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Started 6 months ago by zach
Latest reply from Elemenope

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Francesco
Member

@kessy

Actually, ethnicity and nationality here very often coincide. There is a strong sense of "belonging" to the region you're born in (this may be the result of complete different traditions, languages and so on between relatively close places here).
I live in Rome, and I'm Roman. Some of my friend that live in Rome since they were 12 live in it, but they do not call themselves Roman. I've got parents from the nort Italy, but I'm not part of that culture, while my parents are.
Tradition cannot be carried over if you've never seen the land from where that tradition comes from, and even if you have italian heritage and you're proud of it, you cannot call yourself italian, because you're completly separated from that culture, tradition and people.
Just having parents that are part of a culture doesn't make you part of that culture too.

Posted 6 months ago #
Justice Gustin
Member

I blame snow for irrational Northerners, and Nascar for irrational Southerners. Y'all can just keep that thar snow to youselves.

Posted 6 months ago #
UrsaMinor
Member

I like snow, up to the point where it makes my car hard to find. This year you need not fear that we will export it. So far, nary a flake, and if anything we will be hoarding it when it does arrive.

Posted 6 months ago #
zach
Member

I'd prefer the snow.

Posted 6 months ago #
kessy_athena
Member

@Francesco: Yes, I am well aware. I've had this conversation with European friends several times, and they usually just don't get it. To be blunt, this is why Europe is having so much trouble with its immigrant population these days. Well, one of the reasons, anyway.

Culture is not about geography, it's about people. Traditions are created by the people, not the land. If you were to move to another country, do you seriously think your Italianness would be surgically removed at the border or something? And would you fail to pass that on to your kids? There is nothing about a particular patch of land that makes it a particular nationality. It's strictly the people living on that land. Think about what Italy looked like a few thousand years ago, before the rise of the Roman Republic. You had Celts in the north, Greeks in the south, Etruscans, Latins, Samnites, Umbrians, and so on and so on. In their day, these peoples were all as culturally and nationally and ethnically distinct as Italians, French and Germans today. And yet today, on the exact same land, you have an entirely different nation.

So, for example, the Po Valley and Sicily are culturally quite distinct, right? And yet they are both equally Italian, right? Italian Americans are also culturally distinct from those in Italy, but they're still Italian, too. It's a matter of how you think of yourself, of personal identity. And neither you nor anyone else gets to tell other people who they are. You just don't. And frankly, nobody's going to care if you try. Italian Americans are going to keep calling themselves Italian, and don't really give a damn if you like it or not.

Posted 6 months ago #
kessy_athena
Member

All your snows are belong to us! Mwahahahahahaha!

Posted 6 months ago #
Kodie
Member

Well see the thing to remember is the massive wave of immigration from Italians and some of the other nations of Europe was not 10 generations ago. There is a fierce pride in national identity and culture from one's own grandparents who are usually still alive and well connected to a very large family and neighborhood in the United States. You grow up inside that as well as going to public school probably with other kids who are not in your enclave there. The same thing is true about more recent immigrants. The kids who go to school are assimilated and yet retain culture at home, and that sense of home and family go a long way toward someone deciding to call themselves "Italian" when they've never been to or lived in Italy, or China, or Mexico, or Ireland, or Russia.

America is a weird case. I don't know how migration happens across Eurasia, but I know beyond a certain point, someone is established and changes identity to their current living place. Being an alien, you have no real place that feels like home until you meet with other people. They ask where you're from and you say? I say I'm from New York. People mistake me for Russian a lot which is funny to me. When I was 5 someone (a kid) thought I was Chinese.

All I really know of my immigrant ancestors is they came here. I don't know why they decided to when they did, well another great-grandfather was coming to visit another relative and fell in love (according to a eulogy) with a woman from the same country (well her parents were, she may have been born US), and this is where it is weird. He was only supposed to stay for 6 months, but as soon as he decided to stay, he was very insistent of her to speak English all the time. I have no culture from that line either because my great-grandfather was all about assimilating, blending in, not being noticeably from outside the US.

I have two other mysteries - one was here a lot longer but some people insist I am the nationality of my last name - the one that was US the longest. That is one quarter and already "mixed"*. My grandmother also doesn't have any stories. She knows they just worked very hard and didn't have time to think about this silly bullshit. It's a luxury that we're asking questions of the oldest living generations of our families, to know where we came from. Her answer is basically "not that important." We worked very hard and didn't have time to think about it. Which is basically how I feel about it most of the time.

*Which brings it full circle - I estimate from the last name of my great-grandmother that I may be part Cornish, so yeah! Cornish-American! What does my flag look like and how do I hang it out the window of my apartment?

Posted 6 months ago #
Noelle
Member

I always figured Southerners were sore at us for sending them our elderly during the winter months.

Posted 6 months ago #
Noelle
Member

Francesco, the thing about Americans is that they will often identify or mention their immigrant ancestors' origins. Even though in my family the most recent European ancestors came over in the early-mid 1800s, we still know that we have mostly German and English backgrounds. We tend to use it to explain things like temperament, even if it's not a real reason. Like how we say that red-heads have bad tempers and blondes are dumb, even though hair color has nothing to do with it.

For example, I blame my English ancestry on not liking people hugging or touching me or talking to me when I'm not in the mood. I also blame my dry sense of humor on it. I blame the German parts on my bluntness, need for precision, and the need to be punctual for everything even if it's not all that important. But in reality, those traits can belong to anyone anywhere.

And Custy, nice thread derailment.

Posted 6 months ago #
Theory_of_I
Member

Francesco-

I agree. For most people, especially after a few generations, all there is is hearsay of what it may have been like in the old country. Without experiencing traditions first hand and living within cultural attitudes as they are or were, one can not 'know' what any of that really is. With very few exceptions, what's left here (US) is at best a bastardisation of oft repeated stories and artificial role playing of what is thought to be appropriate cultural behavior.

Posted 6 months ago #
Francesco
Member

@Theory_of_I : that's exactly what I was talking about. even if someone feels italian, your tradition will probably be (at best) heavily edulcorated, and it's more than possible that they won't be actually recognizable by other people.

Posted 6 months ago #
kessy_athena
Member

Cultures are always evolving and changing, Francesco, that's simply their nature. That doesn't make one branch more "real" then another. You're right that the culture of Italian Americans has changed quite a bit since they left Italy, let's say in the late 19th century. So has yours.

Posted 6 months ago #
Kodie
Member

Italian-ness is modified by being in another culture. It's not the same as being Italian. And then Kessy is right here. Are you more Italian than my great-grandfather when he moved to New York in 1890s? How does something like culture "wear off" when you move? It doesn't. It can be modified as one adapts to a different culture, as happened with my other great-grandfather - for him, assimilation was a priority. Then again, Scandinavians are not exactly outcast minorities like Italians or Irish at that time. Immigrants who make a home in a very Italian "section" of a city, where they can retain their customs and not be bothered by their Anglo landlords and people calling them names, where they can ask for goods at a store in their language and the shopkeeper understands. I don't know if "customs" are a distinct thing - Italy has a variety of traditions depending on regions, just like the US has. Italian Americans in New York are different than ones in Dallas or Denver or Washington, DC. That's actually fascinating. European political borders have some effect, while regions, say "Mediterranean" has customs that are more akin - it can get hard to tell where a food is from, for instance.

I was thinking about the North End, the Italian section of Boston. I used to live there and it is different than the rest of Boston. They had fruit stands and butchers and stuff. Old-fashioned stuff they don't have in the regular city, what I would say - a normal butcher, every day. It is not some kind of fascinating archaic hipster butchery revival specialty shop. You know what I'm getting at? Italians even in the US a few generations, do have some interest in retaining a culture that is not identical to the US more generically - is there a Starbucks there? Yeah, but the better coffee shop is not interested in being foofy and specialty - it is just there like a normal thing, or at least that is the illusion they provide. That illusion is that whatever you see on travel shows through Europe is boring to them, but special to us. We go there as a curiosity and they go there to get a cup of coffee or meat or bread or dinner. Something we can all relate to is a distinct attitude between a tourist and a townie. Italian-Americans are townies in their own village and the rest of Americans are tourists when we go there.

I don't know does that sound racist? It feels more racist when I think the same thing about how it is in Chinatown. Or how things are in a ghetto amount to a culture but not a quaint one.

Posted 6 months ago #
kessy_athena
Member

No, Kodie, it's not racist. There's nothing wrong with appreciating the differences we all have. My feeling is that racism is when you make a value judgement that a particular group is bad or inferior as a whole, and that all or almost all members of that group are that way.

Posted 6 months ago #
Custador
Moderator

I don't think it even has to be negative, I think it just has to do with pre judging individuals based on a stereotype about their race. For ecample: All black men have big penises, all black women have big buttocks, all Scots can drink like fish, all Germans love David Hasselhof... All racist presumptions, but none of them implying inferiority.

Posted 6 months ago #
Kodie
Member

More to see and do in New York.

Posted 6 months ago #
Elemenope
Moderator

I am reminded of an earlier conversation.

Posted 6 months ago #
blotonthelandscape
Member

Boo Custy! London is great! Well, working here and living in the Kentish countryside is. Wales can get stoubhd :D

Posted 6 months ago #
zach
Member

"Boo Custy!" is not allowed on this thread. ;)

Posted 6 months ago #
blotonthelandscape
Member

Fine. Boo Zach!

Posted 6 months ago #
Kodie
Member

I'm disappointed.

Posted 6 months ago #
Noelle
Member

I love NY. Upstate is beautiful. NYC is a blast, and I'm not a city girl. Times Square all lit up like a Christmas tree every night is dazzling. There's that rush and shear volume of people, all walking with purpose to wherever it is they're going. It all seems so foreign to me whenever I visit, but in a nice way. My children raised in the quiet woods outside a small town are enchanted by this busy place of skyscrapers and huge toystores and gelato in Central Park.

You ever come to NY, Custy, and we'll find someone to show you around.

Posted 6 months ago #
kessy_athena
Member

@Custy: You have a good point about that sort of stereotyping. For me personally, the word "racism" implies some degree of negativity, and I would use a different word for that sort of thing. That could just be me, though.

Posted 6 months ago #
Kodie
Member

It's racist to think all Asians are good at math. They are not really as good at math as they are at academics and the cultural attitude toward excelling at everything they do (which includes math), but that's probably racist too. Math is just a magic trick to white people, so they don't tend to notice what else Asians might be good at.

Posted 6 months ago #
Elemenope
Moderator

Math is just a magic trick to white people, so they don't tend to notice what else Asians might be good at.

A little warning next time when you're going to be this funny. I nearly aspirated my chili.

Posted 6 months ago #

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