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Research on the importance of culture and identity
How culture impacts personality
The importance of identity in society
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Recommended: Research on the importance of culture and identity
Why is cultural identity important to us as people from different race and ethnical background? Identity is one of the most baffling, unpredictable, problematic, survival instincts of individual life in any society around the world. CulturalIdentity is that is aspect of individual that creates a distinguish characteristics and unique differences from one person to another. It can be looked upon in the different angles and spectrum depending on what the case may be. Identity can be analyzed in terms of way of life of people in a geographical setting.Culture is the back born of every identity, and then we can look into some subcultures like, music, language, and communication and perception.
First the question will be what is culture? Culture
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Many will ask what role does identity and culture play in the society? As a matter of fact, culture is that one factor that speaks to us about our origin. According to Lahiri “For my parent, home was not our house at Rhode Island, but Calcutta, where they were raised. I was aware that the things they lived for, the Nazrul songs they listened to on the real to real, the family they missed, the cloths my mother wore that were not available in any store in any mall” (pg 612). On this quote, Lahiri tries to explain the way of living her parents left behind before moving to America in search for better lives, her parents found themselves in a strange new environment that necessarily doesn’t collaborate with their past cultural values, but they coped with it and the sense of origin from which they were raised still follows …show more content…
Other people’scultures are as important as ourown culture so it is crucial we respect it. Being an American does not give any one the right to travel to other country and violate their tradition, values and believe, or other people coming to America to violate their system. We as individual have to acknowledge the fact that there were people residing there before our arrival so it is mandatory we obey their rules. “At home I follow the customs of my parents, speaking Bengali and eating rice and dal with my fingers” (Lahiri 612). Lahiri attempt to explain that that when she is at home with her parents, she has the obligation to respect the parents culture and way of doing things rather than doing things her own way or the way she
Identity is defined as being oneself and not acting or being something else. The identity that one forms throughout their life time is a slow and tedious process, each and every event in one’s life whether it’s larger or small scale has an effect on developing ones overall identity. In the play Only Drunks and Children Tell the Truth by Drew Hayden Taylor, Janice it caught between two identities and struggles to find a happy medium. Being adopted into a white family at a young age, Janice has become accustom to many of the white traditions and ways. Janice’s native family has recently gotten in touch with her and has put a great deal of pressure on her to regain some of the native culture she was born into. With pressure building Janice begins to question her identity and begins to show signs that she wants nothing to do with her native roots. Drew Hayden Taylor does an excellent job in this play showing how stereotypes and pre-conceived notions affect ones identity and their relationships within society. Each character within the play shows how their identity has been shaped through the relationships they have acquired throughout their lives; Tonto’s identity is heavily influenced by his father and best friend Rodney, Barb is influenced by the customs and traditional ways of her mother, and Janice after being adopted at a young age has formed an identity revolving around that of her adopted parents but she faces a great deal of pressure from her native birth family.
I am not a child of immigrants, but maintaining one’s culture is a universal struggle in a land far from one’s ethnic origins. Lahiri suggests that without cultural connections such as family and friends, one’s culture can simply vanish if they are not in the land of ethnic origin. I have found this to be true within my own
Some may say that people can adapt to a new place and completely let go of their culture; thus they are saying that cultural identity does not continually inform the way one views the world. This however, is not accurate. While people can adapt to a new place and adapt to parts of a new places culture, they cannot completely let go of their cultural identity. It will always impact the way one views the world. Take for example Bharati, the author of the personal essay “Two ways to belong in America”. While Bharti's sister Mira chose to hold on to every aspect of their indian heritage; Bharati wanted to feel like she belonged fully in America. When talking about her sister she says “She is happier to live in America as expatriate Indian than as an immigrant American I need to feel like a part of the community I have adopted”(85). Bharati needs to feel like she belongs, and though she may have broadened her culture; her perception of the world and others is still influenced by her indian cultural
...d and left with little cultural influence of their ancestors (Hirschman 613). When the children inadvertently but naturally adapting to the world around them, such as Lahiri in Rhode Island, the two-part identity begins to raise an issue when she increasingly fits in more both the Indian and American culture. She explains she “felt an intense pressure to be two things, loyal to the old world and fluent in the new”, in which she evidently doing well at both tasks (Lahiri 612). The expectations for her to maintain her Indian customs while also succeeding in learning in the American culture put her in a position in which she is “sandwiched between the country of [her] parents and the country of [her] birth”, stuck in limbo, unable to pick one identity over the other.
Traditions control how one talks and interacts with others in one’s environment. In Bengali society, a strict code of conduct is upheld, with dishonor and isolation as a penalty for straying. Family honor is a central part to Bengali culture, and can determine both the financial and social standing of a family. Usha’s family poses no different, each member wearing the traditional dress of their home country, and Usha’s parents diligently imposing those values on their daughter. Those traditions, the very thing her [Usha] life revolved around, were holding her back from her new life as an American. Her mother in particular held those traditions above her. For example, when Aparna makes Usha wear the traditional attire called “shalwar kameez” to Pranab Kaku and Deborah’s Thanksgiving event. Usha feels isolated from Deborah’s family [Americans] due to this saying, “I was furious with my mother for making a scene before we left the house and forcing me to wear a shalwar kameez. I knew they [Deborah’s siblings] assumed, from my clothing, that I had more in common with the other Bengalis than with them” (Lahiri ...
Culture and identity are two very strange ideas. They are received at a very young age, yet they are very hard to give to someone else. They will affect you for the rest or your life, yet for the most part you are born into them. However, they soon become very important to us and we cannot, no matter what we do, live without them. They are a part of us, and a vital aspect of society. However, it took me a very long time to recognize that I had an identity and a little while after that before I knew what it was.
To begin with, culture is something that may change evolve within time but culture is something that come with your heritage or your ethnicity the traditions and things that happen that make up your culture like how your parents raised you are culture. In the informational text “ What is cultural identity” by Elise Trumbull and Maria Pacheco, and in the personal essay “Ethnic Hash” by Patricia Williams, there are similarities and differences in how each writer conveys their message about cultural identity. Based upon their research, Trumbull and Pacheco present the idea that culture changes and that it will never stay the same, while Williams uses her personal experience to develop the idea that many things influence cultural inheritage but
The author of the story was born in 1967 in London, and soon after she moved to Rhode Island in the United States. Although Lahiri was born in England and raised in the United States and her parent’s still carried an Indian cultural background and held their believes, as her father and mother were a librarian and teacher. Author’s Indian heritage is a strong basis of her stories, stories where she questions the identity and the plot of the different cultural displaced. Lahiri always interactive with her parents in Bengali every time which shows she respected her parents and culture. As the author was growing up she never felt that she was a full American, as her parents deep ties with India as they often visited the country.
Culture is the clothing each of us dawn every day that give people around us a general sense of who we are. The language around a culture is the code in which we communicate with one another in our own culture. When two of the same cultures are interacting, nothing is lost in translation, nothing is misunderstood, and above all they have had relatively the same personal experiences and see things in the same way. It is when you leave one culture and go to another culture that the code in which we use to communicate is misunderstood and things are lost in translation. Even the the cloths of our culture which identifies us in our identity wardrobe are called into question in the interaction of foreign cultures. It is important for us to know
Who am I; my beliefs, values, morals, and views on society have assisted in molding me into the person that I am considered to be today. I was raced with specifics values, traditions, and norms. Being raised in a small town made being socially aware very easy. I was raised under the southern Baptist Christian religion. Church was always the same and it had a majority of women in attendance although the men and elderly people ran the church overall. It was always the same, repetitive habits and events that occurred in my town but after a while I became accustomed to always being near or known by others.
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.
According to Beck (2005), Indian’s in India had the culture surrounding them to teach their children about who they are, and the significance of Indian culture. Because the children were engrossed into their culture and the significance of the Indian culture, it kept on getting passed on to the next generation (91). To compare this to the modern world, it is like a ring or a special piece of memory that is pass through the family. Meanwhile, the stories of the Indian culture told by the parents are the same as the ring passed through the family because it is significant to that family, or person. Only that family is able to realize how special it is, and they are the only people to keep a value on those priceless jewelry or moments. However, the normal of passing on the Indian culture stopped in the United States because of the changes in the parenting styles. As parents started to change their styles, the children knew they had the advantages. At a young age, who would stay and pay attention to a history lesson that is useless in the worldly life? Many Indian parents started to realize this of how the children in the United States did not care about their culture. In a study done by Beck, it showed about how only about 50% of the children born in the United States had any to some knowledge on their culture, and about another 5-10% have little to no idea of their culture (91). Of
The topic of belonging and identity has become very topical especially with recent increases in migration and debates on cultural identity (Guibernau,2013 ; Adams,2009; Ahmed,1999). It has been noted by writers like Erikson (1968) that through different stages of an individual’s life they experience the forming and the reformation of their identities which become more complex as an individual develops from childhood to adulthood. However, the process of identity formation is generally complex and difficult when it comes to second generation West African immigrants in the United Kingdom. Thus, this process can often be especially difficult, resulting in struggles to identify a clear sense of belonging and identity.
How many times have people asked themselves, who am I? What defines me? Culture plays a very important role in the identity of people. People are born in a culture, their family's culture, but not with an already established culture. The term culture refers to the values, beliefs, customs, style of dress, food, songs and stories that are shared and learned in a characteristic group. On the other hand, identity is a set of features, attributes and characteristics that define a person. Identity is constructed by language, social structure, gender orientation and cultural patterns. Although many do not relate these two themes, there is a complex relationship between culture and identity.
Jess, an Indian girl whose parents came to Britain in search for a better life, struggles to find mutual ground for cultural norms of her parents, and the cultural norms of the society she lives in. Her parents have adapted some cultural elements such as mobile phones, but those are all merely just a means to adapt to a modern culture they don't feel they belong to, or rather don't want to belong to. Because, when it comes down to moral values, they are not concerend with gadgets or such they have adapted from British culture, they rather feel the importance of belonging to their Indian community in Britain, rather than the British community. They are concerened only with what their Indian communi...