Best Western Europe

I'm supposed to be doing reading for a class (I am very far behind in reading in that class because I only just bought my books, despite this being the third week of school), but this current reading is boring to me. It is also 50 dense pages long. So instead I thought I'd read the professor's notes on it. Right at the top there, she wrote that this is a radical piece, and she really hopes that it sparks debate and discussion. I may not be very far into it, but I think I understand the main theme: Europe is not the center of the world, and most of the world is nothing like Europe.

Whaaaaaaaat?

I never would have thought...!

It probably does have a few radical ideas in it, but the ones outlined in the intro are pretty common ideas to anyone that has spent time talking to a foreigner. It's also annoying to read about how Europe is considered to be "The West" and everything is else everything else, and we're not sure exactly were Western Europe ends and oh, I guess America is sort of apart of Europe I mean it has to be apart of something. It confuses me that a power as big as America is barely even considered to be a Western culture by this guy.

But then again, I'm still not very far into it. Maybe he discusses other large powers, such as Japan and America, later on.

Do you think the radical idea my professor was talking about was that America doesn't matter to Europeans? I do wonder.