Global Ignorance - Television Tropes & Idioms

This scene is from a Japanese manga.

For some reason, TV producers seem to consider geography to be the most basic form of human knowledge. When they want to show that a person is an idiot, they almost inevitably show some geographic mistake, such as mistaking a continent for a country, or inability to find a given location on a map.

This can be done with a character, to demonstrate his or her status as The Ditz, or with real people as part of a Selective Stupidity feature.

Alternatively, it can be used to depict a character as being a short-sighted nationalist, usually a resident of The God-Blessed United States of America. Europeans frequently use this trope as shorthand for stupid Americans who knows nothing of the world beyond the continental forty-eight states. It's not without its merits, though: a variety of studies have found that American students are among the least geographically literate in the world.^note

In another variation, a character who insists on using the old names for countries that have reformed or gained independence, such as Rhodesia

(a former British territory in Southern Africa) or Ceylon (Sri Lanka). In this case, the character is oblivious to the changing political climes, and has no interest in staying current. If he knows the modern names, but refuses to acknowledge them, he's probably a Quintessential British Gentleman who wants to harken back to the glory days of the empire.

A third possible use is to show a character as being out of touch rather than stupid by using the old names for countries that no longer exist but did exist in their life time, like Burma or Yugoslavia. Unlike the above example, these characters are unlikely to be making a statement and are simply old or otherwise haven't had any reason to check a map in the past decade.

Of course there are greater and lesser degrees of this trope, and it can be used in subtly different ways. Not knowing the name of the capital of the country a character is currently in almost certainly is showing how the character is genuinely stupid, while being unable to name all of the former Yugoslavian republics is unlikely to be saying a character is dumb unless its being asked by The Smart Guy to demean a character. However this can back-fire as the 'genius' character demands another name the capital of Belarus and ends up stumping themselves.

Often a character who isn't characterized as being either The Smart Guy or The Ditz will make understandable but amusing slips along these lines to cement their position in the intellectual hierarchy particularly if they have been being a bit too smart recently. A good example would be thinking Thai people are from Taiwan which is wrong, but not completely stupid either.

Can overlap with Eskimos Aren't Real, if the character refuses to believe that a country actually exists.

Examples:

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Anime and Manga

In Mahou Sensei Negima!, when Makie reveals how much she's learned much about the history and geography of Mundas Magicus in a few weeks, Yuna is surprised, given that normally she can't find Germany, Italy or France on a map, and thinks that Switzerland is near England and that Australia is around Europe.
Pictured: Alfred/America in Axis Powers Hetalia asks where Japan is on a map... of the United States of America.
- In the English dub of the anime, the narrator begins a discussion of a part of Polish history, stops herself - "Right, anime fans." - and backs up to begin a dumbed-down version of the same information. Then she stops herself again: "Right, American fans. Poland is a country. In Europe!" Ow.
Used as a plot point in Gundam 0080. Bernie, posing as a Federation soldier, claims to be from Australia while making small talk and mentions how he used to love playing in the snow around Christmastime. Several minutes later, the man he was talking to realizes that the Southern Hemisphere has warm weather in December; this is the mistake that blows the team's cover and gets everyone but Bernie killed. Not to mention that Sydney was wiped out by The Colony Drop and no longer exists at that time, anyone from Sydney should not be talking like that about it.
In a SBS manga column for One Piece, a fan asked Eiichiro Oda which real world countries would each of the Straw Hats come from. He answers by saying that Luffy would be Brazilian, Zoro is Japanese, Nami's Swedish, Sanji's French, Chopper's Canadian, Robin's Russian, Franky's American, Brook's Austrian... and Usopp? Oda says that he's African, because everyone knows Africa is a country and definitely not a continent. Unfortunately, that's not too far off, because several people believe it's a country already.

Comic Books

Dave from Knights Of The Dinner Table is convinced that Canada is a Communist country and behind the Iron Curtain. He also thinks the language of Israel is Orkish.
- And Weird Pete doesn't realise that Papua New Guinea is a real country.
Tabby in Nextwave. She thinks Europe is a country and is shocked to learn that the French are in Canada.

Film

Dumb Blonde Lorelei Lee (Marilyn Monroe) in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes:
Lorelei: Excuse me, but what is the way to Europe, France?
Dorothy: Honey, France is in Europe.
Lorelei: Well, who said it wasn't?
Dorothy: Well... you wouldn't say you wanted to go to North America, Mexico.
Lorelei: If that's where I wanted to go, I would.
From the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie:
Buffy: Well, excuse me for not knowing about El Salvador! Like I'm ever going to Spain, anyway!
In Die Hard, a psychiatrist interviewed on the news brings up his book on "Helsinki Syndrome", as he calls it (presumably Stockholm has copyrighted itself and wouldn't give the rights). The newsreader cuts into clarify that Helsinki is in Sweden, and is quickly corrected - "Finland."
In a Shrek film, Donkey is served a platter of food by a chef who says "Bon app�tit" (which is a French expression) and Donkey remarks: "Oh, boy! Mexican food!" (Of course, the fact that a four-legged animal can speak in the first place is pretty impressive on its own.)
Invoked inn the Disney The Three Musketeers (1993), Porthos claims to have been given gifts from various royals who don't exist, including the Queen of America and the Czarina of Tokyo. He smirks whenever he says one, waiting to see if anyone catches onto his bullshit.
In Snow Dogs, the character played by Nichelle Nichols apologizes to an Alaskan cab driver because she only has "American money" with which to pay him.
Earth Girls Are Easy - an alien asks Valerie if they're in Finland (just having seen a sexy travel commercial) - she cheerfully replies "No, you're in the Valley - Finland is the capital of Norway!"
In The Wizard of Oz, Glinda's song in the beginning says, "She fell from the sky/ She fell very far/ And Kansas she says/ Is the name of the star" implying that Oz is on another world that now thinks Earth is Only Kansas.

Literature

In The Great Gatsby, Nick asks Gatsby what part of the Midwest he is from. Gatsby responds, "San Fransisco." This is the first sign that Gatsby isn't who he claims to be.

Live-Action TV

The Chasers War On Everything had a journalist checking out general knowledge about Americans. During that skit, one section had random people point out Iraq and North Korea on the map. While they did find those countries, the map was mislabeled, and thus they put the pin in the middle of Australia. One person also commented that North Korea had a large land mass compared to South Korea (mislabeled from Tasmania). And finally, if the USA needed to attack the country in the bottom-right corner of the map, they would have to attack from the West (cause the East just has the edge of the map.)
- There was another skit that involved promoting Australia's tourism. Random Americans were shown pictures of famous landmarks, which the Chasers then claimed were actually in Australia. Notable examples include the Leaning Tower of Perth, Big Ben in Adelaide, The Eiffel Tower in Melbourne and the Taj Mahal in the Simpson Desert.
  Woman (after being shown a picture of the Sydney Opera House): That was in Nemo. I have no idea what it's called though.
Happened frequently with Ali G on Da Ali G Show.
- In one episode he visited the United Nations building, was surprised to find that Africa wasn't represented as a country, and refused to believe the guide's explanation that many African countries were represented.
- In a mock appeal, he shows a map of the world with pretty much everything mislabeled - such as Africa being labeled Jamaica and South America as South Central.
Joey from Friends was fond of this one too.
- Notable exchange when Chandler is trying to compete with Joey for the attentions of a Dutch girl.
  Chandler: Joey, where do you think Dutch people come from?
  Joey: Um.... Pennsylvania Dutch come from Pennsylvania.
  Chandler: But original Dutch people? Would you say they come from somewhere like the Netherlands?
  Joey: Haha, you can't fool me. See the Netherlands is a made-up place where Peter Pan lives.
  - For some reason, Chandler doesn't point out that Pennsylvania Dutch are actually German. ~~The word "deutsch" degraded into "dutch" because it's easier to say.~~ It took until the 19th century for it to be firmly established that in English, Dutch referred to people from one of the Low Countries, and not to the Deutsch.
- Joey also spent an episode trying to find somewhere he could change US dollars into "Vermont money".
- And then there was the Thanksgiving Episode "name the states" game, in which he named 56 (including New England and South Oregon), and then chided Ross for making up a state (Utah) that was actually real.
- When Chandler is pretending to emigrate to Yemen to escape Janice: "That almost sounds like a real place!"
- Averted in a second season episode, where Chandler and his new roommate are talking about ex-girlfriends. Chandler mentions how he broke up with a girl because she thought the capital of Cambodia was Sean Penn, when "everybody knows the capital of Cambodia is... not Sean Penn."
  - Which isn't actually as foolish as it seems since Sean Penn sounds similar to Phnom Penh.
Scrubs had geography as one of J.D.'s weaknesses. He claimed New Zealand was close to "Old Zealand" and pointed out China on the Janitor's globe when he was looking for Iraq.
J.D.: You're China.
In the pilot episode of Mr Show, Bob Odenkirk tries, and fails pathetically, in an attempt to name all the US states in 15 seconds. Thereafter, David Cross explains that Bob missed the first day of school, believes there are only five states, and thinks one of them is called "Chim-Cham".
In a Running Gag, Gob and Maeby in Arrested Development believe Portugal is a Spanish-speaking country in South America. The pilot also features Buster mistaking the blue parts of a map for the land (to make it even sillier, he was described a scene or two earlier as having taken graduate-level classes in cartography).
- Another one involves Gob's plan to hire "Mexicans from Colombia", where Michael points out that they are called "Colombians".
In one episode of Whose Line Is It Anyway?, Drew Carey called Africa a great country. Greg Proops responds "It's also a continent if you're a geographer!" The contestants turned it into a Running Gag for the rest of the episode.
In Malcolm in the Middle, on his journey to Alaska Francis was conned into changing his US currency for 'Alaskan dollars'.
In an episode of the "Trash Talk Show" parody Night Stand, host Dick Dietrick (played by Timothy Stack) responds to a Vietnamese guest's question, "You've heard of Vietnam, Dick?" with "Oh yes, we fought against each other in The Korean War."
Andy Dwyer in Parks and Recreation:
April: I'm sorry, I was in Venezuela.
Andy: Oh, really? Wow, across the pond.
- And in another episode:
  Andy: "Hey it's me, Justin. Take my coat, but please be careful I got it from the King of Africa when we were walking on the Berlin Wall together." Really, Justin, what instruments do you play? [pause] Actually he's a pretty sick keyboardist.
- Andy choosing a country for a model U.N.
  Leslie: Andy, will you be Iceland?
  Andy: The bad guys from Mighty Ducks 2? Don�t think so.
  Leslie: How about Japan?
  Andy: The bad guys from Karate Kid 2? Even worse. How about Germany? They�ve never been the bad guys.
- A Freeze Frame Bonus in the episode, "Win, Lose, or Draw". On Andy's list of all the places he and April could live, "U.S.S.R." is listed, but crossed out with "Russia" written in next to it. Presumably, Andy ignorantly wrote down "U.S.S.R." and April corrected him.
- After driving for many hours to visit the Grand Canyon with April, he asked, "So where are the faces of the presidents?"
In one episode of Boy Meets World Shawn thinks that you can get to Europe on a bus. He even buys a bus ticket to Paris, Texas thinking it will take him to Paris, France.
Seems to be a common trait among the 'Beauties' in Beauty And The Geek.
The Amazing Race being a travel show and all, and not all of the contestants have exactly been geniuses. Occasionally the producers make a task based on it.
- Despite being constantly reminded that they were going to Chile, Season 16's Jordan (the female one) proceeded to request tickets to Santiago, China.
- Season 12:
  Nate: Taiwan? We're going to Taiwan? Huh.... I don't know much about Taiwan... but Thai food's pretty good.
  - Which is kinda a cheap shot, but still.
- Season 17:
  Phil: Nick & Vicki, what's the name of this country?
  Vicki: We're in London, right?
  Phil: That's right, the country of London.
- Also in Season 17: The teams were visiting a school in Ghana and tasked with identifying Ghana on a map. It went about as well as you would expect.
  - Could you find Ghana on a map ?
  - Maybe if I was there.
When Frank, Dee, and Mac tried to play "50 States" in It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Mac and Dee continually name states like "West Dakota". Much to Frank's amusement.
In the Stargate SG-1 episode "Chimera", Carter remarks to her Cop Boyfriend Pete Shanahan that there's no zoo in Colorado Springs, apparently completely unaware of the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. Writer Joseph Mallozi said that this was done on purpose to indicate that she spends so much time working she's completely unfamiliar with the city she lives in.
"Moldavian wedding massacre" was a major plotline of the soap series Dynasty Apparently, the show's producers and writers were unaware that Moldavia was a real region and a historical country (although, at that time, a Soviet Republic and not an independent country).
There was a somewhat infamous episode of Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? where American Idol contestant Kellie Pickler showed up. "I thought Europe was a country..."
A Saturday Night Live sketch featured guest host Jerry Seinfeld playing a High School history teacher. After all his students fail a test, he decides to adopt an interactive approach and opens a discussion about the Battle of Britain. However, the students turn out to be too ignorant for the approach to work, as they don't even know who Britain was fighting. You can see it here.
Teacher: How many of you saw Raiders of the Lost Ark? [all hands go up]
Student: I have it on tape. I could bring it.
Teacher: No, thank you. Now, who in the movie was Indiana Jones fighting... [hand goes up] ...besides the snakes? [hand goes back down]
This happens so much on game shows like Family Feud when given a question of a country as an example.
In Derren Brown's The Gathering special, he randomly selects an audience member and asks her to think of a country. She does. Her country? Africa. Not only does Derren not call her out on her obvious mistake (Note: there are over 50 countries in Africa) but has her reach under her seat and find a note he left there with the description of the woman in question and her choice of country. That's right, even Derren is guilty of that.

Newspaper Comics

In a FoxTrot arc, Paige's friend Nicole was once asked to locate Iraq on a world map without country names. However, it comes to light that Nicole not only can't locate Iraq on the map, she can't even locate the U.S. Eventually Paige locates Iraq on her first try... but only because it was the only place Nicole didn't point.
Nicole: Okay, so if this is America... then this must be Iraq!
Teacher: Let's go back to that 'if', Nicole.
Nicole: (pointing at Antartica) Okay, so if this is America...
- This arc took place shortly after a real-life study came out showing that an embarrassingly high percentage of American high schoolers could not identify their own country on a map.

Other

This trope is standard fodder for political satire. Various humorists' caricatures of Sarah Palin have had her, among other things, refer to West Korea, say that Delaware was in the Middle East, and think that lesbians are Lebanese, along with the famous "I can see Russia from my house" from SNL.
- Lesbians are Greek. Everyone knows that.
Conservative humorists had a field day when then-candidate Barack Obama mentioned visiting 57 states. He actually visited 47, so this was probably just a slip of the tongue.
According to Americans, New Mexico is not part of the United States.
A rather worrying number of people still refer to Russia as "the Soviet Union". The policies of Mr. Vladimir Putin are not helping the confusion.
Some people still refer to Beijing as "Peking"; there used to be, in Britain, a group of people who wilfully refused to make the changeover. Honestly, it isn't as if "Beijing" is any more difficult to spell or pronounce than "Peking"; and when one considers that "Beijing" means "northern capital", whilst "Peking" is meaningless gibberish left over from colonial times and thus best forgotten, it's hard to see any reason for the refusal.
- In Russia, it's still called Pekin. It's highly unlikely that they will bother to change the way they say or write it.
- "Peking" still means "northern capital." It's just an older transliteration of Chinese.
The Danish school system has a subject called "geography", but it's based much more around physical geography than human geography. Meaning that many Danish students will be able to tell you exactly what terrain and ecosystems that make up Brazil, but not where Brazil is (at least, they may not be truly sure except for "somewhere in South America"). Facts such as a country's location, its population number, its capital and the sorts are facts you'll have to find out yourself or be taught by someone else than your geography teacher. However, living in a very small country that is not as self-contained as the U.S., and being among the nationalities that love travelling the most, has helped to make most Danes not that global ignorant.
Following the announcement that the perpetrators of the Boston Marathon bombing were Chechens, so many Twitter users thought Chechens were from the Czech Republic that the Czech ambassador put out a statement which basically said, "we're not Chechnya".

Webcomics

Walky from It's Walky! suffers from the same misconceptions about Canada as Dave from Knights Of The Dinner Table.
In an Arthur, King of Time and Space strip, Arthur tells Gawaine that while he had the advantage of being taught by Merlin, there are a lot of factors holding back education in this hemisphere. Gawaine responds "Hemisphere?"
Subverted in xkcd with the strip titled "The World According to a Group of Americans" who turned out to be unexpectedly good at geography, derailing our attempt to demonstrate their country's attitude toward the rest of the world."
Gabe from Penny Arcade, all the time. In one comic he thinks that the language spoken in Holland is Hollish.
- Which is actually a double mistake; "Holland" is a province, not a country. Referring to the Netherlands as "Holland" is like saying "London" when you mean England.
- Actually, it's more like England when you mean the United Kingdom. And both are done regularly.
One Batman And Sons strip has Barry Allen remarking that Wally doesn't want to go to England and have to learn a new language. Bruce points out "They speak English there", and Barry (with the perfect expression of frustration on his face) responds "I know."
- Of course, some US expats living in the UK and vice versa would probably argue that Wally actually has a point...

Web Original

Moviebob referred to Africa as "a beautiful country" in an episode of The Game Overthinker discussing racism. To his credit, he apologised for that error in a later video.
During the Hulk Hogan vs. Kim Jong-Il Epic Rap Battles Of History, Hogan threatens to kick Kim's ass "back to Beijing". Kim's first line in his rebuttal verse: "Beijing is in China, you blonde asshole!"
There are countless stories on Not Always Right about people who never seem to have heard of New Mexico, Canada, or Delaware.

Western Animation

The Simpsons. When Marge became the substitute teacher for Bart during the teacher's strike, at dinner, she describes her day as "Exhausting. It took the kids 40 minutes to find Canada on the map." To which Homer responds by also invoking this trope, commenting about how small and tucked away Canada is.
- Homer and Bart get whacked by this trope again in "Bart Vs. Australia". Bart mistakes a "Rand McNally" logo on his globe for a country, causing Lisa to mock him: "In fact, in Rand McNally, they wear hats on their feet and hamburgers eat people!" Later, Homer looks at the globe, spots Uruguay, and laughs "Look at this country! 'You Are Gay'!.
- Both Homer and Mr. Burns (in different episodes) are astounded at the discovery of a New Mexico, though Mr. Burns at least has the excuse of old age.
- In The Movie, Homer says, "We have a great life here in Alaska, and we are never going back to America again!"
- Homer as a high school student skipping English class in 1974 in "The Way We Was": "English? Who needs it? I'm never going to England! C'mon, let's go smoke!"
- Taken Up to Eleven in "G.I. D'oh" when Homer asks "We're China, right?"
- In the episode introducing Mona Simpson, Mister Burns is seen in the post office trying to send a letter to "the Prussian consulate in Siam", exasperated as the clerk cannot find any mention of Prussia or Siam in his geographical index. This isn't a joke about ignorance so much as part of the Running Gag about how outdated Burns is - Siam became Thailand in 1939^note, and Prussia broke up into several different countries between the World Wars^note, and had not been a sovereign state since joining the German Empire in 1871.
- Two linked moments from Bart:
  Bart: Some say the ducks went to Canada. Others say, Toronto.
  Gretchen: I'm leaving in ten minutes. My Dad's shooting a movie in Toronto.
  Bart: You're going to Spain?!^note
- There was an episode that featured a girl who thought Norwegian people were from a place called "Norwegia".
In The Penguins of Madagascar Alice, the zookeeper, thinks koalas and kangaroos will get along well, because they're both from Austria.
Repairman: You mean Australia?
Alice: There is a difference?
- Also King Julian, while living in the Central Park Zoo, believes he is in France.
In South Park, Randy tries warning Arnold Schwarzenegger that California would be New Jersey's next victim after Colorado is taken over, only to be informed that Utah and Nevada lie between them.
- And he is a Geologist.
  - To be fair, they did manage to drive to China one time...
An episode of Neds Newt has Ned trying to lecture a dimwitted schoolmate, and one of the tasks is to place a cutout of Africa on the globe. He puts it on the Moon.
Pinky and the Brain: When Brain founded a fictional country, he was relying on the trope to keep people from finding out it wasn't a real one.
Phineas and Ferb: Lawrence Fletcher thought Hawaii wasn't part of the United States.