Cultural Values And Its Impact On Identity

Throughout the ages, humans from all over the world have created and accepted honorable cultures which they feel a strong connection to and are dependent upon. One’s way of living demonstrates nationality, religion, ethnicity, and art. People who have more than one culture, have been torn between two worlds that have eventually affected their lives. The cultural identities portrayed in both Self Portrait: On the Borderline Between Mexico and the United States by Frida Kahlo and “Legal Alien” by Pat Mora are shown through the symbolism, theme/message, and persona created in the works.

There is a Mexican man that enters with the rest of his family. They eat beans, rice, flour tortillas and etc. The family does there every day routine, the dad wakes up at six- thirty to go to work in his truck. The children go to school and the mother stays at home. The things a person does in their all has a reason which goes all back to culture. Culture is what makes up everyone different from one another. Texts such as “What is Cultural Identity?”, “Where Worlds Collide” and “Two ways to Belong” supports that depending on one’s culture it effects one perspective on the world and others.

Cultural Identity is “The definition of groups or individuals (by themselves or others) in terms of cultural or subcultural categories (including ethnicity, nationality, language, religion, and gender)” (Oxford Reference). Everyone has cultural identity even though some are unaware of theirs because their habits and traditions might be seen as normal to the person and they might not make the connection that it is a cultural tradition or connected to their cultural identity. Some people are very aware of their cultural identity and have conflict within their identity because the cultures may not coincide. Frida Kahlo’s Self Portrait: On the Borderline Between Mexico and the United States and Pat Mora’s “Legal Alien” both show cultural conflict through symbolism, conflict, and purpose.

Society has played a dominant role for the personal identity of an individual based on where they are from or the culture they were raised with in. With an individual’s identity, one may encounter struggles or challenges. Based on where a person is from or their physical appearance, they may experience discrimination or prejudices in various forms and circumstances. In order to understand the basis of social identity, it is important to understand how social identities are formed and what they are, what social justice is and the process and goal for it to be achieved, and what the different types of oppressions are and where they can occur within society. Accordingly, social identity is made up of various components that may or may not result

Culture is a big influence on people’s perspective on how they view others and the world. When a person grows inside a culture, it shapes who they are. In “What is Cultural Identity” it explains why culture is influential. While in the short story “Where Worlds Collide” there is newcomers from another country that come to America and there’s all these new rules that they don’t understand. They are not from America, To us the rules are normal, to them they are strange and new. Another example of Culture impacting one's views comes from “Two Ways to Belong in America”, two sisters move to America. One of the sisters is still rooted to India, her beliefs come from her culture and she wants to keep it that way. All things considered culture

Cultural identity is when many people from vastly different backgrounds identify with a distinct group or culture that shapes who they are. Cultural identity also influences the way people act and how they affect society. Some aspects of cultural identity that influence how people act in society is their ethnicity and peoples diverse background.

“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind”, a quote from Dr. Suess. I wanted to acknowledge this quote because this inspired me to do my collage. I’m not going to lie, I started my collage later than told because I was having a creative block. I was scrolling through twitter and saw the quote on my timeline. I was motivated by this quote. I was afraid that what I was going to put on my collage would trigger judgement from other people, but this fear faded away once I read the quote. As you may have seen from my collage, I have incorporated just a few of the main objects and people that have shaped my identity. These things are family, culture, religion,

A cultural identity explores and explains how our place of upbringing, ethnicity, religion, socioeconomic status, and family dynamics among other factors creates our identity as a person. Even facts such as what activities we took part in as a child can be part of cultural identity. During the process of writing my second paper for my English class in my first semester of college, my professor asks this question several times; “Who are you?” This exercise I believe she is trying to use to show that people are multifaceted beings; meaning there are different aspect of individual’s life that shape them into who they are. It is not just based on one particular aspect of their life that define them. Ethnically, I identify myself as a Yoruba girl (an ethnic group in the western part of Nigeria). Writing this self-identity paper has engaged me into thinking about the factors that are woven together to define my identity and how and where they each play their role. Culture, in addition to family traditions is one of the factors that define my self-identity as well as affect my self-identity.

Being caught between two locations and their varying cultures has caused identity issues within myself and a lack of belonging when I’m in either place. It was from an early age that I realized I wasn’t like everyone else around me. Myers would call this “not being a part of the in-group”. The in-group in his opinion were the people who had something in common and anyone who doesn’t have that thing in common also is in the out-group. This separation is what divides us as a society and makes life difficult for people like me. Being included in certain groups can give someone the ability to be dominate and confident where people in the outgroup can’t. This division can also bring about stereotypes and conformity within the groups themselves. This central idea of “us” and “them” is something that everyone struggles with in some way no matter what they do, mine just happened to be geographical and cultural all wrapped into one.

What was an innocent attempt to develop a young child’s interest for learning new cultures, came the unavoidable result of rejection to something unfamiliar. While rejection towards foreign concepts is looked down upon in our developed society, it is often viewed as harmless when it comes from an adolescent. Despite these “so-called”, innocent rejections, guiltless refusal is admittedly offensive to those youth who are left with the choice to either their cultural identity or to assimilate into the cultural majority.

How do we get are Cultural Identity? There are many ways that make us who we are, from are decisions we make in life, to whom you have in your life, which can be family, friends, or even strangers that can impact your life. Everyone has their own culture, traditions, and customs which makes us who we are. The reason we get are Cultural Idenity is all based on these few aspects. Some aspects could be on what we do, the disisons we make, where are background comes from and more. Culture means to me a variety of different people from different places that celebrate traditions and customs from their culture.

Why are we born from 2 people, but are not exact copies of our them?why can we have siblings but be completely different than them? There are so many questions on cultural identity and millions of answers. Throughout the course of two months, I have been learning in class, trying to find my cultural identity .

Self-discovery and the formation of one’s identity is an ongoing process that requires reflection of one’s values, behaviors, and the situations he/she experiences. Embarking on a new journey miles away from where I was raised has made a significant contribution to my self-concept and my identity overall. Stone and her colleagues’ (2015) emphasis on transnationalism coincide with the notion that human beings are ever-evolving, especially in regards to one’s cultural development. They argued that one’s identity progression is consistently changing and how he/she may feel about themselves now is not predictive of the transnationalism he/she would feel in the upcoming years (Stone et al., 2005). Thus, taking a step further from the previous self-exploration reflection, this paper aims to review my ethnic background as well as my cultural values and how they may have strengthened or altered since I have been in Saint Louis.

“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind”, a quote from Dr. Suess. I wanted to acknowledge this quote because this inspired me to do my collage. I’m not going to lie, I started my collage later than told because I was having a creative block. I was scrolling through twitter and saw the quote on my timeline. I was motivated by this quote. I was afraid that what I was going to put on my collage would trigger judgement from other people, but this fear faded away once I read the quote. As you may have seen from my collage, I have incorporated just a few of the main objects and people that have shaped my identity. These things are family, culture, religion, social media, gender, and music. Each of these things has generally shaped who I am and who I identify as.

Imagine yourself watching people cross a busy road with speeding cars on every block. What kind of people do you see? Are they with others, or sprinting to safety on the other side? Or do you notice the isolated man on a bench, patiently waiting for cars to slow down? Now the important part: identify the cultural identity of the various people you see. This may be tricky, not knowing what cultural identity is. No matter where you are or what you decided to do in this situation, it makes up a piece of your cultural identity. Every kid, every teenager, every adult - no matter shape and size - has a cultural identity. Cultural identity is a part of why you do what you do; it identifies you as a person in a particular group. A certain religion, a specific class and even types of clothing can be a person’s cultural identity.