# What American cultural stuff is MORE popular outside North America? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 19, 2008, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010 "2008-04-19T15:51:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Icerigger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icerigger/32/432_2.png) [@Icerigger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icerigger)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2008, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/41 "2008-04-21T17:19:49Z")
I have heard the American Indians and their culture along with the “old west” is very popular in Germany. I don’t know this for a fact. ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2008, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/42 "2008-04-21T17:28:11Z")
[QUOTE=Tyrrell McAllister] I’ve never seen root beer in Europe. [/QUOTE] When McDonalds were expanding in the UK in the late '70s/80’s it was possible to get root beer in some of them. It didn’t seem to last very long though. ---
**Author:** ![ntcrawler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/34f0e0/32.png) [@ntcrawler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ntcrawler)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2008, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/43 "2008-04-21T17:35:22Z")
Bobby Vinton. Also, Rockabilly was a huge thing in England, Germany, and Japan for a period in the 1980s while it was all but forgotten here. ---
**Author:** ![Tyrrell\_McAllister](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tyrrell_mcallister/32/16772_2.png) [@Tyrrell\_McAllister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tyrrell_McAllister)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2008, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/44 "2008-04-21T17:53:09Z")
[QUOTE=Icerigger] I have heard the American Indians and their culture along with the “old west” is very popular in Germany. I don’t know this for a fact. [/QUOTE] The New York Times had an article about this phenomenon a while back: [In Germany, Wild for Winnetou](http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/12/arts/design/12karl.html?&pagewanted=all) ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2008, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/45 "2008-04-21T17:56:48Z")
[QUOTE=Sublight] For some reason, _Bewitched_, _Little House on the Prairie_ and _Full House_ were extremely popular in Japan. I guess NHK picked them out of the syndication bargain bin and just played them every single day. It’s not American, but _Anne of Green Gables_ is extremely popular in Japan as well. There was a hit anime adaptation series made in the '70s which just about every adult has watched at some point. From what I understand, PEI still gets a lot of Japanese tourists coming to see the original house. [/QUOTE] We went to Nova Scotia/PEI on our honeymoon in 2000, and I can vouch for the ubiquitousness of Japanese tourists at the Green Gables home. Thanks for shedding light on that mystery! ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2008, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/46 "2008-04-22T05:53:37Z")
[QUOTE=Argent Towers] Off topic, but isn’t it tremendously ironic that someone with the surname of Cook should be cannibalized? [/QUOTE] Leaving aside the ironic possibilities for a moment, there’s still considerable debate among Cook scholars over whether Cook was, in fact, cannibalized. Prominent anthropologist Gananath Obeyesekere believes not, although Marshall Sahlins is not quite so sure. Their debate over Cook’s death and its significance is one of the more fascinating exchanges in the field of anthropology. One piece of evidence that Obeyesekere offers in supports of his argument is the journal of Lieutenant King. One of King’s entries, describing the period after a part of Cook’s body had been returned to the crew, says: > [@](#): > > This [meeting] afforded an opportunity of informing ourselves, > whether they were cannibals; and we did not neglect it. We first tried, > by many indirect questions, put to each of them apart, to learn in > what manner the rest of the bodies had been disposed of; and finding > them very constant in one story, that, after the flesh had been cut off, > it was all burnt; we at last put the direct question, Whether they had > not eat some of it? They immediately shewed as much horror at the > idea, as any European would have done; and asked, very naturally, if > that was the custom amongst us? They afterward asked us, with great > earnestness and apparent apprehension, “When the Orono would > come again? and what he would do to them on his return?” The same > inquiry was frequently made afterward by others; and this idea agrees > with the general tenour of their conduct toward him, which shewed, > that they considered him as a being of superior nature. [V, 3:69] From Gananath Obeyesekere, " ‘British Cannibals’: Contemplation of an Event in the Death and Resurrection of James Cook, Explorer," _Critical Inquiry_, Vol. 18, No. 4, Identities (Summer, 1992), p. 632. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2008, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/47 "2008-04-22T06:26:44Z")
For that matter, as Cecil points out, there’s some argument about whether cannibalism existed at all: [http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3\_054.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_054.html) It’s certainly at least rare. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2008, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/48 "2008-04-22T07:36:39Z")
[QUOTE=Wendell Wagner] For that matter, as Cecil points out, there’s some argument about whether cannibalism existed at all: [http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3\_054.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_054.html) It’s certainly at least rare. [/QUOTE] Right. In fact, Obeyesekere makes a related point in the article i cited. He concludes not only that the Hawai’ians didn’t practice cannibalism, but that their fascination with the topic was caused mainly by the fact that Cook’s sailors were constantly asking about it. He argues that the Hawai’ians thought that the Brits might be cannibals, because they seemed to talk about it a lot. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2008, 8:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/49 "2008-04-22T08:21:10Z")
[QUOTE=Wendell Wagner] For that matter, as Cecil points out, there’s some argument about whether cannibalism existed at all: [http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3\_054.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_054.html) It’s certainly at least rare. [/QUOTE] I think I mentioned in another thread some time ago that I’d lived 2 1/2 years in Hawaii and never heard about any cannibal heritage. ---
**Author:** ![Cardinal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cardinal/32/4000_2.png) [@Cardinal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardinal)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2008, 8:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/50 "2008-04-22T08:56:49Z")
[QUOTE=Kizarvexius] I spent my spring semester of 93 in a small town in Italy, about an hour north of Rome by train. Among the teenagers who lived in the village, American high school letter jackets (the genuine article, I assume, and not locally made imitations) were a highly prominent fashion trend. As I gather, it mattered not what school was represented, nor which clubs, awards or activities were being advertised – it was therefore not unusual to see ultra-macho studs strolling through the piazza wearing jackets that proclaimed their accomplishments with the glee club, ladies’ tennis team, cheerleading squad, etc. [/QUOTE] If they were genuine (imports), then how did these fine specimines fit in these girlish sizes? ---
**Author:** ![calm\_kiwi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc348/32.png) [@calm\_kiwi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/calm_kiwi)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2008, 10:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/51 "2008-04-22T10:18:08Z")
[QUOTE=mhendo] Leaving aside the ironic possibilities for a moment, there’s still considerable debate among Cook scholars over whether Cook was, in fact, cannibalized. Prominent anthropologist Gananath Obeyesekere believes not, although Marshall Sahlins is not quite so sure. Their debate over Cook’s death and its significance is one of the more fascinating exchanges in the field of anthropology. One piece of evidence that Obeyesekere offers in supports of his argument is the journal of Lieutenant King. One of King’s entries, describing the period after a part of Cook’s body had been returned to the crew, says:From Gananath Obeyesekere, " ‘British Cannibals’: Contemplation of an Event in the Death and Resurrection of James Cook, Explorer," _Critical Inquiry_, Vol. 18, No. 4, Identities (Summer, 1992), p. 632. [/QUOTE] Cook’s ship the Endeavour features on our money. Whilst we know Abel Tasman sailed past New Zealand first, Cook is our “discoverer”. He and his crew were the first pakeha/white man to set foot on New Zealand. We all know he was killed in Hawaii but this is the first I (and I’m sure I’m not alone) in hearing stories about cannabilism associated with his death. Tthough the details escape me this minute he was exposed to cannibalism in New Zealand but I don’t know how that was ever confused with his death. After watching a documentery series about him recently I am in awe of the man, not only was he an amazing sailor he was also an incredible people manager/antropologist/ambassador and an amazingly driven man. ---
**Author:** ![DangleYourModifier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@DangleYourModifier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DangleYourModifier)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2008, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010/52 "2008-04-22T10:37:39Z")
In a similar vein to a lot of replies, [Rodriguez](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixto_Diaz_Rodriguez), was hugely popular in South Africa and virtually unknown anywhere else, especially in his own country. They even launched a website, The Great Rodriguez Hunt, because many people thought he was dead. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-american-cultural-stuff-is-more-popular-outside-north-america/446010.md?page=2)