Christina

Dear Cultural Identity,

This past experience in Beijing - as well as every other time that I’ve visited China - has really made me think about what you are. Is culture something we are born with, something we grow up in, or a mixture of both? I ask this question because, as an adopted Chinese American, this is not something that is easily answered. I feel a strong pull to both cultures, because I am physically and biologically “Chinese”, while my upbringing has made me psychologically “American”.

My parents exposed me to a lot of Chinese culture while I was growing up, and I am very thankful for that. I learned the language, celebrated the various holidays with other adopted girls, and many other things. But when I visited the small town of Anshan, China between my sophomore and junior years of high school, on a State Department study abroad program, I came to realize that I might not have been as “Chinese” as I thought. This was not the first time I had felt like this, though. The town I live and go to school in has a pretty large Chinese population. Everyone would call me “banana” or “Twinkie”, because I was “white on the inside”. This never really offended or bothered me because I understood it simply as an observation. However, the more I heard it, and the more I processed it, the more difficult the concept became to understand. What made me “white” on the inside, and not “Chinese”? Was it because my parents were American? To this, I said no - we were not your typical barbequeing, football-loving, quintessential “all-American” family.

However, some of the cultural workshops during class have made me re-question what being “American” or “Chinese” really means. Our country is without a doubt a melting pot of cultural identities. Although China is not as ethnically diverse, I think that Chinese citizens would all have different definitions of who a “Chinese” person is, just as Americans all define “being American” differently.

Ultimately, cultural identity, I don’t think that you have a true definition. On the surface, the idea of identity is something meant to categorize and organize certain people in certain groups. However, I disagree with this. You are fluid and flexible, and it is up to the individual to define what you are to them - and I am perfectly fine with never having to decide which identity I am.

Sincerely,

Christina