Significant Quotes from the Ugly American

The following are some quotes that I believe should help you understand something about mission work. Understand that these quotes are for State Department Personnel and not for missionaries but I do believe that they are very applicable. “Interpreters are no substitute. It is not possible to understand what is in the minds of other people without understanding their language, and without understanding their language it is impossible to be sure that they understand what is on our minds.” “In extensive interviews with superior graduating seniors the authors have discovered that the brightest seniors reject foreign service because it is ‘too dull, too bureaucratic’. Many of these students would be attracted to overseas duty if the standards were higher, if contact with natives were possible, if the ‘good living’ were not stressed so much and the challenge stressed more. “What we need is a small force of well-trained, well chosen, hard-working, and dedicated professionals. They must be willing to risk their comforts and -in some lands- their health...They must speak the language of the land of their assignment, and they must be more expert in its problems than are the natives.” I learned recently how the early Americans believed one should study. I would like to begin to do just that. Their plan was to 1: research, 2: reason, 3: relate, 4: record. William J Lederer and Eugene Burdick, THE UGLY AMERICAN. ( W. W. Norton & Company, New York. 1958) pp 275-276