Learning how to show courtesy and respect to people from mixed cultures
A BYU–Hawaii professor and students from mixed cultural backgrounds stressed the importance of understanding the concept of liminal space and avoiding categorization. They said being aware of microaggressions is a practice of showing courtesy when interacting with people who have diverse cultures.
Understanding microaggressions
Keila Faaootoa, who is half Samoan and half American, explained people of mixed heritage like her are called “afatasi,” meaning half-caste or half of one. Faaootoa, a freshman majoring in political science from Utah, added, “That is what it’s called in Polynesian culture when you’re half, and I hate it.”
She said children who grew up being labeled as half of something usually identify strongly with one or the other. “You’re too much of one to belong fully to another. So I feel like I identify a lot as Samoan, but I’m very fair so I look palagi,” she shared.
According to Faaootoa, microaggressions are prevalent in daily conversations. “Comments like ‘Oh, you’re really white’ or ‘Oh, you’re Polynesian? That’s weird.’ Lots of little things are inherently racist but come off innocent because of ignorance,” she added.
Andrew Limobong, a writer for the NPR website, described microaggressions as subtle, everyday instances of racism, homophobia and sexism that are expressed as gestures, comments or insults.
Dr. AnnaMarie Christiansen, an associate professor in the Faculty of Arts & Letters who is Italian and Maori, said she experienced microaggressions from outside the community she identifies with and those in it. “We didn’t really have a word for it back then. It was based on internalized expectations that people try as much as possible to align to a Western ideal of beauty or economic power,” she added.
Having fair skin, dark eyes and dark hair makes one not readily identifiable as one thing or another, said Christiansen. “Sometimes in places I’d go to the U.S., people would speak Spanish to me because it’s their expectation when they look at me. When I lived in Idaho about 20 years ago, that happened quite a bit,” she shared.
She said she called this experience, “liminal space.” She explained, “[It’s] the gray area. No one could really figure out who I was, and when I was younger, I thought that was a big problem. I was uncomfortable with people not knowing who I was, and on the other hand, I also felt like it’s not my business to educate people about me.” Christiansen continued, “So the liminal space can be liberating because I get to choose who I am, and what and how I want to represent myself. No one else does.”
Enough with categorizing
Jaron Narayan, an Indian-American junior majoring in business management from Colorado, said he didn’t know a lot of children who looked like him when he was younger. “In Colorado, it was mostly white or Hispanic kids. We didn’t have many Polynesians or Indians and not many mixed people. I felt a little out of place because there wasn’t really anybody similar to me ethnically,” he shared.
He said his father is South Indian but grew up in Fiji. “On the Indian side, we ate a lot of rice and curry with our hands. From the Fijian side, it was cassava and taro. And from my mom’s side, we had American food.”
A mixed person typically tries to be more like whatever the dominant race is from where that person is at the time, according to Narayan. “Back home, I catered more to the white, mainland majority, but now that I am here [at BYUH], I can express more of my Indian background. There’s a lot more people who look like me. I feel a lot more free to express myself,” he added.
Narayan said he served his mission in Washington for 10 months and served the rest of his mission in Bangalore, India. “I looked like the people, but I did not have the same background or experiences. People would see me and go, ‘Oh, you’re north Indian,’ but I wasn’t,” he said.
“I felt like I didn’t fit in with them at first, but I also felt like I didn’t fit in with the Americans,” said Narayan. The Americans he served with expected he had a prior understanding of the culture and the place already, he shared.
He advised people to become open-minded and stop categorizing people of mixed cultures, sharing, “People who are mixed grew up with different ethnicities so their identity is going to be mixed between those. People don’t really know what the mix is exactly. Just let them express themselves however they want.”
Reconnecting with culture
Sophia Calderon, a half Mexican and half American freshman from Utah majoring in political science and TESOL, said she struggled with her cultural identity the most on her mission. She said, “I felt like I did not relate to other Latinos because they couldn’t understand me.”
Calderon recounted, “At one point, I questioned how come I couldn’t just be white or just Mexican. I had to be both. I think people nowadays emphasize where we grow up. We don’t choose those things.”
Calderon said her dad is from North Mexico and her mom is from California, but they divorced when she was 4. “My mom was the one who raised us. I did feel disconnected from my heritage growing up. But I wouldn’t say I didn’t have a culture because I definitely did but maybe not so much of Latin culture,” she explained.
Calderon said her mom always showed appreciation for her father’s cultural background. “She learned how to cook Mexican food from my father’s mother. But she did have her own twists with the food,” she added.
Calderon said her mother always wanted her to explore both sides of her heritage. “That is why I like it when people ask me about both of my heritages. Because for me, I have love and appreciation for both,” she said.
On her mission in Scottsdale, Arizona, and San Jose, Costa Rica, Calderon shared her struggle. “I was 19 when I left. I was inspired by my mom and my older sister who served. I was in a place talking to people in a language I was still learning, and I felt insecure. I realized I wasn’t just a representative of Jesus Christ, I was also a representative of my culture. But what culture did I grow up in?”
Reflecting on her struggles with the Spanish language, she shared, “I grew fond of the older woman we were teaching because I had spent a lot of time with her in the previous transfer.” However, she said she felt out of place, adding, “My Nicaraguan companion seemed to connect with her more, not only because of the time they spent together, but also their shared cultural background, while I often felt like the outsider as the American.”
Growing into adulthood helped Calderon gain more appreciation for her culture, she said. “I realized I needed to stop with this victim mentality that I had and take control of what I know now about my culture. I learned so many things here already and am still continuing to build my own cultural identity that revolves around BYUH’s diversity,” she shared.