Saturday, June 20, 2009

Stereotypes

I am interested to hear any stereotypes that you all may have about Kenya or Africa, and I am kind of going to do an experiment observing in my month here and asking questions as to whether or not they are true. I know that I had a few of these stereotypes myself, several of which have proved true so far, and several of which are not even close.

So what are yours (on non-foreign keyboard, a question mark would here be inserted)

1 comment:

  1. I asked my step-dad what he thought and the first thing he said was poor children and that's sort of one of the first things that comes to my mind; not poor children specifically but more extreme poverty in general. I was actually quite surprised when you said the house you stayed at was very nice and similar to an American home. For some reason when ever I think of Africa and houses I picture little stick huts with no running water or bathrooms and interesting toilets like the ones they had a picture of at church (by interesting I mean unsanitary)... or just a hole in ground...

    I always figured they ate food I would never consider touching like bugs, snakes... and I believe my roommate told me they eat dirt balls over in Kenya or some kind of ball that included dirt as a main ingredient.

    I also always assumed that the people living there would be one of two types: extremely happy that you are there and excited to meet you and talk to you, or very hostile and unfriendly. Maybe a few people who are inbetween the two. And from the way my history teacher presented the African nation I pictured them as not being big on wearing clothes and if they did happen to be wearing clothes they would be brightly colored and have interesting patterns... and no shoes. But I think that probably depends more on what part of Africa you are in.

    I figured it would be extremely hot in Kenya and not a lot of rain. I also think there are lots of bugs (bugs bigger than Missouri bugs). I also kind of thought that there'd be a lot of wildlife. Not like lions, although I guess I would be surprised if you said one wandered into the village, but other animals.

    The only other thing I can think of off the top of my head is that they have interesting dialects over there and that one region may have four or five languages used in it because of all the different people living there.

    That's all i can really think of right now, hope that helps with your experiment!

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