After reading, A Single Numberless Death by Nora Strejilevich there is a passage in the book that I found fascinating. It states that “The secret of assimilating into the new culture was to never look back.” When I read this it made me think about my family coming to the U.S. Although, I was a the first generation to be born in the U.S., I still felt that I had a lot of the custom that I inherited coming from an immigrant family. In order for me to settle and become part of a new culture was going to school and watching on TV, also what my parents would try to teach me.
There was a time in my life that my mom had gotten a promotion but needed to learn more English in order to be successful at her new promotion. She asks my brother and me to stop speaking in Spanish to her and to speak English so she could learn the language. Looking back at this moment now I see that our family was starting to adjust to our new American culture just like Nora was trying to adjust to the life in Argentina. Even assimilating in school it was hard to do because of the language barrier that I had, I was always able to speak the language, but grammar would always set me back, and it was hard to be part of a culture because I was not able to write the language.
Although my experience is not as severe as Nora’s experience because they would force them to perform acts that I could not image happened in the U.S. One of the experiences that the book mentions is that they made people who were Jewish do Nazi practices and tell them to hail Hitler. The worst punishment that I had was to maybe do more homework, but as a youth this experience was not enjoyable. It just that when you are trying to settle in to a new culture you need to let go some of your old custom in order to assimilate into a new culture.
There was a time in my life that my mom had gotten a promotion but needed to learn more English in order to be successful at her new promotion. She asks my brother and me to stop speaking in Spanish to her and to speak English so she could learn the language. Looking back at this moment now I see that our family was starting to adjust to our new American culture just like Nora was trying to adjust to the life in Argentina. Even assimilating in school it was hard to do because of the language barrier that I had, I was always able to speak the language, but grammar would always set me back, and it was hard to be part of a culture because I was not able to write the language.
Although my experience is not as severe as Nora’s experience because they would force them to perform acts that I could not image happened in the U.S. One of the experiences that the book mentions is that they made people who were Jewish do Nazi practices and tell them to hail Hitler. The worst punishment that I had was to maybe do more homework, but as a youth this experience was not enjoyable. It just that when you are trying to settle in to a new culture you need to let go some of your old custom in order to assimilate into a new culture.
I can understand how that passage about assimilation resonates with you. It has the same effect on me, too. Having moved here about eight years ago from the Philippines, I know a little about assimilation. It’s a constant struggle--to grow up with many of the traditions and values that other Americans do while trying to incorporate your parents' culture as well. Sometimes the two cultures come into conflict. It can be very tough to choose one over the other, always trying to find the middle ground…
ReplyDeleteAll these various attempts at defining one’s identity can be really difficult. Always, it is the immigrant who assimilates, who must explain his or her presence, who must earn the right to exist and speak, who must prove his or her identity. This burden of proof is constant, heavy, and tiresome.
But perhaps by taking a closer look at this issue of identity, it will help us understand how racial identity is asserted and recognized in this country. And perhaps, with all these knowledge and awareness, we can hopefully contribute to the act of change.