When I look in the mirror I know whom I am, but society makes it difficult to understand who I am, because I was born to immigrants of Nigerian descent, and I am a first generation American, that term is sometimes used so loosely. By looking at my name they assume that I am from some island, but I am so quick to tell them that “I am Nigerian”, there is another statement that normally follows this. “You do not have an accent”. I wonder if I had an accent would I be considered Nigerian and not American; then I say that “My parents are Nigerian” and then that changes, so to them I am just associated with the Nigerian culture it does not make me Nigerian, there has been many discussion between my friends who are the same like me confused to what defines us in general, who is to say who you are? Are we not the ones who define who we are? This is my journey through my life, how I deciphered what I am.
Who defines what it is to be Nigerian or American? Is it the color of my skin, the way I speak, the kind of hair I have? Maybe it is my circumstances or my nature defines if I am Nigerian, when I was younger these questions arise so many times, I just simply say that I am African-American; but they say “You’re the real African” what does all this mean and why is society allowed to define who I am culturally. “First generation Haitian-American.
Our parents either try to completely assimilate, or create pocket communities. There was a class system back home, so they usually stick to their "social class," which is predominantly an economic caste system, but also to a lesser degree a color thing (which was more of an issue in our parent's generation). I ...was discriminated against in school for being Haitian, as a result, I refused to sp...
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...in the middle, and that I am being asked to choose, but the truth is, you do not have to really choose. ” Food and language are an important part of one's cultural identity as well as the living experienced in foreign countries” (Onyekwe, 2000.). The only choice you have is to be genuine or to be forged. You cannot choose where you are born, what ethnicity you are, what language your parents spoke to you in when you were a child. I can only be who I am, accept who I am, and I do not have to apologize who I am. There is a saying that goes “You are what you eat”, that is true because one day I will eat some Fufu with stew, or pizza with buffalo chicken and French Fries, I have to realize that America is foreign already, because of the many immigrants who settle to make the next generations better then what they had and to continue the growing population of culture.
These categories often include our race, class, gender, income and our educational level. More often than not we are generalized by what category we fall under. However, these categories are the ones that society sees us as, but it’s not what defines us as a person. “A friend argues that Americans battle between the ‘historical self’ and the ‘self self.’” (Rankine 104). We can say that our “historical self” is what people view us as. Not only is it the category we fall under it’s the stereotypes that have managed to travel time and stick with us regardless of us not having lived during the time they were initially created. Our “historical self” is how we are perceived by people who don’t know us. On the other hand our “self-self” is the person we initially are. It’s the person who our family and close friends know us as. It’s our personality, our attitude and who we really are as a person. Nevertheless our “self-self” doesn’t have the power to protect us from what we are genuinely seen as. “however, sometimes your historical selves, her white self and your black self, or your white self and her black self, arrive with the full force of your American positioning.” (Rankine 104). We can tell ourselves that society isn’t what defines us but there’s going to be times where you realize that people see you as nothing more than the label society puts on
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.
“Who am I?” (415). This is the question Leona Thomas asks in her essay entitled “Black and White.” Through the use of pathos, logos, and inductive reasoning Thomas is able to come to a consensus that “I am black and white, both races, both cultures, and both heritages” (418). For Thomas, there is some form of closure as to where she belongs racially and culturally, but many others still lie in ambivalence concerning their race and culture.
Our identity has a great influence on how we are perceived and classified by others in society. Some ways we are usually identified are gender, race, and ethnicity. I am a white, male, of Italian decent. I was born in Arezzo, Italy and moved here when I was seven. I am now nineteen years old. Often times in society based on our social location people believe they know who we are and how we should behave.
Biologically speaking, there are not many physical elements that we can change about our identity, but we can change our identity in every other aspect. However, it is possible to grow up adopting a culture that one is born with and embracing the culture that ties with the color of your skin and choose to adopt the traditions of another culture and identify within that culture. For example, someone born in Africa can identify as African and embrace the traditions of their land. Moreover, African people may move to America, and immerse in American culture. Later, they may acquire citizenship in America, after adopting cultures as their own. Some may object to this idea of a U.S. alien acquiring a U.S. citizenship. However, a person’s identity, and how others perceive them, does not determine a person’s citizenship status. Notably, one gains citizenship through a process.
My parents like all parents are faced with raising their children with culturally suitable morals and ethics that will not only prepare them for adulthood but also molds them into the person they are today. For my brother and I, we were taught from young where my parents, grandparents, and other ancestors were from. Even though I never went back to the country my parents or grandparents were born in I was able to gain a sense of my ethnic self. Whether it was taking my brother and me to events those in the Guyanese culture celebrated or showed us picture to keep the culture alive. I believe something simply as cooking traditional cuisines that originated from their country my parents did to show us this is what we ate. My dad hung up flags, shared stories of life growing up in the
In Lavanya Ramanathan’s Washington Post article published in 2015 titled “Why everyone should stop calling immigrant food ‘ethnic’”, she discusses about people’s preconceptions on the type of food that should be labelled ethnic. Ashlie Stevens also touched on a similar topic in her Guardian article published in 2015 titled “Stop thinking and just eat: when ‘food adventuring’ trivializes culture”. She talks about how people assume that just by eating food from a certain culture, they are able relate to the culture as a whole. Both authors acknowledge the importance of appreciating authentic cuisines, but takes different approaches to convince the audience. Both authors establish credibility by using a wide range of substantiated evidences. While,
In Stuart Hall’s “Ethnicity: Identity and Difference,” he claims that identity is a volatile social process through which one comes to see the self. Hall argues that identity is not a thing rather a process “…that happens over time, that is never absolutely stable, that is subject to the play of history, and the play of difference.” These factors are constantly entering the individual in a never-ending cycle, re-establishing and affirming who one is.
The identity crisis that is spoken of in “If You Are What You Eat, What Am I?” concerns the changes from an Indian diet to an American diet and the way it makes her feel. For her food ended up being one of the most important parts of her own personal identity and was the source of distress for her as a child. As a child she wants to fit in with her friends at school by eating American foods and she has concerns as to whether she is really her parent’s daughter or not.
Talk about a label or ethnicity may sound normal for most of the people in the United States. However, in the border, I’ve found many people that talks about ethnicity as it was a depicting way to talk about other people. Nonetheless, as we understood during the first weeks of this course, even though people never think in a label on their person, or have never thought in one, other people might get one for them in a daily basis. No matter where a person is, nor the country a person lives in, that person has a label for others and that person forms part of an ethnic group. In many cases, people’s ethnic identity will depend on the place where they grew up, but some others it simply will depend on their family descent. In my personal case I consider my ethnic identity as a Mexican-American. The reason for this are simple, but has many ramifications, I grew up in Mexico.
What does it mean to talk about ethnicity as an option for an individual? Mary C. Waters address the importance of this question in Optional Ethnicities For Whites Only. She argues how having choice in ethnic identity is the opposite of the idea we perceive; “that one’s identity is a fixed characteristic, reflective of blood ties and given at birth”. Yet there are two major options Waters describes as for White Americans: (1) the option whether to claim any specific ancestry, or to just be “White” or American, or (2) the choice of which European ancestries to include in their description of their identities. These two options exist only for White Americans.
At the start of the semester, my oblivious state of nature associating with the Chinese culture reached an unacceptable level. Implementing a necessary change, I decided to educate myself on different cultures starting with China. I failed to ponder that such a rich, deep culture existed outside America. Encompassed by this country’s unique yet suffocating melting pot culture, my outlook believed ideas such as uniformity between American Chinese food and Authentic Chinese food. After this course, my bigot perspective widened as I witnessed diversity in the world. Before this class, when I thought of Chinese food, my connotation jumped to thoughts associated with chop suey, but as I progressed my education, my mindset gradually pondered foods like steamed buns or “New Year Cakes” with authentic Chinese food.
Everyone is raised within a culture with a set of customs and morals handed down by those generations before them. Most individual’s view and experience identity in different ways. During history, different ethnic groups have struggled with finding their place within society. In the mid-nineteen hundreds, African Americans faced a great deal of political and social discrimination based on the tone of their skin. After the Civil Rights Movement, many African Americans no longer wanted to be identified by their African American lifestyle, so they began to practice African culture by taking on African hairdos, African-influenced clothing, and adopting African names. By turning away from their roots, many African Americans embraced a culture that was not inherited, thus putting behind the unique and significant characteristics of their own inherited culture. Therefore, in an African American society, a search for self identity is a pervasive theme.
A person’s identity is shaped by many different aspects. Family, culture, friends, personal interests and surrounding environments are all factors that tend to help shape a person’s identity. Some factors may have more of an influence than others and some may not have any influence at all. As a person grows up in a family, they are influenced by many aspects of their life. Family and culture may influence a person’s sense of responsibilities, ethics and morals, tastes in music, humor and sports, and many other aspects of life. Friends and surrounding environments may influence a person’s taste in clothing, music, speech, and social activities. Personal interests are what truly set individuals apart. An individual is not a puppet on the string of their puppet-master, nor a chess piece on their master’s game board, individuals choose their own paths in life. They accomplish, or strive to accomplish, goals that they have set for themselves throughout their lifetime. Individuals are different from any other individual in the world because they live their own life rather than following a crowd of puppets. A person’s identity is defined by what shaped it in the first place, why they chose to be who they are, and what makes them different from everybody else in the world. I feel that I have developed most of my identity from my own dreams, fantasies, friends, and idols.
In this reflective paper, I discuss several aspects of my race, ethnicity, and culture that has made me who I am, and impacted my overall individual identity.