The United States is widely known as an automotive capital of the world. It is a part of the American culture to drive a car. It is a right-of-passage to get your drivers license at 16. A symbolic interactionist might even say driving a car is a symbol of our culture. A symbol is “a word, phrase, image, or the like having a complex [amount] of associated meanings and [is] perceived as having inherent value.” The way we communicate with, for example, Europe is through our knowledge of each other’s transportation. Americans think of Europe as the place with lots of trains and Europeans think of America as the place with all the cars and freeways, each of which are believed due to the symbols our cultures try to present to the world.
In Germany this past summer a friend of mine was studying to get her drivers license. When I heard this I assumed she had to do what we do here, take Drivers Ed and take the permit test, then take drivers training and learn to drive for 6 months. Finally when you turn 16 you take the final driving test and get your license all for under 50 dollars. I was surprised to find out it is much more difficult to get a license in Europe. You have to be 18, first of all, and you have to take an intensive driving course that can take up to 2 months to complete. If you complete it with the accompanying training and driving course and you pass, you take the test, otherwise you have to start from the beginning again. The whole process costs around 1 to 2 thousand euros and is instilled in European Union country. Although the process is long, it still seems like driving is still not as important to Europeans as a main source of transportation, its not quite a symbol of their culture. It is much easier for an American to get a drivers license and thus there are more drivers on the roads. If Europe wanted more drivers wouldn’t they want to make it easier to get a license?
In Europe, cars are still a part of the culture, especially in Germany with famous car companies like Volkswagon and Mercedes-Benz, but we see more people taking other modes of transportation like the bikes, trains, or buses. Making cars may be a symbol of some parts of Europe, but driving is not. According to Nation Master.com there are 765 cars per 100 people, where as there are 500-600 cars per 100 people in some European countries. It’s not quite as ingrained in their culture to drive everywhere or own a car, like it is in the US, so there is less of a necessity for cars. In fact, when you go to a town in Germany or Italy the roads are more like extras to the city than a central part of the cities infrastructure. Here in Utah, however, we have streets that were built wide enough to fit oxen and wagons. These streets were built as an integral part of the city. It’s the same in big cities like New York and San Francisco. The streets were built first, than the rest of the city and culture around them.
Today we see a lot more bikes and public transportation in the US, even our train system works pretty well. Most of the cars we see on our streets are outsourced from countries like Japan, Germany, and the UK and we have seen less and less Fords and Chevrolets, so are cars still a symbol of our culture? Have other countries taken to cars as an important part of their culture more than the US has in recent years?
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