Sushi, Hair Metal,
and My American Identity
Anonymous
I. How I Identify Myself
No one is
ever raised the exact same way as their friends, cousins, co-workers,
classmates, etc., and I’ve always tried remembering that when certain things
about others seem weird to me or don’t make sense. Even in the apartment I live in now during
school, the two other girls I live with have been raised very differently and
have very different family backgrounds than me.
I sometimes forget now, since I’m not living with or close with some of
my family, that there is more to me than being just an “American.” There’s more to all of us than just being
“American” and America really is a big melting pot of different cultures,
beliefs, and traditions.
I grew up
in a Japanese household with my grandmother, brother, and father. My grandmother and father are from Okinawa,
Japan, and came here in the late 1950s or early 1960s. She was the main person who took care of me
because of my father’s work schedule and a lot of her traditions and customs,
which she raised my father on, were also taught to my brother and I. We were only allowed to speak Japanese at home
and if we asked for something in English or said something in English, she
wouldn’t acknowledge it because it was important to her for us to learn the
language. She also made a lot of
Japanese food, which I still like to this day.
A lot of the cartoons, toys, etc., that I liked and remember playing with,
too, were also originally Japanese and I think that’s because, besides her
raising us that way, it’s what I knew and what interested me at the time. I even met my family from Japan and really
enjoyed meeting them and learning from them.
When I
started getting older, I started being interested in my own things, like most
teenagers, and was allowed to hang out with friends more. My grandmother moved into assisted living
eventually and I stopped really paying attention to a lot of her and my
father’s stories, somewhat ignoring that part of me more because I didn’t
really care at the time. I even lost the
language once she moved out because I was barely using it. Once I moved out of that house and into my
mother’s house, I wasn’t surrounded by those things at all and pretty much let
go of all of what I grew up on altogether.
Now, being
20 years old and a senior in college, I’ve realized what is important to me and
that a lot of my personality traits, what I like to do, and what I know have
come from my childhood. I’m really
disappointed I can’t speak the language anymore and have wanted to begin
learning again because it is important for me to hold onto some of those things
for the future, to carry down when I have a family of my own. My grandmother has even began losing the
language because she doesn’t get to use it a lot, except on the phone with
relatives, and it really upsets her because even though, at this point, she’s
accepted the American culture, she still wants to hold onto part of where she
came from. I still know how to make
sushi and cook some of the food, which I am proud of knowing, but that’s the
only thing I can truly say I’ve still totally held onto and know.
Besides
where my grandmother and father came from, there’s a lot about me that makes me
“me.” My father rode a Harley and
listened to Ozzy Osbourne, Alice Cooper, Motley Crue, Poison, Kiss, etc., and
those things have definitely been passed down on me. Motley Crue is still one of my favorite
bands, and I have to see them live at least a couple times a year, and that’s
probably one of the first things people that know me would think of when saying
what I’m interested in.
At first, I
didn’t know what I wanted to do with my journalism major because I know I could
never come right out of college being a clean-cut news anchor or something
along those lines, but this far into it, I’ve found that it actually fits me
very well. My biggest interests to write
about and explore are music, body art, and motocross and it’s possible to be a
successful, professional, journalist in those areas while still being
myself. I’ve never cared about going
into a field where I’m guaranteed to make a lot of money in the future, like
some other students I’ve met. It’s more
important to me to hold onto who I am and enjoy the rest of my life than hate
going to work everyday, as long as I make enough to get by and provide for my
own family in the future.
II. A Significant Experience With American
Identities
My father
fought in the Vietnam War and has told me small stories of his time there, but
for the most part doesn’t really want to explain them to me or explain how
scary it really was being there. As a
little girl, I never knew exactly what the war was or how bad of a war it
really was, but once I got older and started learning about it in school, I
started realizing a lot more of what my father went through and why it affected
him so much to this day.
I can’t
imagine what he saw with his own eyes and it took me up until recently to start
fully understanding his PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) and how to not be
bothered by it. It used to embarrass me
sometimes how awkwardly social he was and how a lot of the time, he keeps to
himself and doesn’t know how to act in certain situations, but I’ve really
learned, especially this past summer, how to not let other people’s reactions
to the “weird” things he does affect me.
This story
about America, to me, is the one I feel has most affected me because a part of
it is still with my father to this day, and throughout my life, I’ve had to
experience and live with that part he carries with him. I don’t think many people truly understand
the effects war has on people until they see it first hand and while we learn
about the different wars throughout our school years, and while we live through
one now, it’s hard for me to imagine all of the people going through similar
things my father, as well as my grandfather in WWII, went through and are going
through. The number of soldiers written
out in textbooks is more than just a number and many people forget to think of
it as an actual group of people like us.
All the
students my age and older can probably recall where they were when the World
Trade Centers were hit and right now we’re all living through something, some
more than others, that will be a few chapters in a high school history textbook
in the future. I was getting ready for
school when I walked in my living room and saw my father watching it on
TV. I had no idea what was actually
going on because I was only ten at the time, but I started gradually
understanding what was going on as people explained it to me. I didn’t think or understand at the time,
though, that the after-effects would still be going on now.
Now, at this
point, I’ve met many people my age back home in Buffalo that have been in the
war, as well as students and friends in Fredonia. My roommate’s boyfriend was in Iraq for 8
months and came to Fredonia for school afterwards. It’s strange to think of how much he went
through there and now he’s here just doing everyday things with us, once again,
but still carries that with him. Many
people I went to high school with have also gone over there and it’s changed my
perspective a lot on my dad’s experience because I’m living through seeing them
leave, not just hearing about it after it’s all over, and what they’re going
through is somewhat similar to what my dad had to do.
III. My Beliefs/Principles On How We Ought To
Define And Understand American Identities
America is
full of many different people and I’ve met people from many different places
and backgrounds, as I’m sure many others have also. Coming to Fredonia, some of my best friends
here are from Africa and Jamaica. They
still fit right in being here and I don’t see them as being any more different
than anyone else, they’re just used to some different things than us. The “melting-pot” idea of our country is very
true. We’re all a mixture of different
ethnicities, religions, etc., mixing together and living together.
I feel like
there’s a place in America for people of every color, race, religion, belief,
sexual orientation, etc., and think the first thing any American should be is
accepting or open-minded. We all know
that this isn’t really a trait everyone in our country possesses, but to me,
it’s what every American should aim for.
I couldn’t imagine living in places like Jamaica, where my friend is
from, where being a gay male is wrong and having a relationship with another
man is against the law. Cops there even
turn the other way when it comes to hate crimes against homosexuals, while here
there are parades all over the country here and gay marriage is being legalized
in many states, giving some of my friends the right to be who they are and have
that equal opportunity.
I also feel
like living here gives us the opportunity to make a lot out of ourselves. We can pretty much dream of doing anything
with our lives and there’s a way to achieve it.
There are so many different majors to choose from when going into tech
school or college and we have the ability to change our minds at any time as
long as we can finance it in some way.
Everything in our country doesn’t always run smoothly and isn’t always
the fairest, and many people don’t always agree with the governments policies
or ways and some abuse government assistance, but we have a lot a more
opportunities and rights than other places.
In Margaret
Regan’s The Death of Josseline, the
Mexican immigrants see America as an opportunity to make more money than they
can back home so they can support their families, and it’s true that we are
able to make more money than them, but being an American citizen, we have to
pay taxes/pay our dues for being a citizen.
Living here and making a life for ourselves here is expensive, so it’s
not like everything here is just given to all of us and our country has its
problems. While we are lucky to live in
this country, the stereotypes others have about the “American dream” and us
aren’t true altogether to that degree.
IV. What Makes My American Identity
After taking this American
Identities class, it’s led me to really think about what all of those factors
say about my American identity. They all
seem to just work together and fit into being “American.” Growing up listening to hair metal and music
along those lines and also facing a Japanese upbringing has made me the person
I am today.
I believe
the Japanese upbringing has made me more of the person I am today than I ever
realized before this class. Like I
mentioned in section I, I went through a rebelling stage of my upbringing, but
I still hold onto some of it today and part of my personality comes from
it. Even when I was trying to let it go
and be my teenage self, I never realized that my self included some of the
Japanese traits that my grandmother passed down to me and I can’t erase
something that makes me.
I related
to Amy Chua’s Battle Hymn of the Tiger
Mother because of her daughter’s struggles with her unusual, strict
parenting. In the memoir, Chua doesn’t
see that her way of parenting is too strict, which in my opinion it is, and I
think my grandmother was a lot like her, just not as extreme. I couldn’t hang out with friends a lot
because she felt like homework was more important and I always had the pressure
on me to not disappoint them. I played
the flute and only practiced because it pleased her and my father. I felt like an outcast in school because I
didn’t wear the cool clothes or do the cool things my other classmates did
because she didn’t feel like that was important. I also studied a lot in school and did very
well, and to add onto my embarrassment at the time, I was the biggest teacher’s
pet. I eventually applied for City
Honors School (CHS), which is one of the best schools in the Buffalo area, and
began going there in 7th grade.
They were so happy for me to go to that school because it kept me out of
the rest of the Buffalo Public Schools that weren’t good.
Once I got
into CHS, that’s when I began to rebel against my grandmother and father and
met friends that were in similar situations.
As much as I tried to ignore my home life, I look back at it now and
realize how I really never did. The
music I was listening to still related to the heavy-metal, hard-rock past my
father passed onto me. The rebelling
stage fit into exactly that image, as well.
I may have worn more black, gotten more piercings, and acted less
reserved than I used to, but it was nothing new. It’s the same sort of rebelling we see in
many American movies and hear countless teenage stories about. I was still doing well in school, but didn’t care
much and skipped a lot of classes. I think
that might have been the biggest way I know how of firing back at my father and
being an angry teenager.
I’ve gone
through some other stages since then, but that was my most relevant one because
it was at such a crucial time in life transitioning from middle school up to
high school. Now in college, I’ve
realized how reserved, or shy, I am compared to a lot of people, including my
roommate, and this may be because my grandmother was always raised to be this way
as well. I’m very soft spoken, unlike my
roommate, who is Italian and is loud and vocal with everything she’s thinking or
feels.
As far as
the metal music goes, I can pretty much say that it is something I will never
get over and in a way, I feel like some of it makes America. When I think of the perfect American
spokesperson, I think of Bret Michaels running around on stage wearing a cowboy
hat, cowboy boots, blue jeans, and a ripped up t-shirt and singing to the
troops, then riding his Harley around. My
father’s love for Ozzy Osbourne could have been his rebelling stage that he
went through against my grandmother’s upbringing, so I think we have that in
common. He held onto that and somewhat
Americanized himself, while growing up and realizing that he couldn’t let go of
the Japanese part of himself either. My
children will probably grow up getting rocked to sleep by me with Motley Crue,
Black Sabbath, Poison, and Kiss on in the background and maybe they’ll hang
onto it the way I do.
Thinking
back to friends’ stories about growing up and their identity, as well as other
classmates’, I don’t think there is one certain trait that everybody in America
possesses that makes us who we are as a country. What we all do have in common is that our
ancestors and/or ourselves have all come from different places and have faced
different cultural issues. America is
just a big melting pot of every culture, religion, race, and issue.
V. American Stereotypes
My
boyfriend is from Nigeria and he considers himself very American. He’s interested in arts and music, which
disappoints his parents because they came to America to make a better life for
themselves and their children and they feel like he’s setting himself up for
failure. His family back in Nigeria
doesn’t have all that they do here and they feel like he doesn’t take advantage
of that or appreciate it. He always
mentions to me how proud they are of his sister for going through medical
school and becoming a doctor. I’ve
noticed many doctors I meet are from other countries and maybe part of the lazy
stereotype of Americans is because we all don’t take advantage of education the
way they do, or we don’t have the same goals that they do. As I mentioned earlier, money isn’t a huge
deal to me and I’m happy pursuing a job in writing. I’ve never wanted to be a doctor or a
lawyer. My parents are a little worried
about my future because journalism is a tough field to find a job in, but compared
to his parents, it’s nothing and they’re still supportive. His parents are constantly on him about
finding a good job or going back to school for something other than marketing
and music business, but that’s all he wants to do and feels like he disappoints
them sometimes.
When it
comes to religion, I’m far from religious and am technically Jewish, but I’ve
never followed it. My boyfriend’s family
is very Christian and they think it’s a shame that our country is more lenient
on religion. We’re free to believe
whatever we want and in my opinion that’s the way it should be, but I can see
where they’re coming from because religion has caused many issues between
different regions in Africa and their culture is based on religion. America is more accepting of different
people’s beliefs, including theirs so, I feel like we’re fortunate in the way
that we can all live side by side with far less conflict. No country is perfect when it comes to
different forms of hate, but at least here it’s not extreme.
Some of the
American stereotypes we talked about in class may apply to myself and/or
others, but I’m not sure if they’re only American traits. I’m going to London next semester to study
abroad and I’m excited to be exposed to life there and want to see the way
people act in their everyday lives compared to Americans. I’m wondering if I’m just ignorant to some
American stereotypes being true because I haven’t been exposed enough to other
cultures, or if they really are just false stereotypes that could apply
elsewhere. I’ve taken vacations to other
places and have met people from other countries that live in America, but I
don’t think that has opened my eyes as much as that experience will.
Works Cited
Chua, Amy. Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. New York:
The Penguin Press, 2011.
Regan, Margaret. The Death of Josseline. Boston:
Beacon Press Books, 2010.
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