ABSTRACT
When one of the authors of this book first arrived in the United States to start his graduate studies in marketing, a classmate persistently asked what he thought of America.1 Being from a culture that finds it difficult to be directly unflattering, and experiencing a culture shock due to the difference between what he expected of America and what he found, he chose to elude this recurring question for almost two months. Finally, squeezed into a corner, having run out of elusive responses, and finding the courage, his answer was:
You know, Richard, I don’t think there is a culture in America. When I visit Italy, or France, or England, the air is thick with culture. The buildings, the people, the way of life tell me this is Italy, or France, or England. Here in America, the atmosphere is thin. There is no character to the things I see around me that tells me it’s a distinct culture.
