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Understanding diversity within society
Understanding diversity within society
Understanding diversity within society
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An Untraditional Voyage Barbara Ehrenreich’s essay “Cultural Baggage,” Which appears in The Norton Mix, discusses the challenges Ehrenreich faces in trying to identify with an ethnic culture. She uses multiple real life examples, mostly including her kinfolk, to explain her reasoning for not restricting herself to a one ethnicity. Ehrenreich’s logic makes sense because she grows up with no sense of ethnic identity, her mindset is non-traditional and she is willing to accept the idea that ethnicity is not a critical part of who a person really is. Early in the essay, Ehrenreich notes her family background is scrambled enough that deciding on one ethnicity is difficult. She writes, “Well not ‘none,’ I backtracked. Scottish English, Irish …show more content…
She pens that “In my parents’ general view, new things were better than old, and the very fact that some ritual had been performed in the past was a good reason for abandoning it now” (479). While most decedents do not question tradition, Ehrenreich was taught to try things new. This leads to an exciting life of innovation and different experiences that traditionally minded people miss out on. She even relates more to these like-minded people of her past, stating “In fact, this may have been the ideal cultural heritage for my particular ethic strain … What better philosophy, for a race of migrants, than ‘think for yourself’” (479) Ironically this unconventional philosophy has opened up many different cultures over the world, as it is necessary for migrants must establish a more adaptable and sustainable ethnicity to the environment. Ehrenreich’s viewpoint was not only instilled to her from her parents, but also this has been the untraditional viewpoint of immigrants for thousands of years. Most importantly, Ehrenreich accepts her ethnicity is not critical to who a person really is. While her background is scrambled and she was raised with none, as an adult it is evident she proudly accepts no ethnicity. Writing the whole passage “Cultural Baggage”, about her experiences is further evidence to her acknowledgement. Still, this ethnicity does not define her identity, as she writes “We are the kind of people, I realized whatever
Chang-Rae Lee’s Native Speaker expresses prominent themes of language and racial identity. Chang-Rae Lee focuses on the struggles that Asian Americans have to face and endure in American society. He illustrates and shows readers throughout the novel of what it really means to be native of America; that true nativity of a person does not simply entail the fact that they are from a certain place, but rather, the fluency of a language verifies one’s defense of where they are native. What is meant by possessing nativity of America would be one’s citizenship and legality of the country. Native Speaker suggests that if one looks different or has the slightest indication that one should have an accent, they will be viewed not as a native of America, but instead as an alien, outsider, and the like. Therefore, Asian Americans and other immigrants feel the need to mask their true identity and imitate the native language as an attempt to fit into the mold that makes up what people would define how a native of America is like. Throughout the novel, Henry Park attempts to mask his Korean accent in hopes to blend in as an American native. Chang-Rae Lee suggests that a person who appears to have an accent is automatically marked as someone who is not native to America. Language directly reveals where a person is native of and people can immediately identify one as an alien, immigrant, or simply, one who is not American. Asian Americans as well as other immigrants feel the need to try and hide their cultural identity in order to be deemed as a native of America in the eyes of others. Since one’s language gives away the place where one is native to, immigrants feel the need to attempt to mask their accents in hopes that they sound fluent ...
Racial and ethnic identity are crucial elements in the framework for individual and communal identity in our society. Deep values through religion and family create a sense of racial and ethnic identity and are manifested in sensible ways for many distinct minority populations in the United States. Individuals with these beliefs have different cultural values that are undesirable in mainstream American society. For others, on the other hand, especially white Americans, ethnic and racial identity are virtually invisible because societal normality is usually constructed around their ethnic, racial and cultural values. We commonly refer to them as the “standard American culture.” In Native Speaker, the protagonist, Henry Park, is unable to define himself in American society. This essay will discuss Park’s cultural self and his path to discovering himself in relationship to his family, friends, and the United States, as well as drawing in personal experiences that relate to Park’s.
As a European immigrant in the USA, I have encountered many new cultural phenomena in the last 4 _ years that have challenged me to perceive who I am differently. This experience has been even more polarized by the fact that I have lived most of that time in Los Angeles, a melting pot to be reckoned with. Coming to America, I expected these adaptations to my Irish self but the intensity of becoming cognizant of my label of 'whiteness' has mocked the limitations of my anticipations.
Defining exactly what shapes ethnic identity in the United States is the hardest question I can imagine being asked. As a child born in the United States, I find this question so difficult because I have been exposed to a large variety of cultures within the small boundaries of my own family. This makes it very difficult to determine one, or even a few characteristics that define ethnic identity. In the case of many of these novels, the task of defining ethnic identity is not so complicated. The list of determinants that I believe to define ethnic identity includes language, geographic location, and tradition.
In ‘Cultural baggage’, Barbara Ehrenreich described her personal experience and opinion about ethnic and religious heritage. Barbara was born in an immigrant family, With all the information she got, Barbara was unable to find her own ethnic identity. While been frustrated and embarrassed for her incapability of locating her own root, she eventually come to realize that she belongs to the race of “none”, those who think for themselves and try new things, and the race of “none” marches on.
I classify my race, ethnicity, and culture as a white, Irish-Italian- American, woman. My mother was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland and my paternal grandparents are from Sicily, Italy. I imagine being first generation Irish and second generation Italian helps me relate with my ethnicity.
In the essay “Cultural Baggage” by Barbara Ehrenreich in The Norton Mix, Ehrenreich claims that she possesses no type of heritage. She goes on to explain that in her life, she never learned any specific cultural values, and that her family has always lived with borrowed traditions. She closes by stating that she is proud of her lack of heritage and believes that the world would be better off without culture. Having no cultural background is a well-developed and agreeable idea because of the number of people who come from mixed and confusing backgrounds, the complexity of a mixed family tree, and the changing times and their effect on traditions.
Ehrenreich accomplishes her goal in explaining why we should have the race of “none” by establishing credibility when she talks about how her own family has not followed the traditions of their ancestors and some of the social
Nagel, Joane. “Constructing Ethnicity: Creating and Recreating Ethnic Identity and Culture”. New York University Press. Washington Square, New York 1998.
The question of identity can be universally translated, always seeming like a difficult one to answer, especially for those who are culturally dislodged, growing up in two worlds simultaneously, just as immigrants are forced to do. There exists external components of identity which are bestowed upon people; cultural classifications such as race, religion and gender, as well as societal characterizations such as one’s family, career, and title. Many people use these labels and external definitions to describe or define themselves, however, there is much value in going beyond these external descriptors to recognize one’s complete and true identity.
Throughout her career, Gertrude Stein was fascinated by the possibility of revolution in the sense of "a complete or drastic change," especially in relation to her ideas of identity and agency. But critics disagree about her conclusions. For example, Bruce Goebel sees her early texts as "embrac[ing a] deterministic attitude about the formation of identity" (238) that conceives of identity as locked within historical and biological contexts. At the other extreme, many critics such as Caren Kaplan locate Stein's work within the context of expatriate modernism and so see it within the discourses which "celebrat[e] the rootless traveler" (7), cut loose from nation and history and thus free to create a self of her own choosing. I believe this contradiction arises because Stein's texts are themselves often contradictory, with one passage exploring the inescapable weight of history and heredity on her characters, while the next admires her characters' capacity to resist cultural prescriptions, to exercise agency, to transform themselves, to be "singular." Identity in many Stein texts, especially in The Making of Americans, is, then, a negotiation between cultural prescriptions, biological and historical determinants on the one hand and self-definition, change and agency on the other. In this sense, Stein's work anticipates Foucault's later theories of identity in which he explores possibilities for "freedom" or agency. In "The Ethic of Care for the Self as a Practice of Freedom" Foucault begins to define what he calls "the practices of the self":
Ehrenreich expresses the audience her problem which is that she can not seem to feel good about her ethnic heritage. Everyone around her had ancestors that were more cultured, and appeared to be a part of society. Ehrenreich issue was that her ancestors were the ones who took the land, enslaved people, and were not any kind of cultured. Ehrenreich seems kind of humiliated of her culture in the beginning of her essay, but more towards the end of her, she notices that she no longer needed to follow the traditions that were made by her ancestors. Also she longer need to follow what her grandparents made her do. “We are the kind of people, I realized-whatever our distant ancestors’ religions-who do not believe, who do not carry on traditions, who do not do things just because someone has done them before” (Ehrenreich pg 478). Ehrenreich demonstrates that although her family values are not the same as what she wants, she no longer needed to follow her ancestor’s
My culture identity, as I know it as is African American. My culture can be seen in food, literature, religion, language, the community, family structure, the individual, music, dance, art, and could be summed up as the symbolic level. Symbolic, because faith plays a major role in our daily lives through song, prayer, praise and worship. When I’m happy I rely on my faith, same as when I’m sad, for I know things will get better as they have before.
Times are changing and I feel like I am forced to conform to the everyday social norms of America, which makes me feel impuissance. Racial identity, which refers to identifying with a social group with similar phenotypes and racial category, is the only experience that I have with life (Organista, 2010). Racial ethnicity was used to build my self-esteem and to keep me in the dark when it came to how society treats individuals of darker complexion. However, once I left the confines of my family and neighborhood, I was forced to befriend and interact with individuals that had different cultural values and beliefs than me. This experience caused me to learn how to appreciate other racial and ethnic groups and their cultural values and belief. This is an accurate definition, of acculturation because I was able to understand and fit in with individuals different from me, while maintaining my own culture and ethnic identity. Therefore, knowing the importance of my ancestry, while acculturating and developing my own identity was all used
People often times come into the world and grow up without really knowing who they are. Individuals are being raised in an environment where they do not know their own cultural background. Although recently there seems to have been an increase in the number of people who are aware of their heritage. Even with that increase the number is still small, while vast majority know very little about their culture. It is important knowing the value of one's racial/cultural heritage. Knowing about the traits and tradition of one's own race could provide insight on how important one’s cultural heritage is.