Is This Seriously The American Map

Why do Americans place the USA at the center of the atlas map?

I know which map you're talking about, but I've lived in the US for my entire life and I'm honestly not sure if I've ever even seen an American centered map in real life before. As far as I can tell, it basically only exists on the internet for people to rightfully mock.Most maps choose to divide the Pacific Ocean in half rather than Asia. This incidentally places Europe at the center, not because we think that Europe is an amazing bastion of enlightenment, but because splitting the map in half over an area that nobody lives really just makes sense.I mean honestly, look at this abomination, why would anybody seriously think that chopping four out of the ten most heavily populated countries in half was a good idea?There probably are plenty of people in the US who do use this map, (and in fact the two people who have answered this question already seem to be very familiar with it) but it is far from the most commonly used version, and certainly not the kind that you would find in most schools.For the most part I think that this world map is mainly only spread around by either A.) people who believe that all Americans are ridiculous ego-maniacs, or B.) the Americans that actually do fit this description. It's an extremely bad map and I'm glad that I almost never have to look at it with my own two eyes.

Why are some Americans so bad at geography?

I don't know what students in the USA are studying in classes these days, however, in my career and socializing with young adults--many with college degrees I have heard many remark "where is that country?" And when you dig into their knowledge of geography--I am shocked by what they don't know. I started school in the mid 50's and graduated from high school in 1968. In the fifth grade we had American History. In the sixth grade it was Latin American, Mexico and Canadian History. In the seventh grade it was World Geography. In the eighth grade it was American History and European History. In ninth grade Geography. Tenth grade it was not required. In eleventh grade it was American History. Twelfth grade it was US Government. In college I had to take World History, World Geography, American History and three other courses in history to get my BFA degree.By the way, I went to school in California and I was in the honors program which meant that I had to have an overall B average in my high school courses. The honors and college prep courses in high school offered very few electives. We had to take a schedule of history/geography, math, science, english/literature, physical education (PE), and one course of our choosing each year.Someone mentioned making maps--in seventh grade World Geography I had a wonderful teacher and she had us make very detailed handmade maps of every country in the world. The samething with my World geography college professor--tons of handmade maps with every report on each country. I am really happy that they required us do this because it really helped me to understand the world today--even though many countries have changed.I also have been lucky, because in my career I have traveled all over the world (about 75+ countries) and have been to every continent (including Antartica--which was for a vacation). That travel has very much affected my understanding of world culture and the people in need on our planet.

What does a typical American think when they see a world map?

I honestly do not know and nor does anyone else.Seriously.Why? Because no matter how many shitty internet polls, pictures, and clips of random U.S. citizens going “Durr” you will not know without some real research. Also as a side note: 20 years in the entertainment industry has taught me that it’s pretty easy to edit film to only show what you want to show.Now what is known?In the U.S. geographic proficiency is not considered critical.[1]Which averages overall to this:It's not pretty. And based on the highest average was in 2001, and not that high, it shows that No Child left behind had done little to help improve that average. But spatial awareness doesn't scale very well to standardized testing.Further, this isn’t just the children but the adults too. Back in 2002 National Geographic tested geographic literacy among 18–24 year olds. For reference, this was 15 years ago so the age range is now 33–39 years old, who happen to be my peer group globally speaking. The results were not encouraging:About 11 percent of young citizens of the U.S. couldn't even locate the U.S. on a map. The Pacific Ocean's location was a mystery to 29 percent; Japan, to 58 percent; France, to 65 percent; and the United Kingdom, to 69 percent.Further:Particularly humiliating was that all countries were better able to identify the U.S. population than many young U.S. citizens. Within the U.S., almost one-third said that population was between one billion and two billion; the answer is 289 million.[2] Full report here: http://www.nationalgeographic.co...This is not pretty since these are voters, parents, and citizens who will have expectations of how we interact with the world and cannot be relied upon to know how nations are in physical relation at least. And this isn’t counting all the other aspects of geography that has nothing to do what the name of the national capitol is for Gabon.In short, we are not very good at this whole geography thing on the whole and blame who you like but you’re at best only part right probably. But we can do better: http://www.aag.org/galleries/edu...Follow up with your local school system and see how they are implementing this. It is important.So how does a typical American see the world? Who knows, you will have to ask them. But don’t expect much.Footnotes[1] 2014 U.S. History, Geography, and Civics Assessments[2] Survey Reveals Geographic Illiteracy

Why don't most Americans know where the rest of the world is? Do they actually teach geography in schools there?

Usually not as a separate class. I wasn’t offered a Geography class until college.That being said, they often had us draw maps and label them in high school history. I remember drawing a map of Europe and a map of Africa for 9th grade history.Schools also have Geography Bees where students compete in geography contests, sort of like a spelling bee.Non-Americans are not particularly adept at geography either. If you ask an average French or Japanese person to label a map of North America, they’d probably get the US, Canada, and Mexico but fewer of the smaller countries.Americans also think of geography culturally different from how most cultures outside of the US do. We often think in terms of state and county-sized chunks of land, rather than cities. World maps often also have maps of US states and colour-scheme them similarly to how they scheme the colours of small countries. This confuses less-educated Americans and makes them think of Africa or Europe in terms of states.I can label a map of US states and get all of the states, but if you asked me to label the cities, I’d probably get 10% of them. I know Chicago is in Illinois along the Great Lakes, but I have to look at a map to tell where Chicago is along the shore.