Despite having pride with either being labeled a Guinean, Guinean-American, African American, black American, or simply American, each label does not satisfactorily summize my identify, supported by the rejection I face from people who can adequately identify as one of these ethnicities. To exemplify, we shall examine examine my identity as “Guinean.” While my parents were born and raised in Guinea, continue to uphold their Guinean culture in America, while rejecting black American culture, and have raised my brothers and I in accordance to the Guinean culture, I have never visited Guinea, nor have I any tangible ties to the nation. Similar to the Haitian American college students interviewed in Chapter 7 of Georges Woke Up Laughing by …show more content…
Unlike many African Americans who attend church on Sundays, I attend Jummah on Friday’s and attend Eid festivities with Guineans around New York City, as well as carry myself the way Guinean females are raised: with a certain degree of modesty and reservation. In addition, due to my Guinean background, West-African name, and clear, modulated English, I am also an outsider to my neighbors in Brownsville currently, and was teased as a child. My drive and motivation to achieve the American Dream, especially for the sake of parents, in Brownsville, an inner-city African American, is seen as an affront to their perceptions of blackness. Many of my neighbors have confessed that they believe that “I am too good” or “act white.” However, despite this, when I am faced with racism or acts of white supremacy, I feel emboldened to act, where I do not call upon my Guinean identity. In those moments, I especially identify with the African- American identity. I feel a dire responsibility to assist African-American in my community, more so than I feel a responsibility to help my family members in Guinea. In all, when asked about my identity, I respond with, “My parents are from Guinea, but I was born in America.” I am comfortable, and again, proud to identify as a Guinean-American, despite the challenges with identifying as either. This conflict is drawn upon, once again, in Georges Woke Up Laughing where Schiller and Fouron
Approximately 90 percent of Haitians are Catholic and 10 % are Protestant (Jacobson, 2003). Within the Haitian-American community, however, Voodoo exists side by side with Christian faiths. Jacobson goes on to explain that “many Haitians see no contradiction in calling themselves Christians while engaging in Voodoo practices” (2003). In Haiti, Catholicism is highly ritualistic and religious practices combine the ancient rituals of African-based cultures with Western-based faith practices. Jacobson explains that “Voodoo cosmology is made up of a large numbers of supernatural spirits…these spirits are believed to have great influence on human beings and for that reason, they must be respected” (2003).
The Haitian Revolution was one of the most important slave revolts in Latin American history. It started a succession of other revolutionary wars in Latin America and ended both colonialism and imperialism in the Americas. The Haitian Revolution affected people from all social castes in Haiti including the indigenous natives, mestizos, mulattos and the Afro-Latin. The idea of starting a rebellion against France began with the colony’s white elite class seeking a capitalist market. These elites in the richest mining and plantation economies felt that the European governments were limiting their growth and restricting free trades. However, the Afro-Latin, mestizos and mulattos turned the Haitian Revolution into a war for equality and built a new state. The Haitian Revolution, with the support of it large slave population and lower class citizens, eliminated slavery and founded the Republic of Haiti. Tin this essay I will discuss how mestizos, mulattos and the Afro-Latin Americans population in Haiti participate in the fight for independence and how they creation of new republics.
Everyone is raised within a culture with a set of customs and morals handed down by those generations before them. Most individual’s view and experience identity in different ways. During history, different ethnic groups have struggled with finding their place within society. In the mid-nineteen hundreds, African Americans faced a great deal of political and social discrimination based on the tone of their skin. After the Civil Rights Movement, many African Americans no longer wanted to be identified by their African American lifestyle, so they began to practice African culture by taking on African hairdos, African-influenced clothing, and adopting African names. By turning away from their roots, many African Americans embraced a culture that was not inherited, thus putting behind the unique and significant characteristics
During clinical time in the nursing program there are many opportunities for students to explore their new found nursing skills. While engaging in patient care responsibilities there are many languages, customs, values, lifestyles, beliefs, and behaviors that will differ from their own. Each patient may need healthcare providers to consider certain aspects in order to provide culturally competent care. There are many cultures that have migrated to the United States over the years including the people of Haiti. There are many aspects of their healthcare ideals that may need to be considered while providing healthcare in the hospital setting. This cultural assessment will consider the healthcare matters of an 81-year-old woman on the
As of 2015 the U.S Census Bureau revealed that approximately 116 million families are living in the United States. These families possess their own unique style, culture and set of beliefs. My family, consisting of my married parents and my older sister, are no different in the aspect that we too hold our own set of beliefs. The socially constructed term ‘family’ traditionally is defined as a unit that is related by marriage or blood, share financial responsibilities and care for any children/dependents (Lofquist et al., 2012). Growing up as a Haitian American, my ideas of what it means to be a family have been greatly influenced by my cultures and my religion. The Haitian culture greatly emphasizes family relationships and familial
On the very first day of the class, Introduction to the Black Experience, we learned that people are defined by their culture and geography. We are also defined by the gaze of others and our own gaze. This realization led me to contemplate what the “black experience” means to me. As a first generation Haitian-American woman at Wellesley College, it has become clearer to me how important the language and culture of parents has been in shaping my identity. I have also begun to think more critically about how my identity as a woman of color separates me from black brothers as well as my white peers at Wellesley.
We 're all Haitian in my family. It 's not a big family, but we 're happy when we are together. My parents are very strict, I could say that it 's in our culture, but not all Haitian parents are strict. It 's just the way Haitians are. Heritage? I don 't think I have that in my family, except soils, animals like ducks, donkey, cow, and houses my grand-grandfather left before he died, but we don 't care that much. They 're not that important because all they bring is trouble to families. Education was always priority number one for my mother, and all my life I 've been influenced by a wonderful and lovely person, who has a big role in me going to college pursuing a higher education.
The Unites States is a true melting pot of ethnicities and cultures. For many members of minority groups a certain hybridity is readily adopted, but for others, cultural assimilation can be quite difficult. Chicana author, Sandra Cisneros described this phenomenon as “always straddling two countries… but not belonging to either culture” (Doyle. 54). African American author, Alice Walker shared Cisneros’ sentiment, but focused her attention on the assimilation of black cultures and subcultures within the United States. Cisneros and Walker make the same poignant statement about the strains of cultural assimilation, with reconciliation of split identities as the goal, in their respective works, 1991’s “Woman Hollering Creek,” and 1973’s “Everyday Use,” yet their unique ethnic perspectives allow them to make it in surprisingly different ways.
Marcus Garvey, a ‘proponent of Black Nationalism and Pan-Africanism movements” (), once stated that “a people without knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots.” (Good Reads Quotes) He was in fact very much so right. Most people in this world care about where they come from, who they descended from and where the backbone of their identity lies. Have you ever wondered why almost most orphans tend to look for their family lines or go out in search of where they belong? It is with this very essence my quest to look for answers and investigate about two very distinct yet similar groups. The groups I examine throughout this paper are Africans and African-Americans. What I seek to find out is why two very ‘distinct’ yet similar groups of people fail to see eye to eye, judging from the fact that Africans and African-Americans look alike, originated from Africa and their histories and culture somehow intertwine with each other. The main question here really is: what are the factors that hinder the relationship between Africans and African-American people.
The cause and effects of the Haitian Revolution have played, and continue to play, a major role in the history of the Caribbean. During the time of this rebellion, slavery was a large institution throughout the Caribbean. The success of the sugar and other plantations was based on the large slave labor forces. Without these forces, Saint Domingue, the island with the largest sugar production, and the rest of the Caribbean, would face the threat of losing a profitable industry.
It leaves me in a confused and constant state of limbo because, at school, some may see my hair and facial features, and correctly conclude that I am not their definition of an “African-American.” Yet in the eyes of my Kenyan and East African community, I am not a true Kenyan and can be greeted subordinately as a mzungu, or outsider, because I was not born in Kenya; I have not yet stepped foot on Kenyan soil; and I do not speak
Haiti was once the first black independent republic in the world and the richest island in the Caribbean. Today Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and one of the poorest countries in the world. What could have happened to Haiti in almost two hundred years of history? The country experienced repeated civil war and foreign intervention. Haiti is not isolated from the international world. Thus, it was not out of concern for ordinary Haitians that the United States intervened in Haiti. It was out of concern for profit and stability within the United States' own backyard. The purpose of this paper is to show the negative aspect that the United States had played in the government of Haiti.
Haiti has long been known for its major export of Haitian migrants in search of a better way of life. It is an exodus that goes back several decades, however with recent times the numbers have increased dramatically. In fact, that numbers of Haitians fleeing Haiti in the early 1990's far exceeds the numbers recorded in earlier years. Between 1972- 1979, some 8,000- 10,000 Haitians arrived in the United States. Compare this number with the 14,443 Haitians interdicted between September 30, 1991 - January 1, 1992. By early 1994, this number totaled over 41,000 (Report on the Situation of Human Rights in Haiti, 1994). Economic deprivation has always been the predominant influence for the migrating of Haitians, yet in the
On October 9, Penn IUR and the Department of Africana Studies hosted an Urban Book talk with Onoso Imoagene, Assistant Professor of Sociology, on her book, Beyond Expectations: Second-Generation Nigerians in the United States and Britain. The book examines the multifaceted identities of second-generation Nigerian adults in the United State and Britain. After interviewing over 150 people, Imoagene argues that second-generation Nigerians compose an alternative notion of “black” identity that is different from an African American or Black Caribbean notion. These apprehensible distinctions represent both group’s complex relationships on questions of self identity, as well as ethnic and class consciousness.
When studying the black diaspora within the United States, the story typically starts with the classic slave narratives including those of Frederick Douglass and Mary Price and ends with the affirmative action decisions of the late 1990s. History tells the story of an internal racial identity struggle through the institutions of slavery and oppression, resistance and rebellion, cultural reawakening and civil rights which evokes the question: what does it mean to be African American? Aaron McGruder’s animated series The Boondocks creates a context to consider the question of what it means to be an African American today and discusses the institutions that are now molding the African American identity. McGruder criticizes the idea of a