World According to Americans
World According to Americans
THE WORLD According to a Group of AMERICANS who turned out to be unexpectedly good at geography, derailing our attempt to illustrate their country's attitude toward the rest of the world.
[Left to right, up to down.]
[North of Canada.] Hey so what projection should we use? I'll aim for "Robinson."
[North America.] Alaska; Canada; Hudson Bay; Québec; United States Did you know Maine is actually the US state closest to Africa?; Bermuda (British!)
[Central America.] Baja California (Mexico); Mexico; Central America; Panama Canal; Gulf of Mexico; Cuba; Hispañola; POR.; Jamaica Do we have to label all the Virgin Islands?
[South America.] Rest of South America (spanish-speaking); Brazil (portugese-speaking); French, and I think Dutch and English; Tierra del Fuego
[Greenland.] Greenland (still too big!); Yeah but the Peters map is awful; Iceland
[Europe.] British Isles; Ireland ; Gibralter; Scandanavia; Western Europe; Eastern Europe; Black sea; Middle East
[Africa.] Morocco; Algera; Sahara Desert; West Africa; Sudan; Rainforest DRC; Lake Victoria; Somalia; Angola; Mozambique; South Africa; Cape Horn; Madagascar
[West of DRC.] So this is one of those things where you point out our ignorance and stereotypes? Yeah – I mean, I freely admit I don't know the African map very well, which speaks volumes in itself.
[West Asia.] Russia; Aral sea (Gone); Various former Soviet states; Afghanistan & Pakistan; India; Mostly Muslim; Mostly Hindu
[Indian Ocea.] Sri Lanka; Boxing Day Quake Wait, "Boxing day"? There's no way you're American. I read BBC News, OK?
[East Asia.] Mongolia; Tibet (contested); China; Southeast Asia
[Pacific Ocean.] Kamchatka Pennisula, but I admit I only know this one from Risk. Koreas; Japan, duh.; Taiwan (actually called "The Republic of China." – it's complicated.); Phillipines; Malaysia; Indonesia; Sulawesi; Paupa New Guinea; Australia; Tasmania; New Zealand
[South of Africa.] Should we include Antarctica? Let's not – these guys are looking impatient.

There's a somewhat well-circulated image on the internet entitled " The World According to Americans " which plays on the stereotype of the ignorant American. In it, the entirety of Eastern Europe and most of Asia are entitled "commies" and the Middle-East as "evil-doers," and so on. Later, other people created similar maps to re-do the concept. It later spread to other cultures.
This comic is an anti-joke playing on that idea. You expect to see something which plays on the stereotypes that exist in American culture of various parts of the world. However, instead, the map is remarkably well-informed, and shows how sampling bias can be used to conflate results. See below the table of items in the map .
The title text jokes that in fact the only reason that the map is fairly well annotated is that the group of people labeling it were actually on the way back from a geography bee . This could add weight to the 'Ignorant American' stereotype as these individuals should know more than the common person, implying that if even apparent geography buffs use vague labels such as "rest of South America" and "various former Soviet states" instead of using more detailed labels, the average American must be even less geographically knowledgeable (Although, as the illustrators wrote below Cape Horn, the reason they did not draw Antarctica or many South American, Middle Eastern and British countries and the lack of detail may be because the people who asked them to draw this map were beginning to 'look impatient' since they did not get the expected ignorant result.)
A landlocked country is a country that does not border any major bodies of water. Furthering the concept, a doubly-landlocked country is a country that not only has no connection to water, but is only bordered by other landlocked countries. As the title text states, there are only two such countries in the world as of 2012: Uzbekistan and Liechtenstein . This is the type of fact that may be stereotypically expected of a geography bee competitor.
THE WORLD According to a Group of AMERICANS who turned out to be unexpectedly good at geography, derailing our attempt to illustrate their country's attitude toward the rest of the world.
[Left to right, up to down.]
[North of Canada.] Hey so what projection should we use? I'll aim for "Robinson."
[North America.] Alaska; Canada; Hudson Bay; Québec; United States Did you know Maine is actually the US state closest to Africa?; Bermuda (British!)
[Central America.] Baja California (Mexico); Mexico; Central America; Panama Canal; Gulf of Mexico; Cuba; Hispañola; POR.; Jamaica Do we have to label all the Virgin Islands?
[South America.] Rest of South America (spanish-speaking); Brazil (portugese-speaking); French, and I think Dutch and English; Tierra del Fuego
[Greenland.] Greenland (still too big!); Yeah but the Peters map is awful; Iceland
[Europe.] British Isles; Ireland ; Gibralter; Scandanavia; Western Europe; Eastern Europe; Black sea; Middle East
[Africa.] Morocco; Algera; Sahara Desert; West Africa; Sudan; Rainforest DRC; Lake Victoria; Somalia; Angola; Mozambique; South Africa; Cape Horn; Madagascar
[West of DRC.] So this is one of those things where you point out our ignorance and stereotypes? Yeah – I mean, I freely admit I don't know the African map very well, which speaks volumes in itself.
[West Asia.] Russia; Aral sea (Gone); Various former Soviet states; Afghanistan & Pakistan; India; Mostly Muslim; Mostly Hindu
[Indian Ocea.] Sri Lanka; Boxing Day Quake Wait, "Boxing day"? There's no way you're American. I read BBC News, OK?
[East Asia.] Mongolia; Tibet (contested); China; Southeast Asia
[Pacific Ocean.] Kamchatka Pennisula, but I admit I only know this one from Risk. Koreas; Japan, duh.; Taiwan (actually called "The Republic of China." – it's complicated.); Phillipines; Malaysia; Indonesia; Sulawesi; Paupa New Guinea; Australia; Tasmania; New Zealand
[South of Africa.] Should we include Antarctica? Let's not – these guys are looking impatient.
