What Americans think of the British

(a humorous look at the stereotypes)

British people have mixed opinions about the Americans, reflecting the close but sometimes troubled relationship between the two nations. For many British people the US is associated with power in international politics, Hollywood, money and violence. The British think that money matters more than anything else to Americans, and they don’t really approve of this and do not like brash displays of wealth. Young people generally have a much more positive attitude and love everything that comes out of America.

The British laugh at the usage of Americanisms: “Gee, honey! ” and “Have a nice day! ” They think names ending with numbers, like William D Hancock III, are rather silly and pretentious. British people believe that Americans have no culture, and that except for a few intellectuals. Americans spend their free time watching baseball and football, often on television. If they want culture they get television programmes from the BBC.

The popular stereotype of white Americans is created by white Britons, but these people know that the US, like Britain, is a multiracial, multicultural society. When people get to know Americans as individuals they have a lot more respect and affection for them than the popular, rather negative stereotype based on a casual meeting or on television programmes might suggest. The British find Americans friendly, welcoming to visitors; they have no worries about class.

The US once belonged to Britain, and many Americans have British ancestors, so when Americans think of Britain, they think of a place that seems very familiar. Americans watch British television programmes, especially dramas, see James Bond films, and read detective stories by Agatha Christie. Americans admire the behaviour of the British, although they themselves would never want all their social rules. Americans think of the British as being perfectly polite and proper, always knowing which knife and folk to use, always saying “please”, “thank you” and “excuse me”. The violence associated with football matches is not widely known about in the US. Britons are also famous for their reserve and their “stiff upper lip”, i.e. for not giving their opinion or showing their feeling in public, which makes them seem formal and distant. The British are also thought to use understatement (= to talk in a way which makes things seem less serious or important than they really are).

Americans often say that the British are “quaint” (=old-fashioned), but in a nice way. This impression comes partly from differences in how the two countries speak English. British English has words and structures that have not been used in the US for a long time, and so it sounds old-fashioned or formal. A favourite British adjective is lovely, which is used to describe anything, including the weather, other British words like holiday, smashing, brilliant make Americans smile. The British are snobbish and do not seem very friendly. The famous British reserve seems cold to Americans who are more used to an open, enthusiastic way of communicating.

The English still have no written constitution: their legal system is not based on any definite code but on the complicated inheritance of Common Law. There are some advantages here, notably a certain flexibility and some safeguards for the liberty of the individual not found among many other nations (…but the ordinary citizen suffers from some serious disadvan­tages. He rarely understands what rights he enjoys, having no written constitution or definite code to which he can appeal).