Cultural Difference I Suspect My Rural Malagasy Town Didn't Quite Understand At A Screening of the Disney Channel's "High School Musical"
• Karaoke
• Camera phones
• Eccentric theater teachers
• School gymnasiums
• Google stalking
• Stoner/nerd cliques
• Computer hacking
• Detention
• Drama club
• School busses
• Cheerleaders
• Interpretive dance
• References to Ashton Kutcher/"Punk'd"
• Interventions
Things I Didn't Understand in High School Musical:
• Is that McCauley Culkin?
• What's with these pseudo-incestuous siblings?
• Since when is baking uncool?
Things My Rural Malagasy Town Definitely Understood:
• Laughing at the fat girl dancing
• Our high schools are bigger than the biggest buildings in the entire country
• The "tanindrazana" (homeland) of their English teacher is just a little over the top
(After the movie was over, I asked one of my students what he thought about the
film. "High school in America is very different!" I agreed and started to walk home. I later wondered if he was referring to the size, number of students, etc. or the fact that Americans seem to break out into song every ten minutes with choreographed
dances.)
