Since the start of this essay and the blog that comes along with it I had the issue of finding a proper plan for it.
Thanks to Paul Slater, my tutor and teacher for this module, we've managed to identify what were the core elements which were of interest in this subject.
So what is exactly preventing people to get along when one is a foreigner and the other a british?
To make sure we are doing it right, it is best to "scoop large". So i believe that at first, we need to understand what is exactly friendship, since what comes between english and foreigners actually prevent it to happen.
There is a point in looking at what does people see as friendship, throughout their cultures, their age, their social class, or anything else that could be relevant.
My teenage cousin might say that she has 20 friends, my second year classmate at uni will probably venture for 50 or 60, while I'd say I've 10 at the best.
Are we more or less sociable?
Or is it that we define friendship differently?
Secondly, a huge influence in friendship making is the actual bonding process where people get together and start having "common sympathetic feelings" for each other. Usually this implies a feeling of communality (they share something together: they went to the same school, love the same sport, have the same humor...). However you may share commonalities with other people that you may not be friend with: You just don't happen to be friend with everybody at work, or with people that went to holidays to Corfou.
This implies that there is more to it than meet the eye.
This bond making seems quite specific in the British context: It happens mostly in pub, while clubbing, having BBQs, or through absorbing drinks and drugs.
This is obviously a major difference with the foreigners, since their societies do not put such limitations. This particularity is likely to become my third part of study in this essay.
In fact i will probably be looking in part two at how does the British view themselves in terms of friendship-making, while the third part will focus on the differences between this approach, the foreigner's one, and what confusion comes out of it.
2 comments:
Hi ED! As I said I might be able to help. I moved in England for good in Sept 03, went to intensive English lessons where the only persons I met were international students who come and go. I was desperate to make long-term friends but had no opportunities. I didn't go out much as I needed to settle in my new house and partner. In Jan 04, I started a job as a home carer, and I believe the office staff only thought of me as a good scruber! (Foreigners(=illegal and legitimate imnigrants all in the same bag...) can do the dirty work...)I got on fine with my clients, always but they weren't friends obviously. Fed up, I randomly asked for a job in my local supermarket where I still work now, and within the first three months I was down the pub nearly every week-end and out boozing once a month (Disgraceful, some would say!)with my colleagues from work. When at first, I used to talk about work, I now know them each on a more personal level. I tried to avoid gossip as (I don't think) it's in my nature, and I get on with blokes better. About 2 weeks ago, I found myself sitting in a bar 'putting the world to right'with my floor manager. I had an adult conversation with him but with the girls is never so 'serious'.
By the way my blog is now started http://mflinbritain.blogspot.com
Hey Ed! Have you heard this sentence "I don't wanna get involved."? I have the feeling that sometime people are happy to have an informal chat ie talk about the weather or the train being late...again, just scraping the surface. However, they don't seem to be willing to give their point of view and speak out loud and clear. Paul, Xin and I were talking about peer pressure the other day. Are the English scared to look like "prats"?
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