User blog comment:Marina Moreau/Contemporary European geography/@comment-92.140.141.200-20130719124353

Hello.

I'm sorry but I found the "Europe cultural reagions map" to ber really weird...

I'm french, I'm surprised that France is within a "cultural" group made of Britain and Netherlands... two northern European countries siuated lot further north than most of France, without even common borders (well, the chunnel isn't really a border.

UK and NL are both countries of Germanic-speaking culture, predominantly Protestant cultural backgrounds. They belong naturally to the same cultural context as Northern Germany, denmark and even Norway  "the north sea countries". France is a country with latin roots, romance speaking with overwhelmingly catholic cultural roots, wine-oriented culture (vs beer in UK/NL)... Who made this "cultural" grouping?

Western Europe is a geographic concept that include various cultures from Portugal to Scotalnd, but there isn't a "western European culture" that would be the association of France+NL+UK, since those haven't much in common.