New Cultural Spaces Of India Essay

It has been one year since I made a bold movement to come out to my mom as pansexual. Just to clarify, that does not mean I’m attracted to “pans” ,as in the one I could go to my kitchen and pull out. Pansexual, as defined in the dictionary, means to “not be limited in sexual choice regarding biological sex, gender, or gender identity”. Now, I may not be the best at explaining certain situations too in depth, but if I were to rate my most emotional moments in my entire lifetime, then my coming out story would most definitely rank number one. Without further ado, I present to you the most personal moment that I have ever experienced.

As the youngest south Asian girl in a family with traditional values expanding my understandings of social value and public health to race, ethnicity and sexuality is an exciting process. I am now studying my master at the University of Manchester in Gender, Sexuality and Culture. My ambition to gain more knowledge of the power systems of complex identities and social value has grown over the years at university. My interest in social value and public health studies arose from my research from my undergraduate degree at Coventry University. Exploring and challenging current cultural identities, in particular, those of ethnicity has been a personal interest of mine throughout my further education. My undergraduate dissertation explored the history of India and Hinduism and how the homophobic attitudes have affected British Asian attitudes in the Hindu community. Since my undergraduate dissertation, I am now exploring how men’s mental health is now in the process of de-stigmatization.

The privilege to move to California has exposed me to many different cultures. This has allowed me to grow in many ways. The opportunity to listen and learn was there for the taking and I indulged. I now live in a neighborhood filled with people much different from myself My children's classrooms are filled with people from around the globe.  I also have a diverse group of friends that I very much enjoy and spend time with.

Being born and raised in San Antonio, Texas, I was exposed to many different cultures. A few of which were Hispanics and German. They both had different languages and customs. My mom would take us to a festival in San Antonio yearly that was called the “Texas Folklife Festival”. There, our family would experience many different cultures with singing, dancing, food, art, and language. Our family enjoyed learning about the different places others came from and how they celebrated their heritage. Learning to appreciate where others came from and their back ground, gave me a better appreciation for differences.

I was born and raised in Texas where everything is Texas sized and everyone says y'all. I am an Asian American whose parents both came from Vietnam at a young age. I was soon to be molded and developed by them and my community to where I became culturally diverse. I was moved along schools which helped me build character. I also have developed into a very athletic and intelligent person due to all my friends and family helping me to reach this state.

Living in the United States shaped my character. When I was young my family moved from refugee. In the beginning life was tough getting adjusted to the american life. At a young age I understood that some people looked down upon me because of my background. I had a hard time getting along with other students because of cultural clash. After a while I was able to understand the American culture. My mom was a single parent with six other children and the only place we could find to live in was a neighborhood that was not safe. My mother would never allow us to go outside because she was afraid that we would get in trouble. It was not until college that I was able to understand all I was missing out in the world.

I knew it would be a challenging for my family to accept me being gay. Being the only gay male in the family was not as easy as it sounded in my head. I decided to wait for the “right time”. As years passed, it took a toll out of

from Haiti, raised me in a very multi-cultural household. I was exposed to the world through

Having grown up in two very different countries impacted my life in a way I never imagined and it opened up my eyes and made me appreciate what I grew up with even more.

Sometimes I question if culture changes who you are. I try to pull up memories of the decisions I make, are they affected by my culture? Here is the response I came up with: Culture sporadically informs how an individual sees the world because, even being from completely different places and raised in contrasting households, people could still have similar views based on what they think of others and not how you are constructed with your culture, however, sometimes affects your perspective in certain occasions in circumstances where you wouldn’t face a community the same if you weren’t from the culture you were built in. This idea is supported by the personal essay by Bharati Mukherjee, Two Ways to Belong in America, the essay by Robert Lake, An Indians Father Plea, and also personal experience.

Growing up in New York City and attending public school my whole life gave me the opportunity to grow up in a diverse environment which in turn has helped to broaden my perspective socially and culturally. These experiences allowed me at a young age to become friends with other immigrants and people whose culture, ethnicity, religion, and experiences were completely different from my own. Friends have taught me things like cultural norms and what is and isn't acceptable in other religions. Another experience that I that changed my perspective was taking the career pathway biomedical science because it helped me see academic courses in a different way. It showed me that school wasn't only tests, solving math problems, and writing essays. In

Vanita, Ruth. Queering India: Same-Sex Love and Eroticism in Indian Culture and Society. New York: Routledge, 2002.

I grew up in a small city called Dhaka in Bangladesh. Living in a country where the population density is around one thousand people per square kilometer, you are bound to socialize and interact with people from every class and every religion. These interactions helped me to build up my characters and to make me the person I am today.

India is described as a country which is “a Unity is Diversity” because it is comprised of a wide variety of individuals who belong to different religions, speak different languages, practice different traditions, have different castes, worship different gods, wear different clothing, and eat different foods. Although India is comprised of all these different individuals and their diverse traits and practices, these individuals live together in peace and harmony in India.

When I think of India I think of such a dry desert place. Two months ago that was not the case for a specific area in India. Chennai, India had terrible flooding that put a halt to transportation, and some people lost their houses including everything that was inside of them. This natural disaster took place near the end of last year. The week of November 15th Chennai and its suburbs received on again off again rainfall that lasted almost an entire week. Very similar situation on November 23rd. At the beginning of November, the Chennai reservoirs were empty, but by the end of November they were at their max limit. Some houses were already taken over by water. Rain continued to fall the first part of December causing more issues for