Hello SASE Fam! To kick off SASE spirit week this year we want to present to you our Eboard's perspective on what cultural awareness means to them and how SASE has been a part of their personal definition. If you would like to be a part of this post, send us a piece about what cultural awareness means to you! Understanding cultures with an open perspective: Joshua Monteiro, President: As a first generation Indian-American, I have had the privilege to be able to experience two distinct cultures. For instance, how the same holiday is celebrated in different ways or the blatant contrast between the most popular dishes to eat in the US as opposed to what is common to eat in India. Even now, I feel like I'm in two different spaces when I'm with friends and family from India versus when I'm with people from any other nationality. But thanks to my parents, I was provided with the resources and support to be open to other people's background and views on various things in life. I believe this was helpful because I was able to grow up in an environment where I can just learn about other people rather than come up with assumptions about people based on what I was told or what was present on TV or movies. Because my hometown was a "melting pot", I had numerous opportunities to understand the personalities of other people through first hand experiences, rather than judge them based on where they or their parents came from. Whether it was interacting with other students in a very diverse school district, participating in Boy Scouts, or playing a variety of sports when I was younger, I was able to make friends with people who were diverse in their own way. That is what I believe Cultural Awareness means to me: the willingness to be open to other cultures and acceptance of other people regardless of where they came from or what they have had to endure. For me personally, SASE has highlighted this point over and over again throughout my college experience and is one of the reasons I love being a part of the people that care about upholding this virtue of diversity and the value it has on our ongoing societal progression toward complete acceptance and celebration of each other's culture. Imtiyaz Ahmed, Marketing and Media Chair: Culture to me is something that I believe has a misconception about it. I feel as though a lot of times people think that culture is exclusive, I disagree. Both my parents are immigrants from Bangladesh, and I grew up in a predominantly Bengali neighborhood. However I was also lucky enough to go to a school where I meet people from all backgrounds. I found that I loved learning about other cultures and what makes them unique. I am proud to be Bengali and I love teaching others about my culture. I encourage everyone to learn something new about their culture and maybe even a culture they don’t know about! Culture from a Personal POV: Tommy Cho, External Vice President: Hi everyone! As for my cultural background: I am Korean! I was born in Korea and moved to the States when I was three years old. Growing up in America was pretty standard for me. I went to the same schools, lived in the same houses, and spoke the same language as everyone else. I didn't really come to appreciate my cultural background until high school, where Korean culture experienced a boom in popularity. K-pop, k-dramas, and general appreciation for Asian cultures all played a part in Korea's international rise. Through this, I began to value my background as a Korean more and more. Because Korea had a lot of positive backing, I myself felt more positively about my own culture and my self-esteem rose a bunch as well. Likewise, I think it's really important that we constantly have an attitude of positivity towards every other culture as well because we never know who might need the extra morale from having pride in their identity. At SASE, we aim to be continuously welcoming and accepting of any cultural background and I hope that I can be a part of that too. Riya Badge, Marketing and Media Chair: Food helps me stay in touch with my culture as an Indian-American! My family doesn't celebrate many traditional Indian cultural events, but I can still feel connected to other Indian-Americans because we all enjoy similar dishes! My family's go-to special-event food is kheer, a dessert similar to rice pudding, but we usually make it with vermicelli noodles. We typically eat it on holidays like Buddha Purnima, but I like to eat it all the time :) Rakshaa Ravishankar, Community Service + Fundraising Chairs: My cultural identity is an important part of my life! I have the opportunity to embrace both my South Indian and my American cultures and make them both mine. I enjoy being able to celebrate South Indian and Hindu festivities and also engage in American traditions such as opening presents with family on Christmas or meeting family for a feast together on Thanksgiving. Angela Murphy, EGC Representative: Growing up I spent a lot of my summers overseas in China. One of my earlier memories of these trips is of sitting on the back of my aunt’s bike while she pedaled through the busy streets of Luoyang. Even though I didn’t weigh as much as I do now, as a kid I remember feeling concerned for my aunt before hopping onto the bike seat. I worried about whether or not my additional weight would cause her to feel exhausted or lose balance amidst the flurry of bikes and cars. These worries faded away as soon as the bike began its forward motion. Instead, I became engrossed in the sight of the urban landscape melting away from my vision. I owe a lot of my good memories in China to the relatives and family friends that took care of me while I was there. As someone biracial, one of the big aspects I’ve noticed about Chinese culture is the emphasis on taking care of other people, especially the young and the elderly. While I find the idea of biking some kid around on a hot summer day impressive, to my aunt I think it was just second nature. Cultural Awareness - Finding the Right Balance:
Maria Chung, Internal Vice President: One of the hardest things about being a part of multiple cultures is finding the middle ground between them. As a Korean-American, I’ve had several difficulties balancing the “American” and the “Korean” life. Having different cultural backgrounds doesn’t just mean the language differences, but a culture includes different values, perspectives, and products based on those values. One action or product of that culture could be interpreted immensely differently depending on the values that one’s culture holds. With that, a challenge that I’ve seen many friends from immigrant families/multicultural backgrounds have is balancing the life at home (which is more compatible to the motherland culture) and the life outside of home (more compatible with the American culture). When growing up and moving to a different country, developing a new cultural identity and trying to maintain the other was overwhelming at times. I just didn’t know how to balance them well so that I can be “equally” involved in both cultures. I think this comes from the pressure that is given to students from multicultural families: not being too immersed in one side of the identity. Oftentimes, we get criticized for being too involved or too uninvolved in one side of the culture. It’s like having to reach for a door but also not leaning too much so that the chair you’re sitting in doesn’t trip over. But why should this be the case? I’ve always tried to find a justifiable answer to this while still attempting to settle a “middle ground” between the two cultures. To be entirely honest, I still haven’t found my middle ground yet, but I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s just something that I’ll continuously have to seek in order to balance the two cultures. And who knows? Maybe I’ve already found that balance and still don’t know what I’m doing juggling between the two. Shriya Chinthak, Secretary: Growing up in suburban Connecticut as an Indian-American is a life experience I’ve grown to own as one of my biggest strengths. It seems that ever since I was little, I was hyperconscious of the dichotomy between my home and school life. It used to be that at home, I embraced my Indian culture completely where I conversed in a Telugu-English mix to my parents and relatives, ate south Indian food, and listened to my parent’s favorite bollywood songs. At school, I embraced my American side, insisting on bringing “American lunch” to school and talking about the latest episode of Hannah Montana with friends. Over time, however, this separation created a rift in my identity. How Indian could I call myself? What about me was American? These questions seemed to fester until I found peers in high school who had similar experiences. For the first time, I was able to speak with others who were actively involved in their ethnic culture as much as they were American. Rather than keeping my identities separate, I now freely speak about my involvement in classical Indian music and my love for Indian food as well as my American lifestyle. I think SASE emphasized this freedom in that I am able to celebrate my Indian heritage with my peers and learn about the other wonderful cultures our members celebrate as their own.
0 Comments
|
AuthorOur SASE Eboard collaborates throughout the year to bring you informative, helpful, and fun blog posts. Archives
April 2021
Categories |