Going Native

From Menletter June 2005

By Tim Baehr

Innocents Abroad

A long time ago, along the Mohawk Trail (Route 2) in Massachusetts, my brother and I were pestering to stop at an "authentic" Mohawk Indian Trading Post. The Trading Post was a wonderland of tiny birch-bark canoes, moccasins, and tom-toms. The tom-toms drew us in as the ideal combination of souvenir, toy, and memento, even though our 8-year-old eyes could easily see the painted rubber heads and tin-can bodies. There may have been more "authentic" items in this gift shop, but we were innocent of any notions of authenticity. We wanted toys.

Ugly Aliens

Just a few years ago, my family was sitting in a small bistro in Siena, Italy. A rather loud American was bragging about his job as a distributor for a string of ice-cream shops in California. He couldn't make out anything on the menu, so he stood up and (again loudly) announced that he would just go look over people's shoulders and, when he saw something he might like, order that. As fellow Americans, we shrunk into our collars, turtle-like, trying not to be conspicuously American.

Published in 1958, The Ugly American was a novel about clueless Americans abroad (in Southeast Asia, an eerie foretelling of some of what happened in the Vietnam War). The "ugly American" epithet came to depict the stereotypical view Europeans had (and sometimes still have) of American travelers abroad: loud; inappropriately dressed; oblivious to local culture; and convinced that if they speak loudly and slowly, their listeners should understand English.

I've changed the term to "ugly aliens" because the phenomenon doesn't seem to be purely American, at least any more. I've seen Italians screaming at Taiwanese jewelry-makers at Disney World's EPCOT because they couldn't make themselves understood. I've seen British and German tourists regarding cathedrals and architectural treasures of Italy as their own personal theme park. (Yes, Herr Tourist, this is a working church in addition to being a tourist attraction. No, you cannot come into the church wearing shorts, and your wife may not come in wearing a halter top.)

Neo Natives

My father-in-law used to make the distinction between tourists and immigrants. Immigrants eventually have to find ways to cope with the local culture, unless they isolate themselves in expatriate ghettoes. But there's one kind of immigrant at the far end of the spectrum from the innocent or the ugly. This is the person who "goes native," adopting the local dress, customs, and language, and practically obliterating any traces of the culture from which he has emanated. This is the stuff of romance: the "gone-native" individual usually seems to be in some tropical clime, deeply tanned, with a native spouse or live-in companion. He may or may not be doing useful work except as a writer or artist. As jolly and contented as this person may seem, there is often an undercurrent of naivete and sadness.

Real-life people who go native sometimes come to suffer from a psychological disorder called anomie. This is the sense of being cut adrift, not belonging to any cultural or value system. Having dived into the deep end of their adopted cultural ocean, they swim along nicely for a while; but eventually they find that they are drowning, and that the distance to the once-familiar shore of their origins is too far away to swim back to.

Beyond Travel

These three phenomena -- the innocent, the ugly alien, and the neo-native -- are not limited to foreign travel. Let's look at a couple of other areas in which the phenomena take place.

Business. I was one of the innocents during most of my business career: totally unaware of (or indifferent to) the culture of the companies I worked for and therefore susceptible to exploitation or disappointment. The ugly aliens were often the successful ones. These were the folks with the MBAs who took the business culture they had learned in school and rammed it unceremoniously into the companies that hired them. The neo-natives abandoned any shred of individuality and allowed themselves to become absorbed completely into the corporate culture. Their anomie was often triggered by one of two events: they stopped being promoted, or they were promoted to a level at which they were incompetent.

Gender relations. The innocent man never quite gets it about women, or at least about the woman he is living with. He retains a child-like view of relationships, seeking what will please him (the equivalent of the gift-shop tom-tom) and is unaware of any notion of authenticity. Ugly aliens are more grown up, but steeped so deeply in their own masculinity that women are their own personal theme park. They are aware of women's culture and needs but devalue them and subordinate them to their own. Neo-natives don't become women, but they do adopt much of women's culture. They may be metrosexual men who worry constantly about complexion and clothing styles. They may be male feminists who adopt women's liberation as their own campaign, ignoring or devaluing problems men may have and speaking indignantly about the patriarchy. They may be men who abandon most or all of their autonomy as men in order to immerse themselves in a relationship. Anomie may kick in when a man is betrayed by his adopted culture (this may be what happened to Warren Farrell when he was drummed out of the National Organization for Women), when he tries to reassert his masculinity and is met with confusion or scorn, or when he simply discovers that he has no idea of who he really is.

What Now?

Are we doomed to be an innocent, an ugly alien, or a neo-native? Do we have to choose, or is there another way? Here are some ideas that may work:

Growing up. Childlike innocence is great for children, and it can serve an adult well under some circumstances, as in approaching a work of art or the beauty of nature. But informing ourselves of the world and seeking authentic experiences can prevent us from bringing home "genuine" souvenirs of life and discovering, too late, the "Made in Taiwan" label.

Learning respect. A lot of ugly alien behavior can be prevented if we learn that we and our culture (ethnic, national, gender, etc.) are not unique, or at least the only worthy ones. Respect goes beyond tolerance (which has the whiff of superiority) to a place where we can respect and appreciate differences without necessarily embracing all of them.

Knowing ourselves. If we have no idea of who we are, how can we possibly know about anyone else? Males often spend a majority of time in their early years in the company of women: mothers, day-care providers, and elementary teachers. They may get involved with girlfriends, and even get married, without having spent much time with older men. Our models for masculinity come from television and movies: buffoons, sports heroes, thugs, and supermen. Also, no one -- male or female -- seems to be encouraged to engage in any introspection. We can find ourselves vulnerable to being absorbed into jobs and relationships, "going native" but not knowing what we're giving up. Spending time with other men, and quietly with ourselves, can help us stay grounded on our native turf.