailleurs, en parlant d'âge légal, je trouve que 16 ans c'est assez tôt pour apprendre à conduire. Pensez vous qu'à cet âge on est assez responsable pour ça? Pour information, en France on peut conduire à partir de 18 ans, mais il est aussi possible d'apprendre plus tôt (à partir de 16 ans) mais il est alors obligatoire d'être accompagné par un conducteur plus expérimenté.

Pour la consomation d'alcool certains pays autorises que les jeunes de 16 ans boivent tant qu'ils boivent dans un bar ou un restaurant (Pays-bas par exemple)

@Noujoud: l'age de notre majorité civile à évolué en même temps que les moeurs

@ benji

Mais les moeurs ont aussi évolués dans d'autres pays sans que cela ait modifié l'âge de la majorité. Ce ne sont donc pas, à priori les seuls paramètres à prendre en compte.

Je pense pour ma part et d'après de vague souvenirs de cours d'histoire, qu'il s'agissait en fait d'une manoeuvre politique pour les élections, et même si ce n'était pas la raison première, ça a quand même du leur (le gouvernement) traverser l'esprit.

@Noujoud

Les moeurs ont changé dans tous les pays je suis ok. Sa depend dans qu'elle sens elle évolue (religieuse, etc ....). Sur le net, j'ai pas trouvé d'autre réponse.