Kultur 6 - Luc Hildebrand

Kultur 6

After reading “Sex, Smut and Shock: Bild Zeitung Rules Germany” I was very surprised to here that a newspaper like Bild is so popular in Germany. From all I’ve read about German culture it seem to be very serious and conservative so to have a newspaper that is totally different from that be the main source of news for most people is quite surprising to hear. The Bild newspaper in Germany seems to be very
similar to something such as the Sun newspaper in England, which I can understand English people liking a newspaper like that, but I would not expect that from the Germans. While reading “German Privacy: Come On In: My Door Is Always Closed” the author points out a large difference between Germans and Americans when it comes to our door policies. For Americans an open door is an invitation to come in,
whereas a closed door usually means that person is busy, and we usually will knock softly because we don’t want to interrupt that person if they are busy. Germans on the other hand always have their doors closed and you are expected to knock only once and then just walk right in. I find that very odd, and if I ever spent time in Germany, I don’t know if I’d ever be able to get used to that. While reading “Division Hell: Worshipping the Garbage Gods” I learned that Germans take their garbage very seriously, and this really doesn’t seem to surprise me at all. From all I’ve read about German culture this semester, they seem to take a lot of things very seriously, and in some cases (such as with the garbage) they take it too seriously and this ends up complicating things (as such with the multiple colored trash bins that are confusingly labeled).