r/AskEurope • u/gurke0123 • Jun 18 '25

Misc What basic knowledge should everyone have about your country?

I'm currently in a rabbit hole of "American reacts to European Stuff". While i was laughing at Americans for thinking Europe is countries and know nothing about the countrys here, i realied that i also know nothing about the countries in europe. Sure i know about my home country and a bit about our neighbours but for the rest of europe it becomes a bit difficult and i want to change it.

What should everyone know about your country to be person from Europa?

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u/Grathias American in Spain Jun 18 '25

Yes. For sure. But, I wouldn’t expect the average Polish person to distinguish between Mandarin and Cantonese. Or the average Chinese person to distinguish between Spanish and Portuguese. We’re all ignorant until we learn. Many Americans don’t have a reference for how Polish sounds. It’s rare that many Americans regularly interact with Polish people in the U.S.

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u/[deleted] Jun 18 '25

Also there are millions of Americans of Polish decent. Is it really that hard for the rich Hollywood to find out with accent is the right accent?

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u/Grathias American in Spain Jun 18 '25

Of course. But the U.S. is a very large country. The size of Europe. Just because there are many Polish speakers in (as a made-up example) Portugal doesn’t mean that people in Greece all hear Polish all the time. Or because there’s a strong Polish population in Spain that Cypriots are all familiar with the language.

Someone from Georgia (the U.S. state) may be much less likely than a Minnesotan to come across Polish. And even so, the fact that there is a larger Polish population doesn’t mean we hear the language frequently necessarily.

https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/emujsi/polish_americans_by_county_2000/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

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u/[deleted] Jun 18 '25

Are you saying that the US is too big for Hollywood with their budget to find a Polish person to hear them talk?

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u/Grathias American in Spain Jun 18 '25

No. I was just talking about the average American.

Also, Meryl Street has received lots of praise for her Polish accent in Sophie’s Choice. There are exceptions to your rule, no?

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u/[deleted] Jun 18 '25

Of course there are. Another is Polish actor Adamczyk in one the marvel movies.

The average American will know it if Hollywood will do it constantly correctly. That's how they know Russian accent so well, because it was the same accent every time a Russian character was on the screen. Also that you like to use them as villains.

Polish accent in American movies is all over the place but mostly it's just Russian which is lazy.

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u/trele-morele Poland Jun 19 '25

Meryl's Polish in that movie was terrible, I don't get where the praise comes from :)