Dumb Americans and US/UK Editions

[mjollner]

Hello, there.  I started the trouble on the main list...so of course 
I'll follow it over to OT!

Shaw's quote springs to mind, about the US and Britain being two 
nations divided by a common language...

With regard to the asymmetry of expectations of US/UK cultural 
knowledge, catalyna_99 wrote:

<But what irks me, this is a recent phenomena. (snip snip) Why do we 
<think that children now can't do what we did before? 

The reason for the current situation is the power shift that's 
occurred since then. In the last century, and for the beginning of 
this one, Britain exercised cultural dominance over the US (and much 
of the rest of the world).  The US wasn't much of a country vis-a-vis 
the rest of the world in wealth or power or in any other way until the 
two World Wars devastated much of Europe and Asia physically, morally 
and financially. US postwar largesse toward rebuilding many of the 
damaged countries (not to mention the increased number of US soldiers 
stationed abroad) made the US *the* big kid on the block - the 
wealthiest and the one with the most influence - as far as much of the 
world was concerned.  So the US has been the nation exercising 
cultural dominance since then...

...which of course includes the ubiquity of US films, fashions, slang, 
etc. abroad.  From the point of view of certain Americans, including 
obviously those editors who feel it necessary to change British books 
to make them palatable for stereotypically American tastes, *of 
course* others will be familiar with US popular culture, whereas 
Americans *of course* will not be expected to be familiar with 
cultures elsewhere, not even that of our Mother Country.  

And before I'm flamed for what I just typed, let me emphasize that 
this is NOT a moral judgment in favor of the situation!   

Though I do have to agree with the poster referenced below that the US 
editions *have* had the advantage of bringing some canon facts to 
light...

As well as contributing the above thought in response to the US/UK 
edition brouhaha on the main list, davewitley chimed in:

>I also like the fact that the majority of list members have 
>the 'derivative' text - it gives a suitable mystique to us Brits (and 
>Ozzies and Canadians) who are the anointed interpreters of the 
>original.

I dunno about Aussies, since I've never known any, but I do know 
several Canadians, and they sound more like us Americans than Brits  
in colloquial speech as well as accent!  Though they are *thoroughly* 
ashamed of that fact. :-)

Mjollner, 
a secret Anglophile whose favorite historical fiction writer is 
Rosemary Sutcliffe, who thinks Sherlock Holmes is the coolest fiction 
character *ever*, who willingly bought and read a book about medieval 
and Tudor sites in London, and who drools every time British Airways 
announces another fare sale to Heathrow...