Megumi@Ibaraki
Is "Minnesota Nice" different from Japanese Politeness? The Japanese people think the Americans tend to be more direct and straight-forward when it comes to communication. I've always thought being nice for Americans is different from that for Japanese (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/JapanesePoliteness). However, "Minnesota nice" might have an affinity to Japanese politeness. The cultural characteristics of Minnesota seem very similar to what we traditionally consider polite. Some of the characteristics that Minnesotans allegedly have are *a polite friendliness *an aversion to confrontation *a tendency toward understatement *a disinclination to make a fuss or stand out & *emotional restraint, and self-deprecation On the flipside, they are *passive-aggressive & *unwilling to discuss things that are unpleasant I don't personally know anyone from the state, so I have no idea whether these are actually common traits among the residents there.
Mar 4, 2013 1:26 AM
Corrections · 3

Is "Minnesota Nice" different from Japanese Politeness?

The Japanese people think the Americans tend to be more direct and straight-forward when it comes to communication. I've always thought being nice for Americans is different (from that for Japanese/from being nice in Japan) (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/JapanesePoliteness).

However, "Minnesota nice" might have an affinity to Japanese politeness.
The cultural characteristics of Minnesota seem to be very similar to what we traditionally consider polite.
Some of the characteristics that Minnesotans allegedly have are:

*a polite friendliness
*an aversion to confrontation
*a tendency toward understatement
*a disinclination to make a fuss or stand out
&
*emotional restraint, and/or self-deprecation

On the flipside, they are

*passive-aggressive
&
*unwilling to discuss things that are unpleasant

I don't personally know anyone from the state, so I have no idea whether these are actually common traits among the residents there.

March 5, 2013
I've never been to Minnesota, and they don't seem to be different from people anywhere else in North America from what I've noticed. Most North Americans are pretty loud, extroverted, and social in general, (almost to a degree that would be somewhat offensive to people from certain other world cultures,) as that's what's deemed favorable by the culture, and a lot of naturally introverted people feel a lot of social pressure to act extroverted in order to get along with everyone else. I have read though that people in the Great Lakes area are mostly descended from Scandinavians and other Northern Europeans, and I've heard pretty much most of those same characteristics used to describe people from Northern Europe also (as opposed to Mediterraneans who are generally thought of as being a lot louder, more extroverted, and overtly social), so maybe they retained some of those cultural elements while still getting louder and more Americanized like most other people here.
March 20, 2013
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