> [..] students are expected to sit with a partner and engage in quiet conversation. They are supposed to be able to hear each other, but not be heard more than

> [..] students are expected to sit with a partner and engage in quiet conversation. They are supposed to be able to hear each other, but not be heard more than one meter away. This allows other conversations to take place around them, creating an expectation of privacy and personal space in a crowded room. The key here is: "This allows other conversations to take place around them". I was raised (in Germany) to understand that unnecessarily loud talking or shouting at each other is considered rude. As a kid I was far more often told to speak at an adequate noise level than to shut up. On the generalization of "Americans" and "Europeans": Yes, it is BS, but the author reveals that she is mostly drawing from experiences in Austria and Germany and I'm pretty sure that everybody in this thread unjustly generalizes when (s)he does not know better due to lack of experience. Nobody complains when somebody writes about Scottish or Welsh people even though every valley there seems to have its own flag and slight cultural and even linguistical variations that we are too uneducated to see.