RE: brushing shoulders with Holden Caulfield?

I never thought of identity as things but people. We speak Spanish because
WE speak Spanish. I do not see your point on restriction. I don't know
about your experience about established communities, but I saw very little
restrictions. In fact a few cousins went on off to do some odd things and
they are always welcomed by the family. My brother had a signed record
contract doing some pretty heavy rock, many of my relatives didn't care for
his music but they were proud of his success.

I find it interesting that you are defined predominately by your reading. I
am too to a lesser extant but I consider myself defined by my relationships
and my choices. It seems in that show those kids were defined by their
money and maybe that is why they feared losing it as John alluded to.
Daniel

There are advantages/disadvantages to the "new society" vs. the
"established society." "Everyone knowing their place" can be pretty
restrictive, but at the same time there's a kind of certainty and
security that comes along with that too, as well as a clear self
definition. "No one having a place" allows for a much more open
horizon, but also fails to provide any sense of self other than what
individual create for themselves. I'm 100% Puerto Rican (whatever that
means), but that never meant a whole lot to me. I always saw myself as
creating my identity from the books I read. My kids, now, growing up
without a specific ethnic identity, want to recover theirs. So they're
learning Spanish and wear the goucho shirts, etc. :). It's pretty funny.

The families I grew up around didn't fail to maintain their distinct
ethnic identity, whether they were Scots, Irish, Mexican, Puerto Rican,
Korean, Chinese, or African American (all these families lived on the
same street I did). My close Irish friend visited God's country every
summer and his family always managed to sneak back a few good pints of
the real stuff from over there, for example.

My main observation in the essay I posted is that the multicultural
ideal hardly solves any problems -- in fact, it just creates different
ones. I think the root problems need to be addressed some other way.

Jim
-
* Unsubscribing? Mail majordomo@roughdraft.org with the message
* UNSUBSCRIBE BANANAFISH
Received on Wed Oct 29 13:24:19 2003