No reason given to think this is the case on balance.
Because I thought it would be obvious enough.
Americans are less likely to learn foreign languages, most Americans don’t even have a passport, it’s easier to write a science paper without referencing any non-American research (not that I think this done at a significant rate, but the equivalent would be unthinkable elsewhere), foreign movies are generally either ignored or remade (and set in the USA if possible), foreign trade is a smaller percentage of GDP than just about any other developed nation, it’s possible to “buy American” for a greater range of products than the equivalent anywhere else, America has the top leagues for the sports it cares about (it’s not just that America cares for different sports than the rest of the world, for almost all countries the top level of the sport that country cares most about is at least in part played elsewhere so a soccer fan in e. g. Romania has to pay attention to the English Premier League, the Spanish Premiera Divison etc. [and even the English and Spanish fans have incentive to pay attention to each others league because they are at roughly equal level and the top teams regularly play each other]. If America cared about soccer the top league would be there so Americans still wouldn’t have any reason to pay attention to foreign sports).
I think most of those things could be expected regardless of whether America has any such putative hegemonic status. Most Americans don’t have passports because they can’t afford to travel to another continent, and the number is rising now that passports are required to visit other countries in North America. Getting a passport in the US is a fairly annoying, expensive process, so I’m not surprised most people haven’t bothered. Ditto with the foreign languages—most Americans don’t meet or talk to people who don’t speak American.
I haven’t been able to find a source online—do most Chinese people speak foreign languages and have passports? Are they required?
Most Americans don’t have passports because they can’t afford to travel to another continent, and the number is rising now that passports are required to visit other countries in North America. Getting a passport in the US is a fairly annoying, expensive process, so I’m not surprised most people haven’t bothered.
Getting a passport is a bother everywhere, the point is that Americans don’t really need a passport because their country is huge, rich and powerful and they can take a vacation in whatever climate they like without ever leaving their borders. People in other developed nations would have to make much greater sacrifices to never travel abroad.
Ditto with the foreign languages—most Americans don’t meet or talk to people who don’t speak American.
That’s exactly my point! They can do that without missing all that much, unlike most of the planet.
do most Chinese people speak foreign languages
IIRC compulsory foreign language instruction (mostly in English) starts in third grade, and many educated Chinese learn a third/fourth language later. For many Chinese Mandarin is effectively a L2 language so they know their native dialect, Mandarin and some English. The state of English learning is mostly horrible and only a minority can communicate effectively, but I’d think that Chinese on average speak better English than non-native-speaker Americans speak Spanish and the difficulty is much greater.
I’m not all that clear about the passport situation/foreign travel and China is a bad example anyway because it is itself an enormous country and very “nation-centric”, but a huge number of Chinese study abroad, while there is no comparable reason for Americans to do so because they already have many of the most prestigious universities.
Because I thought it would be obvious enough. Americans are less likely to learn foreign languages, most Americans don’t even have a passport, it’s easier to write a science paper without referencing any non-American research (not that I think this done at a significant rate, but the equivalent would be unthinkable elsewhere), foreign movies are generally either ignored or remade (and set in the USA if possible), foreign trade is a smaller percentage of GDP than just about any other developed nation, it’s possible to “buy American” for a greater range of products than the equivalent anywhere else, America has the top leagues for the sports it cares about (it’s not just that America cares for different sports than the rest of the world, for almost all countries the top level of the sport that country cares most about is at least in part played elsewhere so a soccer fan in e. g. Romania has to pay attention to the English Premier League, the Spanish Premiera Divison etc. [and even the English and Spanish fans have incentive to pay attention to each others league because they are at roughly equal level and the top teams regularly play each other]. If America cared about soccer the top league would be there so Americans still wouldn’t have any reason to pay attention to foreign sports).
I think most of those things could be expected regardless of whether America has any such putative hegemonic status. Most Americans don’t have passports because they can’t afford to travel to another continent, and the number is rising now that passports are required to visit other countries in North America. Getting a passport in the US is a fairly annoying, expensive process, so I’m not surprised most people haven’t bothered. Ditto with the foreign languages—most Americans don’t meet or talk to people who don’t speak American.
I haven’t been able to find a source online—do most Chinese people speak foreign languages and have passports? Are they required?
Getting a passport is a bother everywhere, the point is that Americans don’t really need a passport because their country is huge, rich and powerful and they can take a vacation in whatever climate they like without ever leaving their borders. People in other developed nations would have to make much greater sacrifices to never travel abroad.
That’s exactly my point! They can do that without missing all that much, unlike most of the planet.
IIRC compulsory foreign language instruction (mostly in English) starts in third grade, and many educated Chinese learn a third/fourth language later. For many Chinese Mandarin is effectively a L2 language so they know their native dialect, Mandarin and some English. The state of English learning is mostly horrible and only a minority can communicate effectively, but I’d think that Chinese on average speak better English than non-native-speaker Americans speak Spanish and the difficulty is much greater.
I’m not all that clear about the passport situation/foreign travel and China is a bad example anyway because it is itself an enormous country and very “nation-centric”, but a huge number of Chinese study abroad, while there is no comparable reason for Americans to do so because they already have many of the most prestigious universities.
Again, why the down-vote? Is there any factual error or is giving evidence when asked not welcome here?