Disclaimer: Although my nationality says "China", I've become a US citizen recently and have lived in the US for about 12+ years.
It recently occurred to me that while some nations such as Germany are regarded as the "fatherland" and Russia as "Mother Russia", the United States has always been rather sexually ambiguous as to its identity. On one hand, there is the image of "America the beautiful", some kind of genetic twin to Lady Liberty. On the other hand, there's Uncle Sam, a bearded macho white dude with an attitude.
The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that America's more of an Uncle Sam and less of a Mother/Motherland type. Uncle Sam isn't America's Uncle, but he's actually America itself. America's role in the world has always been less of a benevolent mother type and more of an aggressive masculine type.
Example: On average, the United States get entangled in a war about every 30 years or so. Besides the first couple wars with Britain and maybe WWII, the US has been the aggressor in many of these wars. It doesn't really fit the Lady America image, unless every thirty years she whips out her giant dick (which is bigger than all the other nations' dicks) and slaps someone with it really hard.
Example: Uncle Sam's latest conquest is Iraq, which he basically fucked over and pulled out but not before it's already pregnant with a fuckload of problems.
Not that any of this is a bad thing, but it is just pretty strange behavior for a nation generally characterized as feminine. I would still consider China as characteristically a motherland, for example, if only because around the turn of the century a whole bunch of other nations freely went in and out as they pleased.
There's no real point in the end, but I do wonder if foreign policy is ever shaped around this image. The US is kind of strange in that it has a male mascot on top of the feminine characterization.
The physiognomy of the United States has obviously changed in the past one hundred years; Uncle Sam is an austere, puritanical, lanky man. One cannot say whether the physical or mental transformation has been more remarkable.
Attempting to describe something as complex as the behavior of a nation in terms of some nebulous gender stereotypes is beyond pointless. This entire exercise is completely meaningless.
On May 11 2010 07:13 Newbistic wrote: It doesn't really fit the Lady America image, unless every thirty years she whips out her giant dick (which is bigger than all the other nations' dicks) and slaps someone with it really hard.
Well, we Polish say "ojczyzna" which means fatherland. Our country's motto (although unofficially) has always been "Bóg, Honor, Ojczyzna" which translates to "God, Honour, Fatherland".
I think it depends a lot on which language you speak. The history of the "image" of your country, probably goes back to the days it was formed, and the language developed. Although poets, always seem to refer to their beloved country as a "she" which might have had a huge influence also over the last couple of centuries.
You forgot France, I think. Either arbitrarily or out of nessecity (of grammar), France is considered feminine. There may be other countries that are similar.
Hmm... I was thinking of something else. Think that in German culture everything is inverted compared to Latin culture, moon is male, sun is female and they talk about the Father Rhein, when liquid element would typically be feminine in Latin culture.
Explains also why the symbole of power in Germanic mythology is the ring, and not any kind of phallic symbole (sword, sceptre whatever you want).
There are probably some good books on that subject.
If it is based off of foreign policy alone, then these images are only capturing half of a country's image. Like china wouldn't be so mother-like if we took into account their domestic policy of a lack of human rights.
On May 11 2010 07:39 Doughboy wrote: If it is based off of foreign policy alone, then these images are only capturing half of a country's image. Like china wouldn't be so mother-like if we took into account their domestic policy of a lack of human rights.
I heard a story about some guys who were torturing their prisonners, and... Oh wait. No, forget about it.
On May 11 2010 07:24 Latham wrote: Well, we Polish say "ojczyzna" which means fatherland. Our country's motto (although unofficially) has always been "Bóg, Honor, Ojczyzna" which translates to "God, Honour, Fatherland".
I think it depends a lot on which language you speak. The history of the "image" of your country, probably goes back to the days it was formed, and the language developed. Although poets, always seem to refer to their beloved country as a "she" which might have had a huge influence also over the last couple of centuries.
I believe "Ojczyzna" is still a "she", so you are referring to your country as a feminine object. Btw same word in Russian, "Otchizna"( "Fatherland").
On May 11 2010 07:21 Draconizard wrote: Attempting to describe something as complex as the behavior of a nation in terms of some nebulous gender stereotypes is beyond pointless. This entire exercise is completely meaningless.
I wouldn't say it's completely meaningless, since it has been done and is still being done. National pride in general is built on simple, idealistic principles that people can easily understand and adhere to. Most people don't take pride in their own nations when they are considering all the complexities of the behavior of their nation, but will defend their nation on the grounds that it is the "motherland". Despotic and Fascist regimes are built upon capitalizing these simple sentiments, not complex behavior.
I just think it's interesting that America has both a Lady Liberty type image and an Uncle Sam image while so far to my knowledge most nations identify their nation to a single gender.
On May 11 2010 08:02 Random() wrote: "Mother Russia" is more of an American stereotype than something a Russian would use to refer to his country :D
The word that is actually used often is "rodina" that literally means "place of one's birth" without any gender connotations.
Also, "otechestvo" (which is neutral gender, btw) is the more widely used synonym of "otchizna".
It still has female gender in every case besides "otechestvo". And Russians do say "Mother Russia", no one ever used "Father Russia", it makes no sense linguistically.
EPT
