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• Ligne n°1 : The Atlantic | June 1958 | Is France Being Americanized? | Emmanuel


• Ligne n°42 : Is France Being Americanized?


• Ligne n°65 : We were entering the second part of the century: high time to become philosophical, as centuries in their fifties start to be. Vastly prejudiced essayists—they are the best in any case—began to analyze the concept of "Americanization." It turned out to be a very unpleasant monster, hardly recognizable for anyone who had lived a normal and decent life in the U.S.A. Americanization, like a creeping disease, would endanger the deepest roots of the Western soul; within a couple of decades, without noticing the imperceptible process, the French would become neo-Americans. For the sake of our national pride, we accepted a minor reservation: Americanization, though inescapable, would proceed more slowly in France than in Switzerland, Germany, Sweden, England, and generally all Western European countries. Yet the prospect was ghastly enough, for what is an American? A human robot; a worshiper of machines, brainwashed by the movies, advertising, and television, devoid of tradition, of family life, of self-intimacy; a money-maker for whom the dollar is the only universal value; a super-hygienic food washer who cleans vegetables with chlorine, totally depersonalized, conditioned to live in a spiritual vacuum: in short, a science fiction nightmare and a bore.


• Ligne n°65 : We were entering the second part of the century: high time to become philosophical, as centuries in their fifties start to be. Vastly prejudiced essayists—they are the best in any case—began to analyze the concept of "Americanization." It turned out to be a very unpleasant monster, hardly recognizable for anyone who had lived a normal and decent life in the U.S.A. Americanization, like a creeping disease, would endanger the deepest roots of the Western soul; within a couple of decades, without noticing the imperceptible process, the French would become neo-Americans. For the sake of our national pride, we accepted a minor reservation: Americanization, though inescapable, would proceed more slowly in France than in Switzerland, Germany, Sweden, England, and generally all Western European countries. Yet the prospect was ghastly enough, for what is an American? A human robot; a worshiper of machines, brainwashed by the movies, advertising, and television, devoid of tradition, of family life, of self-intimacy; a money-maker for whom the dollar is the only universal value; a super-hygienic food washer who cleans vegetables with chlorine, totally depersonalized, conditioned to live in a spiritual vacuum: in short, a science fiction nightmare and a bore.


• Ligne n°65 : We were entering the second part of the century: high time to become philosophical, as centuries in their fifties start to be. Vastly prejudiced essayists—they are the best in any case—began to analyze the concept of "Americanization." It turned out to be a very unpleasant monster, hardly recognizable for anyone who had lived a normal and decent life in the U.S.A. Americanization, like a creeping disease, would endanger the deepest roots of the Western soul; within a couple of decades, without noticing the imperceptible process, the French would become neo-Americans. For the sake of our national pride, we accepted a minor reservation: Americanization, though inescapable, would proceed more slowly in France than in Switzerland, Germany, Sweden, England, and generally all Western European countries. Yet the prospect was ghastly enough, for what is an American? A human robot; a worshiper of machines, brainwashed by the movies, advertising, and television, devoid of tradition, of family life, of self-intimacy; a money-maker for whom the dollar is the only universal value; a super-hygienic food washer who cleans vegetables with chlorine, totally depersonalized, conditioned to live in a spiritual vacuum: in short, a science fiction nightmare and a bore.


• Ligne n°75 : Returning travelers used to say ironically, five or six years ago: "Zurich is quite Americanized" or "Essen is a Middle-Western city." But, thank God, there were no snack bars in France, for "snacks would be the beginning of the end." Now there are snacks everywhere, and self-service too. In Lyon, the capital of French gastronomy, the famous Buffet de la Gare has been turned into a self-service establishment; it looks exactly like any Horn and Hardart branch (unpaid advertisement). The sacred French two-hour break for lunch will soon be but a nostalgic memory; for where in France if not in Lyon was the respect for food more of a religious and family cult? Foreigners complain that one does not eat so well in France as one used to. True: but the cooking and enjoyment of good food takes time, which very few people can still afford; it also takes fresh vegetables, herbs, and meats, which deep freezes superbly ignore. Ten years from now, we shall eat sandwiches at twelve, leave our offices at five, rush for a train or to a parking lot, and travel forty miles to return home to a cold supper and television.


• Ligne n°83 : For such people, to whom American methods are well known and who admire the way American specialists are integrated into political life, Americanization means first of all simplification. Young technicians—future engineers or civil servants—travel a good deal nowadays. For the last ten years, a number of them have stayed in the United States long enough to study the techniques of modern efficiency, which they want to bring back home. I personally know a few of them who were given scholarships or went to the United States without definite purpose, through organizations like the Harvard International Seminar. They left France with the customary false notions about America, and after a few weeks in the United States they made some discoveries: first, naïve as it may seem, they found that life was quite human in the U.S.A. and far more diversified than a stereotyped image had led them to expect.


• Ligne n°93 : During the dark days of Budapest, the bulk of French public opinion woke up to that unity of purpose. Since then, anti-Americanism has quieted down, though it still exists potentially—as a symbol of ultranationalism. Whether the last American loan had political implications, we cannot say, but most people cannot dismiss the feeling that it comes with strings attached, and they resent what they consider a sort of control, though it may be unavoidable.

Ligne n°124 : ...
• Ligne n°125 : Copyright © 1958 by Pierre Emmanuel. All rights reserved. The Atlantic Monthly ; June 1958; Is France Being Americanized?; Volume 201, No. 6; page 35.