Dear Children of Immigrants,
I write the following letter as a persuasive piece on the benefits of embracing your heritage. I know many of us sometimes feel embarrassed, or even angry, at our parents’ culture, but maybe I can convince you of why having a couple of identities to pull from isn’t such a bad thing after all. Let’s start with my story as a child of immigrants:
“Richard! Vai lavar os pratos!” my mother yelled.
“One second! I can’t pause o jogo, it’s online!”
“Nao me importa, vai la!” she responded.
This was a common exchange between my mother and I growing up; her telling me to wash the dishes while I was playing a game, me painfully arguing that the game was online and so I couldn’t pause it, and her not very much caring. But you may have noticed this exchange isn’t in English, in fact, it isn’t even in just one language. My mother is Brazilian and, so, speaks Portuguese as her first language. And although she has a pretty good, but not excellent, grasp on
the English language, she pretty much exclusively talks to me in Portuguese. I, on the other hand, have a pretty good but not excellent grasp on the Portuguese language, and growing up it was even worse. And so, with my mediocre Portuguese and her being able to understand English, I spoke to her in Portingles (or Portenglish).
The trifecta of English, Portuguese, and Portenglish was ever present in our home, even with my white Canadian-born stepfather who had not one lick of Portuguese or Brazilian blood in his body, but could speak the language after decades of traveling and interacting with Brazilians. Yes, languages flowed freely in my house, and even though some days, one might wrestle over the others for dominance. All in all, I lived in an environment with a balanced mix of languages.
Today, I’m very grateful that I was fortunate enough to grow up in a multilingual home, which is why it saddens me that I used to think so little of it, disregarding my mother’s tongue as a second thought—something not especially useful in my life outside of the house and certainly not something worth delving deeper. I only realized how terribly mistaken I was after coming to the United States and meeting more Brazilians whom I was able to befriend because of our shared heritage and language. I found that commonality led to connection and this extended beyond the relatively small community of Brazilians in Long Island; because of my background as a child of immigrants and as a multilingual person, I was able to form bonds with people from widely different situations than me. I’m not sure if I would’ve had the same ability to relate to them had I not been raised the way I was.
This is why it pains me to see children of immigrants reject or undermine their parents’ or grandparents’ culture, and this occurs especially often with children of immigrants whose ancestral cultures do not have a strong community in the country or region they find themselves in. These people can feel like their heritage is “weird” or too foreign for their new country, when that couldn’t be farther from the truth.
Since I, myself, have experienced how multiculturalism and multilingualism can benefit a person’s life in both the empathetic and the personal, I know how much impact embracing your heritage can really have. Having these different foundations to draw from allows a person to view aspects of life in a variety of ways, not only through one lens or the other, but through a combination of all of them and those of the people they can connect with because of their foundation. The experience held by children of immigrants is wholly unique, precious, and invariably useful.
Sincerely,
Anonymous Author
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