"You can see we're above the suburban canopy"

[schmevil]

Pictures For Sad Children.

btw, John's on Tumblr: Boo Hoo Boo.

Comments

[mad]

Anthropology at its finest.

[aaron_bourque]

. . . buh?

Aaron "The Mad Whitaker" Bourque; it looks like words and sentences in English, but at the same time not.

[stubbleupdate]

I don't get you not getting it

[sethgray]

The sentence structure is really odd. Not all of them actually make sense the way the words are strung together.

[stubbleupdate]

Some of the clauses are split over two panels. Others are missing the subject of the sentence.

I can see if you're an ESL reader that this would be tricky.

[icon_uk]

It doesn't appear to be a conversation, it comes across as random samples from different points in time

[stubbleupdate]

Are you replying to another user?

[icon_uk]

Sorry, I was elaborating on why I thought it appeared to be strangely structured, it seemed to be more than just missing words, it appeared to be overheard, incomplete snatchs of a conversation.

[equinox216]

Look downthread; I tried to break it down by panel groupings. (It probably just digested the humor, though.) It IS different comments/portions, of some hypothetical trip abroad.

[whitesycamore]

That's very characteristic of Pictures For Sad Children - most of the strips contain lines that follow on from each other in an odd, non sequitor kind of way. I like it.

[omgwtflolbbqbye]

Reminds me of this:

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Body_Ritual_among_the_Nacirema

[mynondw]

Haha. It took me a paragraph or so to get it. This, and the comic, are awesome. :D

[glprime]

Neat! *click*

[mistervader]

I will be honest and say that IDGI.

[shanejayell]

Instead of studying some remote tribe, a group of scientists are studying US. :)

[blackruzsa]

:)

[equinox216]

For the ESL or non-academically-familiar, here's the breakdown of related panels:
---
1-3: the 'suburban canopy' panels, where the roofs of the neighborhood are being simultaneously compared to (a) outsiders' views of non-First-World-style housing, where you have older cities comprised greatly of very similar building materials, and (b) the structure of a rainforest, through the 'canopy' term, implying a more organic formation (and therefore a less "civilized" one, depending).
4: a general touristy action, but coming after 1-3 should be taken in that context.
5: another terminology joke. "Traditional" imparts to the entire civic body a sense of monoculture that really doesn't exist other than for bad social science generalization or for REALLY polarized communities. It'd be like going to Boston and remarking on a "traditional" dish of potatoes (referencing the Irish) or France for baguettes, cheese, and sneers.
6-7: Cars vs. lots. Another naturalistic reference, giving the relationship between cars and parking lots a more organic/less deliberate interpretation, again a kind of coded way of implying less intent/'civilization'.
8: Goes back to 5 with the "traditional" dinner, but is playing on the US (Italianesque) food chain named Olive Garden and its free breadsticks.
9-10: The idea of the 'noble savage', elevating in one fashion a culture the speaker is both damaging through stereotype (positive stereotypes are still damaging). This one's probably pretty global, and works for just about everywhere, though for the US the more likely statement (and what the author's playing on) would be 'that they have so LITTLE but can still be happy'. Like the idea of people living in a tiny village in a remote part of the world are somehow managing to OVERCOME their surroundings by being happy without iPads/electricity/penicillin.
---

The voice being parodied here is a combination of ethnocentric anthropologist/social scientist observing an external culture, and bad travel guide (check the book in panel 8, even). Many areas of the world have SOME kind of native or more "primitive" culture remaining of the regional also-rans or minority cultures; in Japan it might be something like the Ainu, Europe the Rom, Australia the Aborigines, and the US any of the various Native American tribes. The approach here is more transnational tourist than in-country condescension, though.

[schmevil]

So... you're awesome. FYI.

[equinox216]

I do what I can!

[greenmask]

Ohh

I thought it was just people lookin' at stuff.

[equinox216]

Well, it works on that level, too ;-) .

[darrylayo]

I <3 John Campbell, Famous Person.