Our Dumb World is a parody of the standard desk atlas created by the staff of The Onion

The Onion

The Onion is an American news satire organization. It is an entertainment newspaper and a website featuring satirical articles reporting on international, national, and local news, in addition to a non-satirical entertainment section known as The A.V. Club...

and published by Little, Brown and Company

Little, Brown and Company

Little, Brown and Company is a publishing house established by Charles Coffin Little and his partner, James Brown. Since 2006 it has been a constituent unit of Hachette Book Group USA.-19th century:...

 on October 30, 2007. It is The Onion's first book of entirely original content since 1999's Our Dumb Century

Our Dumb Century

Our Dumb Century: The Onion Presents 100 Years of Headlines from America's Finest News Source is a satirical humor book written by the staff of The Onion and published by Three Rivers Press in 1999. The chief editor of the book was Scott Dikkers, with specific sections edited by Robert D. Siegel,...

.

The book, written in the satirical paper's editorial voice, contains entries for nearly every country on Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

, including detailed maps, feature articles, and humorous stereotyped descriptions of regional history and customs. For example, Canada's

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 entry is subtitled, "For the United States, see pages 9 - 22." Elements of the book have been transferred to an electronic format available on the paper's website and as a layer on Google Earth

Google Earth

Google Earth is a virtual globe, map and geographical information program that was originally called EarthViewer 3D, and was created by Keyhole, Inc, a Central Intelligence Agency funded company acquired by Google in 2004 . It maps the Earth by the superimposition of images obtained from satellite...

. Our Dumb World is also available as an audio book.

There are eight distinct sections of the atlas. In order, North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

, South America

South America

South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...

, Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

, Middle East

Middle East

The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...

, Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

, Asia

Asia

Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

, Oceania

Oceania

Oceania is a region centered on the islands of the tropical Pacific Ocean. Conceptions of what constitutes Oceania range from the coral atolls and volcanic islands of the South Pacific to the entire insular region between Asia and the Americas, including Australasia and the Malay Archipelago...

, and Extra. Included in the Extra section are the Northern and Southern Poles and Greenland

Greenland

Greenland is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark, located between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Though physiographically a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe for...

, which is "larger than Africa and South America combined.

Mercator projection

The Mercator projection is a cylindrical map projection presented by the Belgian geographer and cartographer Gerardus Mercator, in 1569. It became the standard map projection for nautical purposes because of its ability to represent lines of constant course, known as rhumb lines or loxodromes, as...

"

The visual style of the book has been compared to Dorling Kindersley

Dorling Kindersley

Dorling Kindersley is an international publishing company specializing in illustrated reference books for adults and children in 51 languages. It is currently part of the Penguin Group....

's Eyewitness

Eyewitness Books

Eyewitness Books is a series of nonfiction books intended for young adults. They were first published in England by Dorling Kindersley in 1988. The series now has over one-hundred titles on a variety of subjects, such as dinosaurs, Ancient Egypt, flags, chemistry, music, the solar system, film,...

  series. The book uses faux xenophobia

Xenophobia

Xenophobia is defined as "an unreasonable fear of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange". It comes from the Greek words ξένος , meaning "stranger," "foreigner" and φόβος , meaning "fear."...

 to illustrate the cultural differences of various nations, often mocking racial stereotypes with satirical comments. Each section contains "facts" about the nation, a brief history, and other information.

Critical Reaction

Critical reaction to "Our Dumb World" has been generally positive with reviewers praising the humor and use of satire. In the New York Times, William Grimes called it "an astoundingly offensive guide to the states of the union and the countries of the world, compiled on the premise that all countries are ridiculous and contemptible" and found it "sophomoric, transgressive and intermittently brilliant."

External links

• The Onion Store
• Our Dumb World Online
• Wikinews Interview with Onion Editorial Staff
• Newsweek Review