Being an American in Chile? Think again

[Article I wrote from the Retriever Weekly, UMBC's school newspaper. Original content can be seen at www.retrieverweekly.com.]

Foreign Desk: Being an American in Chile? Think again

By Kristina Gaddy
Foreign Correspondent, The Retriever Weekly

Reading what other foreign correspondents have been writing from their adventures in Russia, England, and anywhere else in the world that UMBC students go for study abroad, there is one thing that I cannot identify with while studying here in Valparaiso, Chile.

While other students write about what is different between America and where they are, and how they might stick out as Americans, I can't say that I stick out as an American and I can't really talk about America being different. This isn't because my red hair and blue eyes stick out in a sea of black-haired, brown-eyed people and it isn't because, try as I might, I still have an accent, and it isn't because things in Chile are very different from my life in Maryland. It is because I am still in America.

Chile is in South America and, to the Chileans, it is elitist bordering on offensive to refer to the United States as America or to U.S. citizens as Americans since they too are Americans - South Americans.

So, when referring to what we usually call America, instead we have to say "Los Estados Unidos," and when referring to Americans, say "estadunidenses" or "gente de los Estados Unidos." This gets cumbersome, so the Chileans say "gringos." (Gringo is not an offensive term here, just what they use for the 'Americans' that come to their country.) And when trying to be more politically correct, they usually say "North Americans." Though Canada and Mexico are still in North America, they are also very different from the United States.

Using to learn a different term for my home and my nationality is just one of the things that is different about being in Chile and is just a glimpse at the things I am learning about Chile, the rest of the world, and myself.

Copyright: The Retriever Weekly