[Sugar-devel] [ASLO] Release I know America-2

[Gabriel Eirea]

2011/8/21 Paul Fox <pgf at laptop.org>:
> i meant to say this when i read the previous mail about this
> activity -- my apologies for perhaps waiting too long:  i think this
> activity (in english, at least) would be more correctly titled
> "I Know the Americas".  north america, south america, and central
> america aren't known collectively as "America".  they're called "The
> Americas".  (plus, for better or worse, when anyone says "America" in
> english, they're almost certainly referring to the USA.)

On the other hand, given that this is an educational project, it
wouldn't hurt using the correct term for a change.

I'll tell you a story. When I was a kid in Uruguay they were showing a
very popular TV series called "Fame". In one episode they would
rehearse and present a dancing piece called "America". I was all
excited since for the first time I was going to watch on TV something
that had to do with me in some way, I felt "included", if you know
what I mean. Then the piece started and they were all showing flags of
the United States and the Statue of Liberty, and I was all confused
and dissapointed. "What's wrong with these people?" was my 10-yr-old's
thought.

Later on I grew up, had the chance to learn a few things and lived in
the US for 7 years. I came to appreciate the good and bad things of
the country and its people, and in the end human beings have so much
in common anywhere in the world.

I would only hope if a 10-yr-old american ;) kid opens this activity
it would create the same type of cognitive dissonance the Fame episode
created for me at the time, and he would ask around, and hopefully
some interesting conversation follows up.

As you can see, for us living in the backyard it is not a small thing,
since behind the innocent word there are so many things we wouldn't
even know where to start.

Regards,

Gabriel