Americans who’ve traveled overseas know well that the U.S. is more loathed than loved in many quarters. But for students traveling abroad for the first time these days—and fortunately, there are many—that realization can be startling and eye-opening. I recently asked Erin Granat a few questions about her experience.

Granat, a Reno/Tahoe-based writer and video blogger, not only spent six months studying in Madrid in 2006, but she also traveled to Australia to conduct research for her honors thesis, Heroes or Hellions: How Americans are Perceived Abroad. I caught up with her during her latest overseas stint in Wellington, New Zealand.

World Hum: How were you received during your study abroad year in Spain?

Erin Granat: I was received just fine—all the Europeans I met were really wonderful, and there were never any huge issues. It was actually something really subtle that sparked my interest in the whole anti-Americanism topic. My first week in Madrid I was wandering down an alley, just taking in the buildings and the essence of my new home, when I came upon “BU$H” spray painted on a wall in red, white and blue. It stopped me in my tracks.

I started wondering if this was how Spaniards viewed America and the American president. Did they think we were just greedy, materialistic people consumed with making money off other nations? Was this how my Spanish roommates Laura and Guadalupe (and their matted cat Agata) saw me?

Over the course of the next six months in Europe I would be confronted with these questions time and again. Americans, it seems, are on everybody’s shit list. I had approached my study abroad time with the assumption that Americans are an idealized nationality. That everywhere I went, Spaniards, Italians and Germans alike would want to shake my hand and congratulate me on a job well done. What I found was the complete opposite.

Did that experience help lead you to your thesis topic?

Absolutely. It made me really want to understand on a human level what it is about America and Americans that inspires such controversy. It made me realize how sheltered we are. Before I studied abroad, I never understood that what we hear on the news isn’t necessarily the truth, it’s an interpretation of the truth.

The study abroad experience made me realize anti-Americanism is a very relevant issue. We’re dominating the world, yet no one likes us. We want the world to back us up on military issues, yet no one agrees with our policies. We plan on continuing to run the world, yet everyone else is itching to oust us. I started doing some research, reading articles and surveys and whatnot, and I found that Spaniards have one of the lowest approval ratings of Americans in the world, and Australians have the highest. So it made sense to me to go to Australia, a pretty neutral country, to try and get some objective answers.

How did what you found in the course of your research mesh with your expectations going in? Any big surprises?

The big surprise is that I didn’t find an answer. As I say in the last chapter:

Everyone I met, from Australia, England, Ireland, France and beyond, has an opinion on America and Americans. They certainly all have nice things to say to go along with the bad, but there’s always the bad. Yet almost all my interview subjects had been to America, or in the very least were eager to go. How can people be so adamantly opposed to a culture, yet so keen so observe it?...In my time here in Australia what I’ve learned is this: anti-Americanism is possibly the most complex, ambiguous issue out there...But there is something we, as Americans, can do about it. When we travel, we can take a few short minutes to learn the basics of the country we’re visiting. We can take the time to explore the media and pop culture of other places. Anti-Americanism is an issue that is not going away any time soon, but if a few of us make an effort when traveling abroad to break the stereotype, we might be better ambassadors for our country. 

Any last thoughts on the benefits of studying abroad?

In a nutshell: I believe studying abroad is the single most beneficial thing you can do in your university career. Even if you think you don’t need the experience for your major, you should still study abroad. Even if you don’t think you’ll graduate, you should still study abroad. The classes you take in the U.S. will finally feel relevant when you’re using math to convert euros to dollars, art history to understand the church in front of you, and comparative economics to strike up a conversation with the sexy waiter in the café. And of course, as with any travel, you will learn about where you come from and where you’re going.

Thanks, Erin.

Photo courtesy of Erin Granat.